Readers of The Times online are going to have to dig into their piggy banks come June; The Times and The Sunday Times are to start charging for access to their websites. You will need to pay £1 a day or get it discounted to £2 a week. If you subscribe to the print edition - £6 a week - you get the online access free of charge. Is this commercial suicide? Almost certainly for a newspaper; yet for other businesses such charging models could do well.

The problem that Rupert Murdoch faces is two-fold. Firstly, the circulation of The Times is plummeting. The latest figures, released in February, show that the newspaper is down 17% in the year since 2009. That's the biggest drop of any national daily newspaper and compares with circulation increases for The Sun and The Star. The Sunday Times is down by almost 8% in the past year. With falls in circulation - and the resulting drop in income - there is also a reduction in advertising fees. Advertisers don't like paying standard rate card fees when the circulation is falling; inevitably they negotiate the costs downwards too.

The second issue which faces Mr Murdoch is the increasing demand for online news. Indeed, The Times gets almost five times as many people reading the newspaper online than it does buying a newspaper. A recent study showed that people now prefer to access online news instead of physical newspapers. But with the plethora of online news sites, people are spoilt for choice. And that means if The Times charges, readers can simply opt for a free news site, including The BBC which has confirmed it will not charge for online news.

Clearly, the chances of success are not stacked in favour of The Times. They are stuck in an old-fashioned business model in which charging for news was acceptable - because that was the only way we could get it. But with Twitter, for instance, world news can be spread to millions of people the moment it happens and without any need for the costs of journalism. The old business model doesn't work. For the newspaper industry, they need to think again. One possible model would be free online news and then access to the in-depth material published as a print magazine, or video material downloadable at cost, for example.

And therein lies the secret to how you can charge for your website. People are not prepared to pay for information they can get for nothing elsewhere. But they are prepared to pay for analysis and in-depth support which is specifically geared to their particular needs. The Guardian, for example, has hinted that this is the direction it will take - charging for in-depth analysis and special sections, rather than the general material which can be obtained anywhere for nothing.

Thousands of websites already exist using a subscriber model. But the basic set-up is always free. The paid-for material is then the specific, in-depth, analytical stuff that helps people improve their situation. So, what in-depth analysis can you provide your potential online customers?

With the "free" model for information so well-established online, you are only going to be able to charge for material that goes beyond what other websites provide. That's the point that has eluded Mr Murdoch and his cronies. Don't fall into the same trap, assuming that people will be happy to pay because of who you are. They won't; they are only happy to pay online for highly targeted, in-depth and supportive analytical material they cannot find anywhere else. Your challenge, as ever, is to be unique.

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Your company web site has no-doubt had several loving hours spent on it. If you have a blog, it's pretty certain that there will be tens of thousands of words in it by now if you have been blogging for a a year. This web site, for instance, has over half a million words of editorial in it - that's around ten books worth; quite a lot of work. How many words does your web site have? Indeed, have you even considered the intellectual capital you have embedded in your site?

Now what if, by the click of a switch, someone, somewhere decided that they will change the way the software that produced your site works. What if the way that sites are stored was changed? What if a key company went bust in the chain that gets your website out to the world at large? Could you resurrect your site - would your intellectual capital be lost forever?

OK - I know - you've heard of backups before and I'm sure you have them. But, Dr Vint Cerf - the person who invented the coding that makes the entire internet work - has said at this week's Search Marketing Expo that we must all consider the problem of "bit rot" - the fading away of parts of the internet because they were constructed with old software that is no longer available.

This is a problem that has been taxing the National Archives for many years. They are charged with storing everything they possibly can to preserve an archive of the country. Since so much of that is now online - what if the archive could not be accessed at some stage in the future?

As Dr Cerf said: "Imagine it's the year 3000 and you've just done a Google search and you turn up a 1997 PowerPoint file, and you're running Windows 3000. The question is, does it know how to interpret the PowerPoint file? The answer is probably no."

But you don't have to think that far into the future. I have book manuscripts in a program called MacAuthor; it was all the rage at the time - in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Douglas Adams even wrote The Hitch Hikers Guide to the Galaxy on it. We used to speak at conferences together about the use of such "desktop publishing" software in business. But sadly the original manuscript of that book - and the original manuscripts of my books are no longer accessible. To edit such books, they now need to be scanned in again from the paper records because MacAuthor no longer exists and nothing will import the files any more.

So even though Dr Cerf is pointing out a potential problem for the internet long-term, not having a copy of your work which can be accessed in more traditional ways could be a real problem for you.

And as Dr Cerf pointed out in his speech, paper will be accessible for many, many, many years to come. After all you can still look at the real, 1000-year-old Domesday Book - as well as access the online version nowadays. But if, in a few years time, that online version failed to work because of some change in software along the line - we'd still be able to access the paper version.

