As a publisher of Kompas newspaper, PT. Kompas Media Nusantara has been enjoying the leadership in the newspaper's circulation since 1965. However, since 1985 Kompas has experienced stagnancy in circulation, which is at around 500.000.

In this project we, the students of IPMI Business School worked together with the management of PT. Kompas Media Nusantara to explain this phenomenon. Many hypotheses have been developed to support the phenomenon but in this project we concentrated on the change of consumer's media habit that may have affected the Kompas' circulation.

In the past decade there have been changes in the media environment, of which one of them was triggered by the crisis in 1998. The mass media industry became 'liberalized' and the reformation era was marked with freedom of the press allowing open competition. It resulted in the emerging many new print media (newspapers, magazines, tabloids, etc) and other electronic media (TV and radio channels, and Internet). All this has not only created the competition in the media industry but also has brought changes in the habit of the information consumers. The fact that there now are various types of media available offered the consumers many options as our research proved that those media have different positioning as they serve different needs of the consumers.

In the newspaper industry, many newspapers (the 'brand') have emerged in the last decade, which resulted the industry to become segmented. As the readers are now offered with various options to fulfill their needs of information, they become more critical and selective in choosing the (print) media. This fact has changed the position of newspaper. It not only serves as the source of information but it has become part of lifestyle.

Kompas has very strong brand image and has positioned itself as the mature and 'serious' newspaper. Should they maintain their strategy which may have prevented them to grow, or should they consider broadening their segment but may jeopardize their current readers?





Research Location : Kompas Media Nusantara, PT