Investment in optimising content for Google has helped Capital Business Media to double its revenue in just two years.
Richard Alvin, who founded the UK-based company 21 years ago, told Press Gazette that the company’s expansion has enabled it to hire three more full-time journalistic staff across its 15 print and digital publications, and he aims to hire a further four by the end of the year.
While many consumer media publishers have seen steep falls in traffic from Google in recent months and years, there have also been traffic winners. Reach, for instance, has returned to growth helped by a strategy which has included building up authority in particular content niches for different publications.
Similarlty, it seems that Capital Business Media has grown Google referral traffic by growing expertise in particular niches.
The company now has 32 full-time staff overall, with 14 editorial and 18 specialist editorial freelances who cover particular niches such as electric vans and commercial property. It is currently recruiting for two full-time roles.
Alvin says the title invested heavily in SEO at the start of last year, targeting business niches such as property investors, business travel and electric vehicles with websites, newsletters, video content and podcasts.
The company’s turnover has risen to £4 million, Alvin says – and he aims to launch a new company to market Capital Business Media’s SEO expertise.
Alvin said: “By optimising the website, getting good Google rankings, getting good scores, and being proactive, we’ve been able to see that growth.
“We have now created a formula that enables us to launch new products, websites and digital-first products and get them into profit within three months.”
Alvin says that the company’s strategy is built around ensuring that all content is written with good SEO practice. He says that companies want “content placed on our high domain authority websites so through specialist providers we have an ongoing process to ensure our authority is as strong as it can be on a paid basis.
“Plus we are grateful that other media outlets like the BBC and the Guardian do pick up things from our sites and link back to it in recognition which does help the ecosystem.
The company’s flagship publication Business Matters has 50,000 print subscribers, claims just under a million monthly unique users and on average publishes 20 pieces of online content per day. It also has a daily email newsletter with 80,000 subscribers.
The monthly print edition is available as a £65 per annum subscription, and no copies are given away free.
Alvin says that Business Matters has been a useful “test bed” to work out how to launch new publications and achieve profit rapidly.
He said: “We do not really want the print version of Business Matters to go above 50,000 subscribers. We just manage that churn, because certain interviewees like to see their name in print and on the cover.
“We have had every TV Dragon, for example and they all pretty much come to us because of the print offering. If we were just the website, we may not get some of the high level interviews that we do.”
UK’s ‘largest business magazine’
Capital Business Media launched in 2004 after Alvin bought Business Matters from Emap. Alvin it says is the UK’s largest business magazine (after the Institute of Directors subscriber magazine).
He said the company is unafraid to shutter publications and reopen them based on demand, shutting a business travel publication during Covid and relaunching in 2024 as business travel rebounded.
The company alsoclosed a publication last year dealing with electric home topics such as solar panels and heat pumps due to demand “falling apart”.
The company’s other titles include US subscription-based Fund Manager Today, the print magazine and site EV Powered, bi-monthly print magazine and website Travelling for Business, the magazine Electric Home and the website Property Portfolio Investor.
Upcoming launches (which are already staffed and in production) include Not.Ltd, targeted at startup businesses, and Stay and Improve, targeted at people who have opted not to move house but to upgrade their existing home, with a further publication targeting the “foodie” market set to launch next year.
Alvin said: “We’re a very niche publisher in so much as we specialise in certain areas and don’t get involved in other areas, basically.”
Sponsored content is driving ad revenue
Alvin says that key sources of revenue include newsletters sponsorship: “We’ve seen a 55% rise in revenue from advertising, both in print and digital, from the second half of last year.”
The rise in ad revenue is mostly from sponsored content, Alvin said, adding that he expects £1 million per year revenue from sponsored content by the end of 2026.
He said: “We need to be mindful of sponsored content overpowering ‘proper’ output as we receive over 200 email approaches daily from all over the world looking to place content so we need to increase our output accordingly which is obviously only for the betterment of our audiences, hence our recent and upcoming hires.”
He said that EV Powered has 30,000 corporate subscribers, with grid services and charging hub locations taking out bulk subscriptions. The EV Powered podcast is said to average 300,000 downloads a week.
Work anywhere policy brings business advantages
The company has had a “work from anywhere” policy for more than a decade, which Alvin said helps to cut overheads.
The editor of EV Powered, for example, works from Edinburgh.
He said the advantages of this are as follows: “We have a lower overhead. We do still have physical bases, but they’re nowhere near the size or cost of others. We’re not governed by geography. Equally, staff were able to retain more of their money because they’re not spending on commuting and whatever else. And we will never, ever be looking to reverse that or change that in any way, shape or form.”
The company aims to launch further titles in areas such as sustainable business and AI in the coming year.
“We are also launching a new company called the Content Crafting Company, which is going to help individuals and companies improve their visibility on Google, using the secret sauce that we’ve worked out for ourselves to actually do it for other people.
“I know for a fact that we’ll be able to do an interview with someone looking to increase their profile, and depending on what else they’ve done and what else is out there, most probably get them onto page one of Google within a week.”
Capital Business Media also aims to launch a new title aimed at sole traders, consultants and entrepreneurs called “Not Limited”.
Alvin said: “We are aiming to either launch or acquire a new website every quarter. There’s a world of opportunity out there, and we’re going after it.”
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