[dropcap]A[/dropcap] few months ago, and for quite a long time, Standard Group was the king of online readership in Kenya. It was often ranked number one news website in Kenya, even ahead of print market leader Nation Media Group and other players such as the Star and viral news portal Tuko.
Lately, the Standard website has been sliding and now it has slipped four steps backwards to number 5 as a readers’ backlash mounts over the quality of its online content and news alerts. This has sparked a revolt against Standard Digital Managing Editor Carole Kimutai by fellow editors and even her own staff.
The biggest accusation against the digital team management is the rise in cases where Standard finds itself publishing fake news and articles with grammatical or factual errors.
Ms Kimutai heads the Standard Digital Division with general manager Robert Toroitich, a former IT guy described internally as “aloof.” In fact, a formal complaint has been raised with the Standard Group HR office over competency issues on the desk, according to internal communication seen by Business Today. “Senior editors are pissed off and keep complaining,” said an editor at Standard, who works for the print section.
Carole was hired in June this year by Standard as the media house sought to strengthen its online platform. She had left Tuko, after running it for one and a half years.
SEE ALSO: Standard forces employees to take leave
But the tide appears to be turning against her too soon as she comes face to face with the vicious mainstream newsroom politics. Granted, most readers have busted Standard’s mistakes and fake news, leaving the media house’s digital section with an identity and credibility crisis. Other editor’s reckon that the digital team is more concerned about generating more hits than quality and credibility of content.
A part from being overtaken by her former employer Tuko and NMG, on Alexa ranking, internal sources say, advertisers are now demanding lower pricing claiming the Standard mother website no longer enjoys the highs of over three million page views daily as readers shift to other sites, squeezing digital ad revenues.
READ: Why Carole Kimutai left TUKO
Standard has been propping up the digital division to bring in revenues to bridge gaps in print and TV. The digital division and print have been the cash cows at the Standard but are now facing a similar threat of falling readership and advertising. This has forced the Standard Group to recently issue a profit warning, saying it expects profits to fall by at least 25 percent in the current financial year.
In the 2014-2015, Standard made Ksh80 million profit which was reassigned to “some non performing divisions” according to insiders – a decision that will return to haunt it as it computes its annual revenues.
Meanwhile, the biggest blow yet to Carole came when a sub-editor working under her wrote a length letter raising issues about her management style. The lady chronicles her frosty relations and interactions with Carole, which portray her boss in bad light.
My name is Fridah Nkatha Kamau. I’m seeking legal redress since I feel aggrieved. One journalist who goes by the name “Lilian Chepkoech” has profiled me twice,in her stories ,in May ,and on 31st August. She’s doing this maliciously in collaboration with some police officers. The stories she wrote are non factual to a greater extent and she uses active speech to pretend that it’s verbatim. The stories are then peddled in two other digital platforms and the same mistakes are recurred. You can imagine the multiplier effect and the implications of these profiling on my career and my reputation yet I’m suffering from double jeopardy while seeking justice. This is notwithstanding the fact that “the internet never forgets”. I will not allow fake news to be peddled to tarnish my name while being profiled in my pursuit to get justice!