The 10-point plan for fixing TheStreet.com

Joshua Brown of The Reformed Broker writes about his plan to fix TheStreet.com, the financial news site that has hired a new CEO and a new editor in chief earlier this year.

Brown writes, “But TheStreet has lost its way.  It’s having an identity crisis, a financial crisis and an existential crisis all at once.  They’re burning cash, flailing about for social media strategies and fighting to stay relevant now that the rules of the web have changed.

“The suits are mostly clueless as to what to do, no matter what they say.  The editorial side is aimless; a hodgepodge of uninformed, redundant one page articles chopped up into three pages for CPM purposes, paywalled insights from a handful of great financial writers and a host of filler and fodder that serves no discernible purpose whatsoever.  And the ad placement is atrocious, it’s slapped across every open space as if to remind the reader that much of what he’s stumbling across on the site is there mainly for the pageviews anyway.

“Some would argue that it’s too late, that TheStreet cannot be fixed and is destined to just lose a little more each year until someone swallows it up and guts it.  I realize there’s a very real possibility of this, but in the interest of offering another option to an institution we all once loved, I’ve put together a list of ten ways the site (and by extension the company) could have a shot at revival.  They won’t listen, of course, because these are radical – it is more likely that they will simply attempt to make incremental moves and preserve the status quo.  But still, I thought it worth a shot.

“If were in charge of TheStreet.com I could turn it into the most widely-read and respected financial news and opinion site in America within six months. I’m not going to get much into earnings and revenue, I’ll focus more on the editorial and product side.  I think my changes in these areas allow the financials to take care of themselves.”

Read more here to see his 10-point plan.