WebProNews

Category: ContentManagementNews

ContentManagementNews

  • YouTube is Now Making it a Lot Cheaper to Advertise on TV

    YouTube is Now Making it a Lot Cheaper to Advertise on TV

    In its bid to capture a portion of television advertising revenues, Google’s YouTube has finally launched an option to run campaigns on TV screens. Labeled “TV screens device type” on the Google Ads platform, the option will allow advertisers to target engaged viewers watching YouTube content on their TVs.

    It’s not surprising that YouTube has added TV to its list of devices for video ads, along with computers, tablets, and mobile phones. Based on the video giant’s estimates, people watch an average of 180 million hours of YouTube on TV screens daily.

    The considerable shift isn’t harming mobile device viewership, though, as many viewers use their tablets and smartphones to stream content onto their TV screens.

    The availability of set-top boxes Roku and Apple TV, devices like Chromecasts, video game consoles, and smart TVs have paved the way for video streaming and changed viewing behavior. YouTube saw the potential and allowed marketers to develop ads tailored for TV viewing. Advertisers will also receive television-focused analytics to determine an ad’s impact on their overall campaign mix, so they can make tweaks wherever necessary.

    With the flexibility and affordability of Google Ads, YouTube advertisers can optimize and set specific bidding prices for campaigns or ad groups on different devices. After all, viewing habits tend to change depending on the platform being used. Mobile viewers, on average, watch videos in 60-minutes increments, while the watching duration for TV screens is about 4.5 hours.

    Brand awareness and ad recall may also be different on TV and mobile, but on both platforms, high-quality content on ads remains essential.

    For companies that already created amazing TV commercial ads, it’s cost-effective for them to post the video on YouTube as a way to spark more interest in their brand. They can tap into new markets while keeping their existing customers engaged. And, by uploading the video ad on YouTube, companies get the added benefit of easily uploading it to the company’s website for more views and sustained interest.

    [Featured image via YouTube TV]

  • 5 Ways Smart Marketers Repurpose Their Content

    5 Ways Smart Marketers Repurpose Their Content

    Coming up with new, high-quality content on a regular basis can be a struggle for marketers. And with billions of blog posts and other content being released daily, there’s a big chance that your content won’t even be seen by most of who it’s intended for.

    The problem of keeping up with posting fresh content is further compounded by a lack of time as your content not only needs to be good but also consistent. However, what many marketers haven’t figured out yet is that they don’t need to create new content every day. Instead, they can repurpose old content and transform it into something better.

    5 Ways Marketers Can Repurpose Content

    Assuming that you’re using Google Analytics or a similar program to track the results of your output, start by sifting through your content pile and picking out the most popular ones. Once that’s done, you can then apply several methods for repurposing your content.

    1. Transform Content into a Slide or Infographic

    Humans are visual creatures, which explains the popularity of infographics, slideshows, and graphs. Transforming your content into a visual format is one of the best ways of repurposing your work. Check your posts for pieces that could be designed into an infographic. While this format is often utilized to make statistics more appealing or to illustrate steps in a procedure more clearly, you can still use content that’s text-rich.

    Here are three things to remember when repurposing content into an infographic:

    • Make sure it’s eye-catching. (Use bright, high contrast images)
    • Only use images that are relevant and memorable.
    • Keep it simple and focused on the essential data so that you don’t overwhelm your audience.

    Here’s a tip for making charts and infographics: Try Canva or Chartgo; both are free and easy to use.

    2. Host a Webinar

    There are two trends that you should take advantage of—the demand for useful content and the popularity of video. 

    You can hit two birds with one stone by going online and hosting a webinar based on the content that you’ve already developed.

    Maybe you wrote a piece describing a new product and how it works. Instead of reposting it, conduct a webinar and teach your audience how to use your product or service step-by-step. Facebook Live, Instagram, and Snapchat are great platforms for webinars and tutorials since they’re free and very social. Users can log in and comment in real time, giving you the perfect opportunity to engage with them.

