5 Reasons Why Your Digital Publishing Strategy Isn't Working

When it comes to role models for great Digital Publishing Strategies work, come up with the same names over and over again.

What does that mean? It's obvious that some companies have been more successful in adapting to the change in their readership than others. However, the vast majority of publishers are disappointed with their own digital publishing strategy.

In my experience, one of the following 5 reasons is behind it when your digital sector either attracts too few readers or makes too low sales.

1 Hesitant use of new technologies

The online world is constantly changing. New technologies and thus new forms of publication are constantly being developed. Companies that recognize a technological trend faster than their competitors are ahead of the pack in the race for user attention.

#1 Trend: Video

Video is increasingly dominating the use of today's media. In addition, there is a clear trend towards moving images worldwide. The figures speak for themselves. This is how the Cisco company The forecast for 2019 has been giventhat 80 percent of all data traffic will come from video.

But that's not the only reason why it's promising to rely on video. Think about smartphone usage. Many news outlets now produce videos with subtitles. In this way, the key messages are understood even when the user has switched off the sound on their device.

In addition, a video is a great way to summarize and even underline the most important statements of your article. In short, a video heavily evaluates an article with visual information.

#2 trend: text-to-speech technology

The second major development at the moment is text-to-speech (TTS) technology. This year, in particular, with Amazon Polly Took another huge step forward. Because now readers can have entire articles read out to them automatically — and now in quality that is really worth listening to.

This also means that content no longer has to be submitted by professionals. Neural Text-To-Speech (NTTS) technology even allows texts to be output in natural-sounding language, but this is produced artificially. Because of NTTS, spoken offers offer completely new opportunities to prepare news or even longer reports.

In addition, Smarte Speakers such as Amazon's Echo, Google Home or Hello Magenta are becoming increasingly popular among consumers. This is how the number of users of these devices in Germany, Great Britain and the USA has increased doubled in the past year.

Some users now even use it to control lighting and heating, get the latest weather forecast and be reminded of important appointments. However, many are also increasingly listening to the latest news and media offerings.

#3 trend: artificial intelligence

artificial intelligence After all, this is the third trend that is rightly making headlines all over the world right now. Machine learning und Predictive Analytics nuse historical data to make forecasts about consumer preferences. This is how the Australian pay-TV channel Foxtel was able to Artificial intelligence significantly increase sales.

More and more service providers are now appearing on the market, meaning that no company is forced to develop their own AI systems to test the technology.

2 Expandable implementation of advertising models

Of course, advertising will remain an indispensable source of revenue for media companies for the foreseeable future. Readers' willingness to pay for content is simply not yet as strong as would be necessary to fully cover the costs.

However, traditional display ads are still considered annoying by many users. Using browser extensions, many readers filter out ads from editorial offerings. Native ads can counteract this. However, this model cannot be scaled at will.

With Sponsored content, i.e. a classic advertorial, the advertiser only rarely delivers the content. The staff resources in the editorial office are therefore tied up for the production of the content and are therefore missing elsewhere.

This also applies to the production of content that affiliate links include. Although product reviews and list articles can be produced quickly, they are suitable according to Reuters' Digital News Report but not for every medium.

But there is another way. Because more and more media companies are also offering their customers direct orders from their own online shop as part of their digital publishing strategy. watchword Direct to Consumer. Since there are no intermediaries here, companies benefit from higher margins. They also retain full control of their brands.

That's exactly where Buzzfeed comes in with a hybrid model. The company specifically addresses brand manufacturers in order to work with them to develop products that are ideally suited to their own readership. An approach that promises higher revenue shares than traditional ads. Buzzfeed CEO, Jonah Peretti, revealed in an interview that his company will generate over 100 million US dollars in revenue in 2019 from this very division that did not even exist two years earlier.

But such a model is inconceivable without the knowledge of one's own readers and users. Your digital publishing strategy therefore needs detailed analyses.

3 Superficial data analysis

Digital content has a huge advantage for media companies. Which one? They provide data permanently.

Every page view by a reader, every click in an app leaves traces. The analysis of this information reveals a lot about the wishes of customers. Content producers are thus holding a real treasure in their hands. However, I remain convinced in this regard: publishers are still too rarely aware of this.

Every media company is now likely to use an analysis solution such as Google Analytics or Google Firebase. However, at this stage of their digital publishing strategy, most people are right at the beginning. Denn Unique User and Page Views In too many media documents, they are often still the only trump cards that should convince the advertising industry to make a booking.

Where the measurement variable is Page Views It's ancient and not very precise. The size is no different from the classic CPM model, as is established in magazines, newspapers and television.