So, consider your web site and your current online resources. What if Facebook decided you had to upload all your profile material, rather than typing it into an online form? They could do just that now if they wanted, nothing is really stopping them (apart from ease of use). But what if they did? Do you have all your Facebook profile information in a file you can upload? Or would you have to start from scratch again? Even if it was on paper, you could scan it in and then upload it.

It may not be very "green" to keep a copy of your web site in paper form; but it would preserve your work, not only for yourself if something went wrong, but for future generations who may not be able to get into your digital work otherwise.

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Most people who download music from the Internet do it illegally. According to a new industry-backed survey 95% of all music downloaded from the Internet is from "pirate" sites.

This morning on BBC Radio Five Live, a UK industry spokesman came out with the same, old, tired arguments that if we don't pay for music the industry will die.

Actually, the music industry will die because it is currently inhabited by this dinosaur style thinking. The world has changed and all the music industry has done is to make its products available by another "channel", such as iTunes.

What the industry has failed to realise is this simple fact - people now expect music to be free. That's a fact the industry simply has to get to grips with.

It's also a fact the rest of business has to understand. Things that people used to pay for they now expect free. For instance, in the past if you wanted information in any kind of depth you either had to visit the local library, or you had to pay a researcher. Few business people had time to visit libraries, so information research was a significant industry. Now, we all get the information we want without paying for it - we use the free services of Google, Yahoo and the like.

Just a few years ago, if we wanted anything really special we would have paid $97 or more for a downloadable report. Now, we download information for free.

Only this week I've been rebuilding this web site (not yet live...!) with free software (Joomla) which I have needed several "extensions" for. They've all been provided by developers (some big companies too) free of charge. Just a few years ago I would have paid hundreds of pounds for these items - not any more. We expect it all free.

Even Microsoft is realising the issue. They made their billions by selling is digital material in huge boxes with big books inside them, which we never read. Now we can get Office software suites and operating systems for free.

Everywhere you look, businesses that used to charge for things are finding they can't do so any more. Industries like the music sector simply have to face up to the changed world where their customers expect their products for free. They need to talk to those pirate web site owners; they are making money even though their core "product" is supplied free of charge. The people who make free office suites are still making money and the Joomla project is also well funded - even though its product costs zero.

The future of business looks very different with core products and services being provided online for nothing with money being made in very different ways. And I'm not the only person who thinks this - take a look at what the influential Chris Anderson has said in this article. Add a comment

Happy New Year; I hope you have enjoyed the celebrations and that you don't start off 2009 with too much of a headache..!

At this time of year, of course, it is traditional to look towards the future and set your resolutions for the coming 12 months. Don't. Resolutions are bad for your psychological health, according to one mental health charity. Perhaps someone ought to tell Gordon Brown about that.

However, forward planning is essential to your mental well being; failing to cope with a changing environment is at the root of stress. The business and Internet world is certainly in for big change in the next year, so if you don't plan to cope with that you will doubtlessly suffer from stress and associated anxiety.

Consequently you need to think about the likely online changes for 2009. There are some fairly obvious things - social networking will continue to increase in prominence and importance, the numbers of people using the Internet will doubtlessly rise and the amount of content available will increase substantially.

Some of the other things you need to think about include the rise in importance of "mashups", the increase in value of "geotagging" and that "reputation management" will also take on greater importance. If you are not planning how to exploit each of these areas during 2009, your stress levels may well increase...!

Of course, planning to handle the recession is going to be another certain way of reducing your psychological health problems over 2009. Today, we hear that in spite of millions of people rushing to the sales, less money is actually being spent. And in the business to business sector, people are not spending in a bid to save budgets and therefore keep their own jobs. Even though these executives know the sensible thing to do is to buy your particular service, they won't because they are protecting Number One first.

So, can you look forward to a good 2009 with a positive frame of mind and safe in the knowledge that whatever you do online will work and therefore help reduce your stress levels? Sure you can - but you must plan in detail, right now. If you have nothing much else in the diary for January use the available time to plan ahead - in writing and in detail - and all will be well. Assuming, of course you take into account the important things online. And if you have never heard of mashups, geotagging or reputation management systems, now - right now - is the time to find out. Add a comment

Your fate is in your hands; up until now businesses have been able to use newspapers, social networks - other publishers - to help them get their messages across. Marketing experts have often emphasised media coverage and social networks (word of mouth) as a way of promoting your business. However, two new reports published today suggest you could soon be on your own.

Today's Financial Times reveals a stark warning for the traditional print media world. The analysts Deloitte are predicting a massive downturn in advertising revenues for the newspaper and magazine industry, threatening the existence of many titles.

