On Tuesday, News Corp Australia announced the launch of the first dedicated commerce content destination on a major news publishing site: news.com.au checkout.
The Australian answer to sites such as NY Times’ Wirecutter, WSJ’s Buy Side, and CNN’s Underscored, news.com.au checkout will address both the needs of clients and consumers.
The recommendation and review platform is now live, bringing answers to Aussies as they try to navigate the never-ending amount of options out there.
Ahead of the launch, Mediaweek spoke with News Corp’s director of e-commerce, Adam Kron, and managing director client product, Pippa Leary.
The platform hasn’t appeared out of thin air, with the team working on it behind the scenes for the last two years. The inspiration for news.com.au checkout came after it became clear that changes in the way people shop post-COVID were here to stay.
Leary: “On a macro level, we all saw that explosion of e-commerce shopping over COVID, we saw an explosion of marketplaces, we saw an explosion of choice. What we ended up with was the Endless Aisle, it became incredibly overwhelming.
“The next thing that really happened in COVID was that people really got into doing all their research before they buy either online or offline, that’s now become a habit. With this explosion of choices and this drive to research, there’s been a natural gap and need in the market for editorially independent and trusted reviews.”
Whilst there are already product review sites out there in the world, news.com.au checkout stands out in the fact that it’s completely Australian-based and aimed at Aussie consumers.
Kron: It’s a trend that started with Amazon’s arrival, and they obviously bring a large amount of global products to the Australian market. There’s a lot of editorial content out there, but a lot of that isn’t specifically designed for what’s being offered here, and isn’t specifically designed to service the Australian market.
“Servicing that research stage of the journey, specifically tailored for the Australian market, is becoming more important and more useful to the consumer than ever.”
Living in such a globalised world means that Australians can connect with commerce from every corner of the globe at the touch of a button. Despite this, there are some standout factors that the News Corp team have had to consider when creating an Australian-centric platform.
Kron: “One of the main things is SEO. A lot of it is really looking at what consumers are actually looking for in the Australian market – we do a lot of keyword research and a lot of research on the topics and the products that people are researching.
“Really understanding what the Australian consumer is looking at and what they need help with has been core to how we plan the type of content that we’re bringing to market.”
For brands working with News Corp Australia, the news.com.au checkout platform offers what Kron calls “an opportunity to be seen and found at the research stage of the funnel.”
Kron: “For brands, this is a really unique opportunity. It’s an expert editorial environment as part of a really trusted news site, it provides credibility marketing. Partnering with us enables you to be seen both in a very credible environment and also at a particularly high-interest stage of the shopping journey that’s hard to capture.
“Google is becoming increasingly adept at separating their results from people in the research stage and the shopping stage, in certain search results you’re going to see retailers, and in certain searches, you’re going to see publishers and reviews. It’s a unique way to be able to reach consumers in that all-important part of the journey.”
Leary: “We are definitely transforming ourselves from existing at the top of the funnel, which is all about creating awareness, to learning skills and capabilities to move down the funnel. This is an incredibly important path for us, and what it does is allow us to say to retailers and partners, we can do all the awareness stuff. But now we know we’re grabbing these very high-intent audiences at the research stage, let us work with you there too.
“We can track what they’re purchasing, whether it’s in-store or online, through all of our first-party data. So it’s a really nice, virtuous circle that we’ve moved ourselves into, and we can help both retailers and brands do exactly the same.”
At the heart of the entire news.com.au checkout platform is trust – a recommendation and review site won’t work unless people have confidence in the people reviewing the products. When asked how the team maintain that trust and their relationship with the audience, Leary and Kron point out that the editorial team is totally independent, and doesn’t report to the pair. On top of that, the team has two years of experience behind them – and counting.
Kron: “We’re two years into this journey, so they’re getting better and better and they’re really building up their expertise. They’re learning more and more both about the consumer, but also about the retailers that consumers shop with. We’ve got a somewhat concentrated market around many of the major players, and our expert team is getting to know them better, they’re getting to know the products better.
“It’s about an editorial quality that we’re building up over time. Our team is structured around category expertise, so they’re really getting better about being able to serve the consumers in their specific categories.”
Leary: “Even though we sell tenancies and flat fee deals to our partners, there are no editorial guarantees. They look at it, and will decide whether it’s a good product or not. We have to do that, they have to have that get-out-of-jail card.”
Looking ahead, the pair say that their hopes for the platform involve growing the platform and helping people through every stage of the funnel.
Kron: “It’s growing strongly now, and we want to continue seeing it grow, we want to build out that body of content to serve more and more consumer needs. Ultimately, what we want consumers to understand is that this is a destination that really addresses that particular need to get advice, research, recommendations, and reviews, and to start more of their journey on the research stage directly within our portal.
“We’re hoping to inspire them to discover new things, learn about new products that they might not have thought about, or help them discover a really good deal.”
Leary: “With the cost of living, deals have gotten very popular. So it’s great for our guys to aggregate a lot of the deals, and really cherry-pick the good ones – it’s amazing how well the audience reacts to the good deals.”
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Top Image: Adam Kron, Pippa Leary