Are you running a print newspaper and looking for ways to digitalize your newspaper? Or you want to start an online news portal. Any of the above reasons must have brought you here.
The news industry is going online by developing news portals, websites and providing e-papers. The spread of digitalization is a cue while the profit generated is the reward. In this dynamic era, digitalizing is a great idea for newspapers and magazines.
By developing a news portal, you can create your online presence and the best part is you don’t have to spend much. All you need to do is learn the right techniques of promoting and running your news portal and you become unstoppable.
In this blog, we will be talking about how to start a news portal, what are the rules, the benefits associated with starting a news portal, features of a good news portal, ways to generate money, and everything you should know about starting a news portal in India.
How to start a news portal in India?
Starting a news portal is not rocket science. Anyone can start a news portal with a sincere motive to run it effectively as well as efficiently. You can open a news portal comfortably sitting in your room. Just follow these simple steps to start a news portal–
- Create a business plan– Is it possible to start any business without a business plan? Probably No. Then create your business plan now. Starting a news portal is not an offline matter but it is advisable to have a written business plan as it can smoothen your movement. It also helps you in getting investors.
Your business plan should contain details like revenue model, budget, marketing techniques, target audience, Plan of action and everything you think should be added to it. It should narrate the story of your business. Because a news portal is a form of business that is going to generate profits. - Choose a name– Imagine running a business or a news portal without any name! Hard to imagine, Right! You have to choose a name for your news portal, that should be unique and descriptive. Choosing a name for a business portal is a bigger task. Choose a name that suits your work and is advisable to choose names that include numerical terms like 24*7, 365, etc.
- Get a domain name– After selecting the name of your news portal, get the domain name (using the same name you selected). It should be short and easy to remember. Buying a domain name is the first step towards starting a news portal. You can choose any name after checking with legal compliances but make sure the name is a perfect fit for your brand.
- Get Investors– If you don’t have enough funds to run your news portal, don’t worry, you always have an option of getting investments. For getting the investment, you would require a hard-hitting business plan. And if you found the investor for your news portal, then great. But if you fail to convince anyone to invest in your news portal, you can start your business on any of the blogging sites.
It wouldn’t look professional but at least you will get a platform to begin. You can consider investing your money, as it does not require heavy investment and once things will get on track, you will become entitled to huge profits. - Choose Web Hosting services– Choosing a web host provider is the next step of developing a news portal. It is important to choose the web hosting services cautiously as it is going to act as a storage space to save your posts, files, pages, and databases online.
It is advisable to go for premium quality web hosting services. Investing in cheap and poor-quality services can make you suffer a lot. It could even slow down your website. - Hiring– You would require some reporters to run the news portal. Several sources can be used to hire reporters or other staff to run a news portal. You can use your Facebook page to look for reporters. You would require technical staff, reporters, if you want to begin at a bigger level.
Instead of in-house technical staff, you can outsource the digital work. You can contact the 7k network for the best news portal development services at affordable prices. We guarantee 24*7 unbeatable support and inimitable guidance throughout. - Install templates– The next step is to get the best templates for your news portal. The template you choose should be catchy and unique. It should be decent and fit everything you want to add.
- Design– You must have noticed different designs on different news portals. Having a unique and excellent portal design can help you in outshining others. After having good templates, you should look up the theme for your business. It is advisable to get unique designs for your news portal. Opting for free themes or designs is a bad idea if you are beginning at a bigger level.
- Customize your design-Customization is very important. After getting a theme for your news portal, the next step is to add other features. This includes the addition of categories like people’s interest from culture, sports, entertainment, politics, business, or others. You can add chatbots, live streaming, and many other features to make your portal a bit more promising than others.
- Publish Content– Let’s talk about the content. Yes, your mind is moving in the right direction. Content is a vital component of a news portal. Start posting articles with engaging headlines. Make sure your content is readable as well as informative. Because not everyone is patient enough to read the whole story if it is presented in a monotonous tone.
The headlines you are using are a matter of concern. Headlines generate the interest of visitors. So, try to hit the portal with the best headlines. You can always use an inquisitive tone to create a catchy headline. - Promote your portal-The news portal cannot run without the promotion. Follow a set of vigorous promotional strategies to promote your news portal. Using social media could be a great idea. You can always use social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter for increasing the traffic on your news portal. Almost Every time you post, you can get traffic on the news portal by connecting to these social media platforms.
Following these simple steps, you can easily start a news portal. This is a great business idea, as you don’t have to register your news portal with any ministry or you don’t have to follow go through with a series of complex legal formalities to start a news portal.