    3. Put it up on Pinterest

    You can recycle the images you’ve posted on your social media accounts with Pinterest. The photo-sharing service now has 250 million active monthly users, making it an ideal place to get attention for your brand. A reported 93 percent of Pinners have admitted to using Pinterest while planning their purchases and 87 percent said they bought a product after seeing it on the platform.

    Take advantage of this by creating a Pinterest board or post. Go over your company’s image collection or infographics and organize them by theme. You can then curate them on the platform. Don’t forget to complement your posts with similar topics or related images from other Pinners.

    4. Come Out with an eBook

    Consider bundling your most popular posts into an eBook. Use different aspects of your blog posts as chapters of your eBook. Make the copy meatier, add a table of contents, an introduction, and a conclusion.

    As a savvy marketer, you may also want to try conducting interviews of colleagues and experts within your niche. The information you collect could then be organized and sold as an eBook. Tactics like this can turn out to be quite profitable if you already have a highly engaged audience that is eager for insider information. 

    5. Turn Old Posts into a Newsletter

    Breathe new life into your blog posts by turning them into newsletters. Your followers won’t be able to see every piece of content you post, particularly if you upload new ones daily. A newsletter will ensure that they don’t miss out. You can collate the most popular or relevant posts for the week and showcase them in your newsletter. It will expand your reach and lure more subscribers to your website.

    There’s no such thing as old content. You can still get value out of your old posts by repurposing. Adding new information or placing them in a new format will go a long way in making them look new and relevant once more. More importantly, you’ll save a lot of time and effort.

    [Featured image via Pixabay]

  • How to Strategically Automate Your Facebook Page, Get More Engagement in Less Time

    How to Strategically Automate Your Facebook Page, Get More Engagement in Less Time

    Facebook might have been hit by scandals recently, but it remains the biggest social media website in the world, with a reported 2.23 billion active monthly users as of the second quarter of 2018. Given the platform’s massive user base, posting content through a Facebook Page has the potential to bring a tremendous amount of attention to your business.

    In fact, research has shown that content marketing through social media generates 3 times as many leads while costing 62 percent less than traditional marketing strategies. That’s largely due to an increase in consumers using platforms like Facebook to find the products and services they need.


    Image source: Demand Metric

    However, running a business and managing your Facebook Page takes a lot of time. You’ll need to post content consistently for it to be effective, and time is a luxury that a lot of business owners don’t have. Fortunately, automating your Page is a strategy you can use to save time and boost engagement.

    Why Should You Automate Your Facebook Page

    An active social media presence is a must for most businesses these days. And Facebook Pages are a great way to drive traffic to their website, build brand loyalty, and reach out to a targeted audience. All that for a relatively low price.

    While Facebook Pages are a wonderful source of traffic, it’s hard work to acquire followers. It takes a lot of dedication and consistent posting of high-quality content to get results. However, posting frequently can have a big impact on your business. HubSpot research has shown that businesses that post 16 times or more in a month generate 3.5 times more traffic than those that publish less than four articles within the same period.

    Image source: Hubspot

    Automation allows you to get the benefits that come with posting to your Page regularly without making a big investment in time.

    What Should You Automate

    There are several things you’ll need to handle if you want to keep your Facebook Page active and your followers engaged. While some tasks should be done manually, others can be automated. Here are some tasks that you can leave to a third-party management tool:

    • Scheduling the posting of content in advance
    • Scheduling and managing the posting of evergreen content. Since this type of content remains relevant even 6 months to a year after being posted, you can recycle these posts. A good rule of thumb to follow is to repost your evergreen content once every 3 – 6 months.
    • Sharing blog posts
    • Optimizing the intervals between posts so you don’t flood friends and followers with too many updates
    • Posting, sharing, and re-posting about an event or a Facebook contest. You can even post more often as the event or contest draws near.

    Conversely, there are tasks or actions that you should avoid automating, like following or friending people or Pages, replying or commenting on posts, and sending Direct Messages. Not only is it obvious that you’re using a bot, but some people may find it annoying or insincere.

