• Advertising Age, Monday, June 15, 2009 9:30 AM

Running a global news business requires a tricky combination of international brand appeal, regional relevance and subject expertise that both travels and translates. People, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, The Financial Times and The Economist are among the companies that have generally succeeded. "But the tough part is: Who wins the race to ubiquity and can make it pay off?" says Ken Doctor, analyst at Outsell.

Winners tend to transcend corporate, political and local agendas; cover locally but market regionally; stick with marketing their media brand for the long term and devote enough financial resource to fund a strong sales force and newsgathering team. A key factor is to have enough flexibility to be interpreted appropriately in each market, say experts. For instance, "CNN tries to be international, but it comes across as being very American," says Eric Zeitoun, brand consultant. Marketing a global media brand requires both consistency and specificity. The Economist, for instance, has a global reach but takes a very regional approach to marketing.

Plenty of global advertisers in the auto, financial, technology and luxury categories continue to target well-heeled executives via international media, and we can expect new global news brands to surface soon. In fact, the next big media brand could quite possibly come from China.

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