Rules Associated with starting a news portal
Don’t get into a panic after reading the heading. We are stuck to our words that you don’t have to go through a series of complex legal formalities to start a news portal. But here are a few rules that should be followed while starting a news portal in India.
- A news site/ portal means a website that contains at least 1/3rd of its visible content related to the news and current affairs originally obtained from its correspondents. The publications on whose behalf the portal got accreditation will accommodate their online journalists within their existing quota.
- The news portals that have paid subscribers will get some preference.
- Online news agencies are also governed as per the existing rules prescribed for news agencies.
- The site should be updated at least 6 times a day.
- The domain name of the portal should be registered for at least the next 5 years from the date of application.
- The issue of determining the authenticity of the site may be decided in consultation with VSNL, in case of doubt.
- If the portal is found involved in any activity perceived as cyber-crime anytime, the accreditation given to the representatives of the portal will be withdrawn at the discretion of the DG.
It is not possible to start a newspaper or magazine without Registrar of Newspaper for India (RNI) Registration. It is a prerequisite to start a newspaper or magazine. This statement must be triggering your mind with a question- “Is it necessary to get RNI registration to start a news portal?”
So, read the next section to find the answer.
Do I need RNI registration to start a news portal?
Here is good news for the online news provider, you don’t have to get RNI registration to start a news portal in India. You should know RNI Registration is not mandatory as per the Ministry of Communication and Information.
The best part is Google doesn’t mind sharing information through a news portal or website. But that doesn’t mean you can operate the news portal without any registration. You can register it at MSME or Jansampark office. If you want you can get RNI registration, and the best part is you don’t have to pay anything to get RNI registration.
What would you require for RNI Registration?
Getting RNI registration is not complex. Follow these simple steps to apply for RNI registration.
- The first step is to get title verification for the newspaper, magazine, news portal, etc. Add at least five names as an option.
- Scanned copy of owner’s AADHAR Card.
- A recent passport-size photo. It should not be older than 6 months.
- Owner’s Contact Number.
- Owner’s Address Proof Document.
- Physical Address of Publication (in case of the print newspaper, magazine)
You can get RNI registration online as well. Log on to RNI’S official website www.rin.nic.in. and follow the instructions.
Undoubtedly, anyone can start a news portal but not everyone can make it a big success. Some lack consistency, hard-work while some lack knowledge. So, if you are planning to start a news portal, make sure these features are embedded in your news portal.
Features of a good news portal
So, how do you think you can design an exceptionally well news portal to grab the maximum part of users’ attention? Here we go with the list of must-have features on your website.
- Ultra-responsive design- While getting your news portal designed, make sure your news portal is responsive. It should open on laptops, mobile phones, tabs, etc without affecting the layout of the portal.
- Easy navigation- Many-a-times people tend to leave the portal or website if navigations are not good. It should be easy to use and the movement along the website should be buttery smooth.
- Best fit advertisement placement- This could be the best gift to your news portal. Usually, advertisements appear in the middle of the blog or article which can deviate the attention of the users.
- Breaking news section- While customizing the design of your news portal, don’t forget to create the breaking news section.
- Continuous reading and next story buttons- Insert the continue reading and next story buttons for the long articles and story section respectively.
- Add story option- Just like social media platforms, you can add a story section on the news portal for social sharing.
- SEO-friendly URL and news portal structure- You must have heard of SEO-friendly content, but here we are talking about SEO-friendly URLs. Get an SEO-friendly URL and news portal structure to gain higher rankings and enhance your visibility.
- Create a comment section- Don’t forget to create the comment section under the post or story. This helps in increasing user engagement. You can also get the reviews and viewpoints of other readers.
- Spam Filters on news or comments- Spamming is an irritating factor. You can avoid it by inserting spamming filters on news or comments.
- Desktop notification for news and articles- People read the news to remain updated. So, don’t forget to add a desktop notifications option for news and articles.
- Develop categories of news- You should always create a different section for different categories of news. Also, bifurcate them based on the region. Offer region-based news in different sections.
- Image Zoom- This could be one of the tiniest tips for you. But adding a zooming feature to the image could be a great idea. It can give you an advantage over others.
- Application development- If you want, you can develop an application for your news portal. You can do it later on. At an initial level, it is not necessary to develop an application for the news portal.
How Online News Portal generates revenue?
Many people are still not acquainted with the ways through which they can generate money from online news media or online news portals. Using all of these revenue models, you can generate money from an online news portal.
