SODP Dispatch - 29 January 2026

FatChilli for Publishers 2026 Review

By Sreemoyee Bhattacharya

Turning anonymous website visitors into actual paying subscribers is a daily challenge – you need to have a good understanding of who your readers are and how they interact with your content. But the reality is, most publishers are struggling with this – just 23% of visitors even get offered a subscription. The conversion rate to paid subscribers, according to a benchmark, is a low 0.003% of all visitors, which goes to show how hard it is to make any decent money from audiences without a much deeper understanding of what makes them tick.

Data getting stuck in silos, conversion funnels getting all disjointed and tools that are about as flexible as a brick wall – all this makes it even harder for publishers to get the insights they need to optimize the reader experience and build genuine loyalty. To help tackle these problems, the Denník N tech team got to work on REMP (Reader Engagement and Monetization Platform). This open-source platform brings much-needed structure and common sense to subscription-driven publishing. By bringing all the key bits together – audience insights, engagement tracking, and subscription management – into one tidy system, REMP helps publishers get a handle on reader behavior, refine their user journeys, and – most importantly – build a loyal readership..

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🔄 Google AI Traps Your Clicks

Google made it official, now Google Search AI Overviews will let you do a follow up question after clicking on the "Show more" button and that follow up question will take you directly into AI Mode. This might lead to less clicks to your website and more traffic into Google AI Mode.

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📊 The 2025 Web Almanac

The web doesn't stand still and neither does the data that tracks it. The HTTP Archive's 2025 Web Almanac is here: the most comprehensive snapshot of how the web actually works, built from 16.2 million websites and 244 terabytes of real-world data.

This isn't speculation or trend-chasing. It's 15 chapters covering page content, user experience, publishing, and distribution, written by 70 web experts who volunteered countless hours to make sense of what's really happening across the internet.

Whether you're optimizing performance, rethinking your CMS strategy, or trying to understand how content gets discovered in 2025, this is the report that connects raw stats to real insight. The kind of clarity you can actually build a strategy around.

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📊 Exclusive Offer for SODP Readers: Phuket Summit 2026

Your ticket to Phuket Summit 2026 just got sweeter! Our friend Ashish, founder of Phuket Summit, is rolling out the red carpet for our community with an exclusive offer you won't want to miss.

🎟️ The Deal:

• 10% OFF all tickets AND sponsolrship packages

• Simply use code: SODP10 at checkout

Whether you're grabbing an early bird ticket, VIP pass, or exploring sponsorship opportunities, this discount applies across the board!

This is your chance to connect with industry leaders, gain fresh insights, and network in one of the world's most stunning locations, all while saving on your investment. Don't let this opportunity slip away!

P.S. Remember to enter SODP10 before completing your purchase to unlock your 10% discount.

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By Vahe Arabian

🎯 How MadTech Integration Is Rewriting Marketing Playbooks in 2026

The walls between MarTech and AdTech are crumbling. What we're witnessing isn't just collaboration; it's fundamental convergence forcing publishers to rethink their marketing infrastructure. This year, the playbook won't distinguish between these ecosystems. It will be about unified customer engagement at scale.

For years, publishers operated marketing clouds for CRM while running separate ad tech stacks for programmatic. That separation is becoming a liability. What's emerging is a unified data layer where every user interaction, such as reading an article, clicking an ad, abandoning a paywall, becomes part of a holistic profile.

AI isn't just automating tasks; it's the bridge between MarTech and AdTech. Machine learning models now predict which newsletter subscriber will convert on premium ad placements, or which reader should see a subscription offer instead of display ads. Publishers experimenting with unified AI layers are seeing higher subscription conversions and improved ad yield simultaneously.

The convergence is reshaping revenue strategy. Performance marketing tactics are now applied to content monetisation. Publishers run A/B tests on paywall presentations, just as advertisers test landing pages. Your content strategy becomes inseparable from your revenue strategy.