At the same time, the latest MIT Technology Review claims that the writing is on the wall for many social networks. Already a number of social network start-ups have been taken over by competitors or simply disappeared.

So where does that leave you? If the available printed media is shrinking and the social networks are disappearing, just how are you going to be able to promote your business?

More than ever before it is going to depend upon what you do - particularly online. Businesses can no longer rely on the media to promote them, or on using traditional marketing tools, such as advertising. Instead, you are going to have to forge ever closer links directly with your niche group of customers. It is more evidence of the need to narrow even further your specific targets and to form really close relationships with your customers and prospects. That way it will not matter if your favourite social network disappears, or if every newspaper in the land dies.

The survivors in the coming year or two will be those companies who realise that their web presence cannot simply be an online brochure. Customer-centric organisations will survive - the rest will go the same way as newspaper advertising, down the tubes. Add a comment

People aged over 40 are often amazed by what is happening online. Sometimes they find it difficult to consider things the way those born in the 1970s do. For instance, people under 30 tend to distrust corporates and they also seek the best solutions for what they want to achieve, regardless of brand. In spite of what you might think from media coverage, surveys tell us that the younger generations are not really that brand aware.

That's a problem for traditional business which is geared around promoting brands. Indeed, it's still the way that much business is generated online. But the world is changing fast. For example, many business people - the younger ones - are avoiding banks altogether as a source of funding. Instead they are going to cooperative ventures such as Zopa, where you borrow money from other people, rather than banks.

Similarly, the polling organisations in the US Presidential Elections showed widely varying results because of the changed behaviour of younger people. Some pollsters only call landlines - but many younger people do not own landlines, using cellphones for all their communications. And that meant many members of one generation were excluded from polling, making some of the polls inaccurate.

Younger people really do think differently. And think about this. What if you construct your entire personal identity online using a range of tools such as social networking, Twitter, and various electronic "safes". You might also have all your finances in PayPal. Guess what - you then do not need a bank account.

The problem with banks is that they are run by people over 40 (indeed many are run by people over 60). They don't think in the same way as the under 30s - their potential future customers. These youngsters distrust corporates, like the banks, they have no need for a bank account and if they want to borrow money they can get it from their "friends" online in cooperative ventures. The banks are blind to the future whereby the way they have done business for the past 300 years is simply not going to wash with the younger generation. Bank accounts as we know them will become obsolete for millions of people within a matter of a few years (for many they already are obsolete).

Yet, banks, like so many traditional firms, continue to plod on as though nothing much has changed. We are in the midst of a fundamental shift in business - where the old ways of doing things are disappearing rapidly, where brand means nothing and where cooperation is the order of the day. How ready is your business for this new way of doing things? If you don't think about it now, you will be in trouble soon.

And if you don't think that's true, just consider the record industry. It was told several years back that online music would threaten its core income. The old "suits" who run the industry thought this was just teenage twaddle. Now who is red faced? Dramatic change IS coming to your industry - faster than you can imagine. Better to make plans now, rather than be like the record industry constantly trying - and largely failing - to catch up. Add a comment

Businesses are ill-prepared for what is going to happen to them in the next couple of years. Students currently at university and college are avid users of social networking sites. New research shows the dramatic increase in uptake of social networking by students.

The study reveals that six out of every ten college students use social networking sites on a daily basis. This is up almost double on the numbers just a couple of years ago.

To undergraduate students, social networking is now a way of life. If that doesn't persist into the workplace, they will be like ducks without water. Graduate recruits who can't take part in social networking will have to re-learn a whole new way of doing things if the corporate world doesn't allow them to use social networks.

But what is big business doing about social networking? Banning it. Yep, that's right - just as the rest of the world is realising the immense power of social networks, big companies the world over are banning social networking.

You might think, for a moment, that large companies know what they are doing; after all you don't get big unless you know a thing or two. Well, think again, it's big business that got us into the global economic mess we're in. Large companies are not as clever as they might like us to think.

So, the social networking situation is another case in point of big business failing to understand. If graduates cannot use social networks within their business they will go elsewhere. Indeed, if a big business does not allow social networking or doesn't have internal social networks, that will become a disincentive for job seekers from the colleges.

Combine that with the fact that over 50% of all undergraduates now report their intention is to start their own business, rather than work for an employer, big businesses will have their work cut out to attract quality graduates unless there is a wholesale change in attitude to social networking. Gone are the days when social networking was something that big companies thought about, tinkered with and then banned. Time has come for them to embrace social networks.

If they don't do this, it will be like employing graduates who can write but banning them from using pens and pencils. Social networking has to be a central strategy for the future success of big business.

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