Three day event aims to inform, educate and explore a range of digital and social media topics
This week the Financial Times will hold its inaugural Digital Learning Week (DLW) for staff, hosting presentations, panel discussions, masterclasses and online learning sessions to inform, educate and encourage dialogue around digital and social media topics and trends.
Running from 9-11 October, FT DLW will take place in FT offices in London, New York, Hong Kong, Singapore, Beijing and Tokyo. Speakers include executives from Facebook, Twitter, Google+, Enders, PwC, BBC, New York Times, Kraft, Edelman, Chartbeat, technode.com, VML Qais and Pearson, plus experts in their fields from within the FT. Sessions are themed around the following topics: social media, mobile, digital advertising, data analytics and other digital trends in the media industry.
FT CEO John Ridding said: “Around the world and across the industry, reader habits are changing and the publishing industry has shifted from a single channel business to multi-channelmedia consumption. The FT is proud of its success as one of the first global media organisations to embrace these changes and make the transition work for our business with innovations like our FT.com metered access model and the FT Web App, which have since been adopted by many others. But the pace of change continues to accelerate and we must continue to adapt. This Digital Learning Week is a part of a larger effort to invest in the FT’s greatest asset, our talented and experienced staff, with a variety of training opportunities. We encourage an ongoing dialogue to ensure we stay flexible, curious and continue to succeed in this rapidly changing market.”
FT Global Communications Director Emma Gilpin-Jacobs, added: “Along with our people and our relentless commitment to offering the world’s best global journalism, digital innovation has been key to the FT’s growth strategy. As we continue to transform our business, Digital Learning Week aims to create a new way of helping our staff to engage with the digital products and trends that we are using to reach our growing global audience.”
The FT has seen consistently strong growth in digital revenues and by the end of the year we expect these will be over 30% of the total. Likewise our digital subscriptions are steadily increasing, and overtook global print circulation earlier this year. FT.com now has over 300,000 digital subscribers and 5 million registered users.
Other important areas of growth are mobile, which drives 25% of traffic and 15% of new subscriptions, and social media, which is growing faster than every other traffic source to FT.com and has seen an increase in referrals by 20% in the last six months.
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For further information please contact:
UK/EMEA:
Emily Gibbs
Corporate Communications Manger
T: +44 (0) 207 873 3184
E: emily.gibbs@ft.com
Americas:
Andrew Green
Communications Manager
T: +1-646-299-4628
E: andrew.green@ft.com
Asia:
Azmar Sukandar
Head of Communications, Asia Pacific
T: +852-2905-5519
E: azmar.sukandar@ft.com
About the Financial Times:
The Financial Times, one of the world’s leading business news organisations, is recognised internationally for its authority, integrity and accuracy. Providing essential news, comment, data and analysis for the global business community, the FT has a combined paid print and digital circulation of almost 600,000 (Deloitte assured, 2April 2012 – 1 July 2012) and a combined print and online average daily readership of 2.1 million people worldwide (PwC assured, May 2012). FT.com has more than 5 million registered users and over 300,000 paying digital subscribers. The newspaper has a global print circulation of280,124 (ABCs, August 2012).