Iger: ABC News Must Adapt to Digital World

Disney President and CEO Speaks at Newhouse School Media Breakfast

By Marisa Guthrie -- Broadcasting & Cable, 4/8/2008 6:22:00 PM

ABC News is “disadvantaged” in a digital landscape where cable news operations including CNN and MSNBC are helping to drive billions of users to their online sites, said Bob Iger, president and CEO of Disney, parent company of ABC.

In a fragmented media landscape where news consumers continue to migrate to the Web, a prominent digital footprint is necessary for survival. For traditional media businesses including newspapers and broadcast-news divisions like ABC News and CBS News, the quest for digital relevance is especially acute.

“ABC News is disadvantaged in that regard,” Iger said, referring to the network’s lack of a cable presence in driving digital traffic. For ABCNews.com, he added, the key will be “better content.”

“It does put more pressure on ABC News to be better at it,” he said, noting that many top news sites, including the Huffington Post, have achieved market share without a television arm.

ABCNews.com recorded record traffic in March with 207 million page views, according to the network. That was up 44% compared with the same time last year and caps four consecutive months of growth.

Fueled by a particularly volatile and unusual Democratic primary contest between Sens. Barack Obama (Ill.) and Hillary Clinton (N.Y.), the politics section was up over 100%. But other Web components -- including Brian Ross’ The Blotter (274%) and the money (231%) and health (131%) sections -- showed even more significant growth.

CNN.com had 1.8 billion page views and 37 million unique visitors in February, according to Nielsen Online. MSNBC.com posted its own record earlier this year, logging 1.4 billion page views and 94 million unique users in January.

Iger’s comments at a Newhouse School media breakfast Tuesday came in the midst of a resurgence of long-simmering rumors of an expense-sharing merge between CNN and CBS News.

On Monday, The New York Times reported that Sean McManus, president of CBS News and CBS Sports, was spearheading the negotiations but that any deal was some time away.

The network officially disavowed the talks. “We're extremely satisfied with and proud of our newsgathering operation,” CBS News spokeswoman Sandra Genelius said. “No outside arrangements are being negotiated.”

(Iger quipped that ABC News was offered such a deal with CNN years ago and turned it down because the company had no interest in "outsourcing" its news.)

ABC News has been exploring digital partnerships. But a recent alliance with social-networking site Facebook, which claims 56 million users, has not been a game-changer for ABC News.

“I think the people at ABC News control their own destiny,” Iger said. “The need for old media to adapt is incredibly keen these days, critical actually. I don’t know if ABC News will get there or not, but they’re going to try very hard with the significant support of the company.”