Fresh from turning the lights on for the newest global news site to join the Australian media landscape, CEO of The Huffington Post Australia, Chris Janz, lays down his expectations for the title on day two.
“We're here to be a force,” he told AdNews. “We're not just an Australian off-shoot of a US website, we're here to be an Australian news site.”
The site is already putting its Australian flavour on the global format, announcing this morning that it's named popular Today Show host, Lisa Wilkinson, as the site's editor-at-large.
It was announced earlier this year that The HuffPo was launching in Australia as part of a joint venture with Fairfax Media, and Janz's appointment was announced a month later. While the site has only been officially live for one day, with yesterday being considered a soft launch, the title already has some strong goals about what it wants out of the coming years.
“We entered the market to be competitive in that market, so we aim to be a top five news site in three years,” he said.
That goal would put the title up against News Corp's news.com.au, Fairfax's Sydney Morning Herald, ABC News websites, fellow global player The Daily Mail and ninemsn according to Nielsen's latest online ratings.
It's not just readership the title is eyeing off, with Janz also aiming to have the title profitable in the same amount of time.
“This launch is number 15 [for Huffington Post globally], it’s a story that's constant about all of the launches across The Huffington Post. HuffPo only enters a market where there’s a real opportunity on the readership front and the profitably front,” he said.
Janz highlighted that commercial support for the site has been strong with advertisers Freedom Furniture, Microsoft, Citibank, UBET, Pernod Ricard and Defence Force all coming on board to support the title.
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