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Is your digital strategy future proof?

How we can help build your digital strategy

Media businesses are facing unprecedented change – intense competition for advertising, more channels to communicate with consumers, vast organisational and skills challenges for teams.

 

Speciall Media helps media organisations navigate the complex digital world, building practical digital strategies for media brands.

 

Carolyn Morgan, founder of Speciall Media, has over 25 years strategic experience launching, acquiring, buying, growing and selling media businesses across print, digital and live events.  Carolyn launched a major conference and exhibition in 2010, the Specialist Media Show, with a workshop programme for specialist media owners to learn about new strategies, swap ideas with their peers and meet new suppliers and services.  In 2013 SIIA acquired the Specialist Media Show.

 

Carolyn now focuses on advising individual media and publishing businesses on the best way to grow their digital revenues.

Speciall Media can help your media business learn from the digital experiences of other publishers and create a tailored digital strategy

Questions for your digital strategy

We have helped independent media businesses create practical strategies to answer these questions:

  • How to upgrade a website to attract new customers
  • How to build a customer database from web, mag, subs, events
  • How to define content types – what stays in print, what goes online
  • How to design a digital subscription proposition
  • How to create marketing solutions for advertisers
  • How to launch and grow live and online events
  • How to research a data and intelligence product
  • How to review a portfolio and prioritise investment
  • How to dispose of non-core media assets
  • How to find complementary acquisitions and manage the purchase process
  • How to negotiate strategic partnerships and joint ventures
How can we help?

Latest Articles

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Interviews & Webinars

Panels and interviews from media conferences and events, plus recording of webinars on digital publishing strategy

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Our Clients

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Recommendations

Carolyn is an extremely knowledgable and focused individual and has helped fast track our online presence for our publishing business. When we hired Carolyn we were very uncertain about how to proceed with digital ventures and 10 months later we are ready to launch multiple professional websites and mobile apps. If you need logical, strategic and commercial advice about digital opportunities for your business look no further.
Danny BowlerMD Practical Publishing
Carolyn was invited by FIPP- the worldwide magazine media association, to develop our digital marketing strategy. She immediately got to grips with the brief, and quickly understood our audience and needs. She is professional, conscientious, and delivered work to a very high standard. Her knowledge of the industry is excellent, and she has been fundamental in helping us to move forward and plan for the future.
Chris LlewellynPresident FIPP
Carolyn ran a strategy workshop with our publishing team in advance of relaunching our site, and provided excellent guidance on how we prioritised the content, how we commercialised it, and how we should implement the relaunch. I’d be keen to work with her again
Andy RicePublisher of Photography magazines, Archant Specialist
“Carolyn was interim Product Manager for the IET on our Electrical Standards Plus digital workflow product. Carolyn pulled together issues which needed resolving, prioritised for further development sprints and worked with our user group. In a challenging post-launch period she provided the direction to ensure problems were rectified and lessons learnt”.
Amanda WeaverPublishing Director, IET
“Carolyn designed several workshops to support and motivate our editorial and production staff moving into multimedia and digital first content types and workflows. Carolyn was very thorough and knowledgeable in her preparation of the agenda, the presentation and the exercises. Her energy and hard work made the day productive and enjoyable and staff greatly benefited from her input. Carolyn is a great facilitator, and RCNi would certainly be happy to work with her on other projects.”
Helen SumnerProduct Director, RCNi
Following the MBO of International Boat Industry (IBI) from Time Inc in 2017 Carolyn assisted us in developing a successful digital strategy. While part of Time the title had lost its direction and its digital offering was poorly executed. With Carolyn’s initial input we reformulated our approach leading to a substantial growth in online revenues which combined with a doubling of print revenues led to the successful sale of the business in late 2021.
Nick HopkinsonPublisher Emeritus Boating Communications Ltd
Carolyn has provided a great sounding board for me as we transition our business from legacy B2B publisher to a multi-channel B2B data and intelligence-led content business. She has been exceptionally generous with her knowledge, experience and connections and I value her advice immensely.
Gavin MillerUltima Media
Carolyn joined our Board in 2018. She has been a very active and engaged member of the Board and can be relied upon to ask insightful questions to probe our thinking. Carolyn put her chairing skills to good use recently leading the Board's annual strategy day, doing a great job of keeping us on track and focussed on the big picture. She has supported the management team in refining their divisional strategies and has facilitated numerous helpful introductions to experts from her extensive network
Chris GibsonMD, Thomas Telford Ltd
Carolyn was my business mentor for 7-8 months during 2020 focusing on B2B publishing and digital media. Carolyn has a wealth of expertise in this area which meant I was quickly able to learn from her about the latest trends, future predictions and real-life instances of the exact challenges I was facing as someone who was going into B2B publishing for the first time (as up to then all my experience was in Consumer). Carolyn would bring relevant examples to ensure each topic was covered in depth and then afterwards would continue to share her knowledge and connections. I always left each session highly motivated having learnt things that I could immediately apply so can highly recommend Carolyn.
Sue HoltPublishing Director ITP Media
Carolyn was our dedicated mentor on the Collingwood Crescent Programme. She was committed to helping us through the challenges of this year and gave us some excellent frameworks for our business model and value proposition. Carolyn went above and beyond in terms of how she was expected to help us, and we are so grateful. She played a pivotal role in getting us through 2020!
Serena McLeodFounder, CEO Suitcase Media
I know Carolyn in our capacity as NEDs for Thomas Telford Ltd. As the Chair of the Board, I was pleased to welcome her onto the Board in order to bring her particular skills to help the management team as they think through their future strategy. Even before the Covid 19 crisis, her capability and knowledge and ability to be a critical friend to the business were making a real difference. Over the last few months, she has been a great support as the management think and manage their way through a very difficult period. Carolyn has quickly become regarded as a senior member of the Board and this will certainly result in her ability to progress in her NED career.
Andrew McNaughtonChair, Thomas Telford Ltd
I was a colleague of Carolyn’s on University of Nottingham Council. Carolyn has a unique ability to take granular data and interrogate it objectively, applying intellect, experience, and common sense to shape and inform decisions. She has the ability to challenge constructively, often highlighting different perspectives on solutions and proactively seeks out research and evidence to support this. Very much a trusted adviser and I have personally found her counsel extremely valuable. Very open and collaborative
Nora Senior CBEVice-Chair, Council, University of Nottingham
Carolyn has recently delivered 2 separate training courses for us at Euromoney Asia. These sessions we well researched and expertly delivered by Carolyn. Despite these sessions being delivered virtually, Carolyn was able to make them engaging and enjoyable experiences. Most crucially, I feel, Carolyn taught us how to think rather than what to think. This distinction will enable us to develop our own ideas going forward whilst using the framework Carolyn provided.
Helen FishCo-Founder, Executive Grapevine
I have known Carolyn for many years in her capacity as an event organiser, investor, and most recently facilitator as she managed with aplomb a full day session at 1854 for the senior team, as part of a strategic overview. Highly recommend for advice, professionalism and contacts in the media industry at large.
Marc HartogCEO, 1854 Media