Email, push notifications, on-site messaging, social, and programmatic display are now orchestrated from a centralised hub. A reader who abandoned your paywall gets retargeted with a programmatic ad, receives a personalised email, and sees a tailored message when they return. One unified journey, not three separate campaigns.

Privacy regulations are accelerating this convergence. When you can't rely on third-party cookies, first-party data becomes everything. Publishers building integrated consent management are using it as a competitive advantage.

Key takeaways for publishers:

• Unified first-party data infrastructure breaks down silos between marketing and advertising data

• AI-powered decision engines that optimise for both subscription and ad revenue simultaneously

• Integrated consent frameworks managing user privacy across all touchpoints

• Cross-functional team structures organised around customer journeys

• Composable tech stacks prioritising interoperability over monolithic platforms

• Real-time orchestration capabilities coordinating messaging across every channel

The marketing playbook is being rewritten because the fundamental relationship between content, commerce, and advertising has evolved. They're not separate strategies; they're one integrated approach to serving and monetising audiences. The question isn't whether to converge your strategy, it's whether you'll lead or be forced to catch up.

AI’s Ad Revolution: Agents, Slop and the 2026 Overhaul | WebProNews

The advertising sector faces its sharpest pivot since programmatic buying upended media trading two decades ago. Generative AI, machine learning and agentic systems have evolved from sidelines to the nerve center of operations. In 2026, these technologies don’t merely support efforts; they conceive strategies, craft assets, bid in auctions and tweak delivery on the fly, reshaping a $1 trillion global industry. Investment surges underpin this change. The AI in advertising sector hit $8.6 billion in 2023 and eyes $81.6 billion by 2033 at a 28.4% compound annual growth rate, per a Market.us analysis. Broader AI marketing tools command $47.32 billion in 2025, bound for $107.5 billion by 2028 with a 36.6% pace.

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Google Says 99% of the Web is Spam and Duplicajutes | Search Engine World

I can't think of a more important chart I have seen in SEO history. In a recent filing by Google, they lay out a case against sharing their data in the US vs Google antitrust case court ruling. In the document it shows 7a 6chart that, Google thinks 99% of the web is spam and duplicates! Only about one percent is considered genuinely original and worth strong ranking signals. To me, that single number and chart explains more about today's search results than a dozen algorithm updates analysis. For many SEO's, it could be the most important chart you will see in the next decade.

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TikTok Publishes New Guide to Its AI-Powered Campaigns | Social Media Today

Will you be making TikTok a key focus of your promotions this year? The app is a cultural phenomenon, and has huge influence over key trends, which could make it a valuable placement option if you’re looking to raise brand awareness, or drive direct sales. And with the app’s future in the U.S. now secured, American brands can safely start planning their TikTok strategies once again, without the concern that it could be cut off at any time. And if you are looking at TikTok, its AI-powered Smart+ campaign option could be another consideration.

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News publishers limit Internet Archive access due to AI scraping concerns | NiemanLab

As part of its mission to preserve the web, the Internet Archive operates crawlers that capture webpage snapshots. Many of these snapshots are accessible through its public-facing tool, the Wayback Machine. But as AI bots scavenge the web for training data to feed their models, the Internet Archive’s commitment to free information access has turned its digital library into a potential liability for some news publishers. When The Guardian took a look at who was trying to extract its content, access logs revealed that the Internet Archive was a frequent crawler, said Robert Hahn, head of business affairs and licensing.

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New Yahoo Scout AI Search Delivers The Classic Search Flavor People Miss | SEJ

Yahoo has announced Yahoo Scout, a new AI-powered answer engine now available in beta to users in the United States, providing a clean Classic Search experience with the power of personalized AI. The launch also includes the Yahoo Scout Intelligence Platform, which brings AI features across Yahoo’s core products, including Mail, News, Finance, and Sports. Yahoo’s announcement states that it operates some of the most popular websites and services in the United States, reaching what they say is 90% of all internet users in the United States (based on Comscore data), through its email, news, finance, and sports properties.

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