This base size But it no longer does justice to the modern media world. Media companies should therefore rely on better indicators. For example, the reading time, activity and loyalty of readers are much more important. Not least because evaluating these figures provides ideas for new content and even the orientation of one's own medium.

The figures can also be further supplemented: For example, via own surveys and information from the customer database. This results in an ever more accurate picture of users. This result forms the basis for valuable personalized content.

Another approach: Why not use the data obtained as content yourself? What attitude can be seen from user comments, for example? Can a story be made out of it?

Data analysis is therefore much more than just looking at access figures.

4 Weak social media strategy

The sentence “Follow us” can be found somewhere on the websites of almost all media companies today. Of course, the well-known icons of social networks are placed next to it.

Unfortunately, the content on most channels doesn't always make you want to accept this offer.

Posts are often limited to pointing out new articles. Users can then react to this on Facebook or Twitter. But only rarely is there really a reaction in the form of likes or comments.

What is the reason for the lack of commitment? I think the power of social media is still too often underestimated. A fatal miscalculation. In May 2019, the Digiday magazine had 124 publishers and media houses to surveyed the three largest traffic providers for their offerings.

The figures are clear. The top 5 reader sources are:

• facebook
• twitter
• google
• instagram
• linkedin

Mark Thompson, CEO of the New York Times, even sees Facebook as a perfect addition:

“We mainly use Facebook to disseminate our content as widely as possible. But we also use it to promote subscriptions. And we're absolutely happy with it.”

Instagram is currently becoming a real shooting star, which is thus establishing itself even more as a traffic source. This is confirmed not least by figures from the MPA (Association of Magazine Media). According to this, Instagram has the highest growth rates among social media.

The New Yorker, New York Magazine, and Scientific American each increased the number of their followers on this platform by 6% in the period under review. The New Yorker now has 3.6 million followers on Instagram alone.

Social media is not just a broadcasting channel. In order to gain users there on a lasting basis, three factors are particularly important.

• Regularity: Only when users know that there are ongoing interesting posts and links, the so-called FOMO effect (Fear of missing out) occurs. You don't create the fear of missing out by having one post a day that links to an article, but by having a much higher frequency and especially interesting posts.
• Interaction: It's not just about reporting news from your own offering. Users also need to be involved. If there are comments on a posting on Facebook or Twitter, then you should also react and respond to them. Smaller surveys or competitions can also activate users.
• Knowledge of the platform: Users have different expectations on each channel. High-quality and surprising photos score on Instagram. Strategies and high-quality tips are more likely to be expected on a business network like LinkedIn. On the other hand, content that is distributed in a scattershot manner does not promise much success on social media channels.

Furthermore, the use of social media is also excellent for your cutting-edge reporting. The American news channel CNN stands for this expertise worldwide like no other, for which the use seems to be very worthwhile.

"If we didn't see a positive impact on audience engagement, we certainly wouldn't be investing our time like this."

Ashley Codianni, Executive Producer of Social and Emerging Media at CNN.

5 Use of obsolete software

Social media, video, audio and text production: Today, your editors have to prepare their content for a wide range of channels. This requires technology and, above all, a specialized CMS that supports them effectively. This is the only way to leave more time for the creative production of your content.

But it is precisely media companies with a long print tradition that (unintentionally) put obstacles in the way of their editorial teams on this path. How can this be? Well, it's not least due to out-of-the-box in-house developments.

The editorial team wants a blog? Instead of relying on special software like WordPress, money and personnel went into the development of an in-house module. Although this works smoothly with the central system, it often lags far behind special solutions.

At first glance, in-house developments seem to offer the advantage of keeping all the strings in one hand. But in fact, they are a dead end in the long run.

Modern publishing solutions simplify the production of content for different channels. They make your journalists' work easier, because they were developed precisely with modern and shared workflows in mind.

"In the beginning, all titles were moved to a common CMS. Then the content has been consistently moved from outdated servers to a cloud."

Christoph Schmitz, Product Owner at Aller Media, on the transformation at his company.

This step is worthwhile from two points of view. First, your various distribution channels are used in a way that is appropriate for the media. And second, the productivity of your editorial teams increases significantly.

Conclusion

A digital publishing strategy must include the joy of experimentation and the quick adoption and testing of new technologies. Of course, new revenue and advertising models must also be developed on the basis of the data generated within the company.

I think that in the next few years, the most successful media companies will be those that succeed firstly in building up a loyal user base in social media and secondly in increasing the efficiency of content production using modern IT solutions.

And ideally, all of this without upsetting the established readership of their print titles.

If you'd like to learn more about standardizing your content creation for social media, read on here. Want tips tailored to your exact situation regarding your own digital publishing strategy? Then schedule a demo appointment with one of our experts today.

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