SODP Dispatch - 26 September 2024

Building the Optimal Monetization Team

By Vahe Arabian

Publishers have faced some hard questions in 2024 with the changes in the industry and dwindling traffic (and revenues). What are the different ways in which monetization can be optimized in this new market?

Our panel discussion with Susanne Sperling, Founder of Stratech Media, and Radu Tyrsina, CEO of ReflectorMedia explored divergent experiences about building and upgrading monetization teams, with a special focus on in-house teams vs outsourcing.

PubTech2024: New Panelist Announcement

🤖 Content recommendations

News Consumer Insights 3 is a 360 reporting assistant that delivers personalized AI recommendations to news organizations, free of cost.
See more ▸

📈 Audience trends
Check out the latest findings of a report by Pew Research Center on where audiences source news.
See more ▸

By Vahe Arabian

📣 Amplifying reach through content syndication

Content, once published online, rarely remains rooted to the same spot. It goes through an entire lifecycle of being published, shared, updated and — in many cases — being republished via content syndication platforms.

Content syndication is an increasingly important growth tool for publishers, given that it can both boost content engagement as well as SEO performance through backlink generation.

Content syndication networks provide a way for existing content, especially evergreen content, to be reused in another space, saving time, money and effort. As this content is distributed to new places, it provides a chance to gain more traffic as audiences follow the content trail from the third-party site to the original publishers.

Another major benefit of content syndication is that small publishers can piggyback on the authority and reach of larger publishers who choose to republish their content. However, sometimes the reverse can also come true. If the content ends up on a site less reputable than the original, then the content may come to be viewed as less trustworthy.

Here are a few content syndication platforms to get you started:

➡️ Free Content Syndication Platforms: Flipboard, LinkedIn Publishing, Slideshare

➡️ Paid Content Syndication Platforms: Dianomi, Outbrain, Quuu Promote, Shorthand, Taboola

➡️ Owned Content Syndication Platforms: Medium, Substack

Google to test its artificial intelligence-powered search in Australia | FInancial Review

Google is about to start testing summaries of search results generated by artificial intelligence in Australia, in the most significant change to the user and business experience of the ubiquitous platform in years.
Read more ▸

Flipboard is federating 250 publisher profiles and 4,000 of their curated Magazines | Flipboard

By building direct followers in the fediverse, publishers have an opportunity to reclaim control over their distribution and their relationship with readers.
Read more ▸

Automattic sends WP Engine its own cease-and-desist over WordPress trademark infringement |  TechCrunch

The brouhaha in the WordPress community looks likely to escalate into a legal battle around trademarks. Just a day after WordPress hosting service WP Engine sent a cease-and-desist notice to Automattic asking its CEO to stop publicly trashing WP Engine, now Automattic has sent its own cease-and-desist letter to WP Engine, saying the latter has infringed several trademarks like WordPress and WooCommerce.
Read more ▸

Google recognizes content creators: A breakthrough for E-E-A-T and SEO | Search Engine Land

Google is explicitly identifying people it understands to be content creators. This article explains how we know that Google is recognizing content creators, why it’s important and what SEO professionals need to do in response.
Read more ▸

NYT to sell audio subscriptions through Apple and Spotify | Axios

Come October, listeners will need to subscribe to The Times' audio content to unlock older episodes of The Times' hit shows. More publishers, including Vox Media and The Economist, are experimenting with paywalled podcasts as part of broader efforts to grow their subscription audiences.
Read more ▸

The power of video in news media: how increased audience engagement drives success | AP

As audiences shift from traditional news consumption to online platforms, the demand for video content has skyrocketed. This shift has prompted news organizations to rethink their digital strategies, placing video at the forefront of their content delivery.
Read more ▸