By Duncan Grieve, co-founder of Daylight
This year has already signalled some major changes to the global media landscape. With big tech owners embroiled in controversial politics, the Australian Government signalling a new push to force tech companies to pay for news, and AI forever changing the SEO landscape, there is certainly a feel that the global media is facing a vibe shift.
At Daylight, our job is to help Australasian media publishers survive and thrive. Our role is to take stock of a publisher, and to help them build audience and revenue streams that are resilient in a tough environment.
From working with Australasian publishers with anywhere from 10 to 1000 staff we have built up some thoughts on things that bring risk and benefit to media publishers in 2025.
Duncan Grieve, co-founder of Daylight
Below are some red and green flags facing AU media this year.
Red Flag: Trump brings more politics and AI to social media
The incoming Trump administration has forced through another seismic change in social media. With the end of content moderation and a sharp rise in AI-generated content, there is an increasing sense from many users that platforms like X and Facebook are reaching a different and quite anti-human new era.
While publishers should rightly be cautious about their brands connecting too heavily with these trends on those outlets, this situation creates a huge opportunity for publishers to make a fresh case for their audiences outside of the usual social media content.
Australian media publishers should talk directly to their audiences, and find ways to connect outside of social media. In this way, they can build enduring habits and relationships with a far better value exchange.
Green flag: Loyal audiences are key
While it has been an agonising quarter century for publishers, for those which have survived, there is a strange upside to where we now find ourselves: there is little more the tech giants can do to us,and the audiences that remain are loyal.
Building audience revenue remains key for most publishers. While commercial partnerships remain crucial, a loyal audience is now paramount. Because of this publishers should look to emphasise the most direct relationships with their audiences: building homepage loyalty, email databases, logged-in readers, and paying customers.
Red Flag: Don’t rely on someone else to take care of your audience
The past years have seen media publishers diversify their audience across new mediums such as podcasts and digital video. While podcast or video audiences mediated by the likes of Spotify or YouTube have value but should be treated with circumspection.
Having a big tech organisation own your customer relationship should be seen as a business risk. Attention should be paid to remedying this and taking the audience back under your control. The story of media platforms built on tech companies typically has an unhappy ending.
In an Australian context, we saw Vice lead a number of digital franchises into Australian offices. In July of last year, a number of them closed – largely
Green Flag: Audiences are increasingly loyal to digital news brands
Now that publishers have stopped chasing scale through the empty calories of social virality and search optimisation, there is a new set of priorities rising. Having a sleek, modern and agile platform allows publishers to maximise the performance of their content, keeping audiences around longer.
Likewise, having a powerful and resonant brand makes audiences recognise and relate to your content in a highly distracting world while also giving advertisers and commercial partners a sense that you care as deeply about experience and product as they do.
Our work with The Squiz, Man of Many, and GALAH centres on a modern, modular design system that seamlessly translates across digital touchpoints. This approach ensures consistency in both content and commercial opportunities while optimising e-commerce performance. By creating a brand-safe environment, we empower partners to invest with confidence, strengthening brand equity and fostering long-term audience loyalty.
At Daylight, we’re working with publishers to figure out how to navigate and win in this chaotic environment – one with huge dangers but profound opportunities if you play it right.