- Advertising- Advertising is a great way to generate money from your news portal. Online news is usually offered for free, so looking for other mediums is a genuine proposition. When your news portal will have a decent number of downloads and users, then people will start contacting you for advertisements.
You can also get in touch with local businesses at the initial level to promote their products or advertise their products for a fee. It is one of the best ways of monetizing your news portal. - Affiliate marketing- This is a kind of B2B conversation. There are tons of online businesses that want to get promoted. You can search for such businesses and earn money. You can promote their business and can ask for payments.
You can also promote such businesses using news content. Affiliate marketing is a great source of making money, all you need to do is use the right strategy and you can generate huge revenues. - Subscriptions- Large news companies are adopting this revenue model to generate profits. It is not at all advisable to use this model right in the beginning. Develop a customer base, offer premium quality content, if you want to adopt this revenue model.
People pay for the valuable content. If they can find the same content free of cost, why would they pay for your content? Although subscription fees aren’t high, it is more than 0 rupees for sure. The subscription models are used by many entertainment apps. - Pay-per-item- This is a supreme revenue model. It is not as easy as it appears to implement. It runs like you have to charge your users for a particular article or blog. But the thing, what are you offering. You have to offer something extraordinary to get paid for that particular article or blog. Because people can get the same content for free.
Using these revenue models, you can monetize your news portal. As you know, the digital world is flexible, so you can try hands-on other revenue models as well. But these are the most popular ways of generating income from the news portal.
How can I promote my news portal?
Promoting a news portal is a vital matter of concern. Using the right techniques of marketing to promote the news portal is very important. Check out these techniques of marketing to promote the news portal.
- Running SEO Campaign- Search Engine Optimization is one of the best methods of promoting your news portal. It enhances the visibility of your news portal by increasing the ranks. Running an SEO campaign is a broad term. You can use different methods of running an SEO campaign.
But the best method is optimizing the headlines and the URL with relevant keywords and phrases to run a successful SEO campaign. The effectiveness of an SEO campaign is measured by the popularity of the news portal. Make sure you are doing things correctly. Also, use SEO page analysis to get the report of the performance of your SEO campaign. - Interact with people on social media– Having social media presence is a must. If you want to spread your news portal to the masses, then don’t forget to mark your presence on social media. Social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter have a soft corner for online news publishers, Make use of these sites to promote your news portal.
Keep interacting with the users. Reply to their comments, address their queries, engage them by posting valuable content on your social media accounts. You would be surprised to know that some news organizations are not running portals but spreading the news to the masses through social media. So, do not underestimate the powers of social media in this era of digitalization. - Run ads to promote your website– Running advertisements is not a new idea. But it is one of the most effective ways of promoting a news portal. Add call-to-action features on the ads that would promote users to make some movement. You can run these ads on social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter as these applications actively support the growth of the news portal.
- Influencer Marketing- This is a form of marketing where you can contact influencers and make paid contracts with them. These influencers have a good fan following on social media accounts which can benefit your product as well.
You can find the influencer as per your budget. If you can want to start on a bigger level, reach the high-paid influencers and if you are beginning at a small level, you can reach out to the low-budget influencers. They may have fewer followers.
Marketing has good scope. You are free to try different techniques of marketing to promote your news portal. All you need to do is choose the right technique to promote your news portal.
Hire Agency to assist you
Starting a news portal is easy. You can do it by yourself. But as a beginner, you are going to lack professionalism for sure. You may or may not be able to add the required features to the news portal. Your competition will get a chance of moving miles ahead. So, it is advisable to hire professional services to get your news portal designed.
At the initial level, every business runs short of funds, so they look for low-priced services. So, if you are looking for an agency that could provide premium quality services at affordable prices, then get connected to the 7k network now. We provide different services like news portal designing, news portal development, news website development, and many more at low prices.
We also provide customized design, graphic designing, live streaming options, and every service you could think of. Seize the opportunity instead of giving it to your competitors by getting associated with the 7k network.
Benefits of starting a news portal
News portals are started with the basic motive of providing information to the masses on different topics like sports, business, entertainment, politics, and many more. These news portals get updated every minute.
Nowadays, people do not prefer sitting in front of newspapers for hours. They prefer digital methods to get the news. Therefore, the news portal has resolved several issues, including-
- The latest news is available around the globe with just one click.
- Easy accessibility
- Saves a lot of time
- You can get the latest news as per your interest.
- News portals educate people on different topics like entertainment, politics, sports, etc.
- Live coverage of events and cricket matches is also an advantage.
- You can present your views through the comment section.
- Video news is also available.
- Blogs, articles answer the number of questions
- Availability of breaking news instantly
- It also offers mobile updates and alerts features, so the user remains updated with the latest news.
Tips to start a news portal
- Archive news section
- News/articles scheme implementation
- Media management features (admin point of view)
- Have a user analytics report
- Author/ Publisher management feature
- Advertise your news portal in the best possible manner
- Place your advertisement wisely
- Choose a simple and easy remember name for the news portal
- Comply with the rules and regulations
- Get integrated with social media platforms
- Research about the competitor’s product as well
- Offer supreme quality content
- Choose your revenue model wisely
Conclusion
Starting a news portal is a great idea. You can start a news portal from your room as well. It offers a promising return on investment and the best part is, it doesn’t demand heavy investment. You can begin by investing a small amount and can grow accordingly. You can generate heavy revenues from a news portal by developing a strong business plan.
Using the right operational as well as promotional strategies cannot be underestimated. At an initial level, it is advisable to follow the existing marketing techniques, rather than trying to hand on unique and innovative techniques.
The world is getting digital, why should the news industry lag. Many newspapers and magazines are vigorously getting online either by developing portals or websites or using social media to educate the masses. Online news portals and websites play an important role in educating people on different topics as not everyone loves to read the newspaper to get the required information.
People prefer using digital methods to get information. Also, these news portals get updated every minute, and every time something important happens, your phone chimes with a notification of breaking news. Newspapers and television cannot do that. In today’s hectic lifestyle, the news portal has become a need of the hour. It saves a lot of time.
The news portals provide the user with personalized or customized news if the user updates it. You can adjust your news, notifications everything. If you are a student, you can set exam news, if you are a politics fan set politics news, and so on. This ease and convenience cannot be provided by the newspaper and television.
So, you must have got acquainted with the different aspects of starting a news portal in India. It has scope, you just need the right strategy and strong marketing to run a news portal effectively. If you are looking for technical guidance from scratch to start a news portal, then get associated with a 7k network now. We promise premium quality services at affordable prices.
Frequently Asked Questions
Ques.1 How can I start a news portal in India?
Ans. Follow these simple steps to start a news portal in India-
- Create a business plan. Launch a portal.
- Select a platform.
- Choose the best plugins
- Produce valuable content
- Start looking for advertisers.
Ques. 2 Is it necessary to get RNI registration to start a news portal?
Ans. No. It is not necessary to get RNI registration to start a news portal in India. But, if you are starting a print newspaper or magazine, you would require RNI registration.
Ques. 3 How can I generate money from an online news portal?
Ans. Using the following revenue models, you can generate money from the news portal.
- Advertising
- Affiliate marketing
- Pay-per-item
- Subscriptions
Ques. 4 What is a news portal?
Ans. A news portal is a website that collects news from selected resources and offers it to the target audience. A news portal, just like a website, may have images, blogs, videos, etc. It even supports the live streaming of videos.
Ques. 5 Where should I place the ads?
Ans. The best place for the ad is sidebars, both right and left, header or footer. Often, ads are seen in between the articles and blogs, which could deviate the attention of the readers. Consider all the factors while placing the ads on your news portal.
Ques. 6 Can I promote my news portal through social media platforms?
Ans. Yes, you can promote your news portal through social media platforms. It is a great idea as you can use different techniques of marketing to promote your news portals like influencer marketing and many more.
Ques. 7 What are the different techniques of promoting a news portal?
Ans. You can use the following techniques to promote your news portal-
- Build social media groups
- Join LinkedIn and reach out to the target audience
- Run SEO campaign
- Run advertisements
- Use hashtags
- Provide valuable content
Ques. 8 What does it mean by creating intentional blunders?
Ans. You can consider making small and healthy blunders to gain readership. Make sure that blunders are not affecting the image of your news portal. There are chances that a big news website likes your article and copy without checking the authenticity of the article can get you overnight success.
Ques. 9 How many days will you take to design my news portal?
Ans. It takes a minimum of 7-8 days to start a news portal. Sometimes it may take more than a week to develop a new portal. It also depends on the types of services you want. If you are looking for a customized news portal, you have to be patient.
Ques. 10 Is there any document required to start a news portal in India?
Ans. No. You don’t need any kind of documents to start a news portal in India. But you have to follow certain guidelines prescribed for the news agencies.