    How to Automate a Facebook Page

    You’ll want to aim for a balance between real interaction and automation when it comes to your Facebook Page. Here are three options that you can look into:

    1. Developing a Regular Schedule for Your Facebook Posts

    Unless you plan to never sleep, you won’t be able to monitor your Facebook Page 24/7. But plotting your Facebook posts weeks or months in advance will help maintain your presence on the platform. What’s more, you can design a schedule that’s optimized for engagement.

    Research shows, the best times for posting on Facebook are on Wednesdays from noon to 2 p.m. and on Thursdays from 1 p.m. to 2 p.m. People tend to be more engaged with brands during these time frames.

    Posting between 10 a.m. and 3 p.m. on weekdays also gives good results. Meanwhile, early mornings and evenings have the least consumer engagement.

    2. Selecting a Good Bot

    Bots are another automation option to consider. More brands are now using Facebook Messenger bots to help simplify communication between the company and consumers. These bots can reply to questions in real time, do upselling, and even help prospective clients make a purchase decision. The bots answers can also be customized to sound friendlier and more human. What’s more, the use of bots can lessen your employees’ workload, thus allowing them to be more productive at other tasks.

    3. Hire a Social Media Manager

    If running your business and managing your Facebook Page is starting to overwhelm you, then it might be time to consider hiring a virtual assistant or social media manager. Remember that successful business owners know when to ask for help. A reliable virtual assistant, along with a good scheduling tool, can do wonders in managing your page, building your presence on Facebook, and handling customer service. It will also give you time to focus on the essentials of growing your business.

    Having an active Facebook Page is a useful marketing tool that shouldn’t be overlooked. Unfortunately, managing one can be time-consuming and labor-intensive. Automating your Page by using a scheduling app or chatbots can save time while ensuring that you maintain a strong presence online. Just make sure that you still keep a personal or human touch to your interactions with your Page followers.

    [Featured image via Pixabay]

  • What are Retargeting Ads and Why Should Your Business Use Them?

    What are Retargeting Ads and Why Should Your Business Use Them?

    Online retailers and small businesses understand how crucial advertising is in driving traffic to their websites. Unfortunately, 97 percent of first-time site visitors will leave without buying anything. There’s a big chance that they won’t ever come back unless you can find a way to convince them to return. One way to go about this is by retargeting them.

    What are Retargeting Ads?

    Have you noticed that some of the ads you see while browsing a site or checking your Facebook feed are from a website that you previously visited? That is retargeting. These ads either offer you customized deals on items you previously looked at or remind you of an abandoned cart. They can help your business re-engage consumers who visited your online store but didn’t push through with a purchase. These ads ensure that your brand is kept in front of bounced traffic even after your prospects have left your website.

    How Do These Ads Work?

    Retargeting is an ad technology that redisplays your company’s product or service to consumers who had shown an interest. If someone visits your product page or downloads your app, that’s a pretty good indication that they’re interested in your brand.

    Retargeting utilizes a simple Javascript code called a “cookie” that allows you to “follow” your audience. This inconspicuous, little code is integrated on your website. An undisclosed browser cookie is then dropped whenever a new visitor lands on your site.

    Image source: Hubshout

    Once the visitor tagged with the cookie starts to browse, the code informs your retargeting provider when to serve your ads. The prospective client will then see your ads popping up while they’re playing a game, listening to music, reading an article, or browsing another store. For example, if a visitor checked a product page for a blue blazer but didn’t buy it, an ad retargeting them would show the same blazer and maybe a deal slashing the price by 15 percent. Or they might see an ad showing similar apparel.

    Image source: RevLocal

    Your ads will remind them of their interest in your product and hopefully bring them back to your website. Site visitors who see retargeted ads are 70 percent more likely to make a purchase.

    Why Should Your Business Consider Retargeting Ads?

    You won’t be able to convince all your site visitors to buy your product or try your services. The best that you can hope for is to keep them interested while they decide whether they are willing to try your brand. In order to do this, you have to utilize more than one marketing channel. Google revealed that integrating retargeting with other marketing campaigns can help you close up to 50 percent more deals. That’s because most shoppers are more likely to notice the products that they had previously looked up. 

    Retargeting ads are also 10 times more effective than conventional display ads. The former’s click-through rate is close to 0.7 percent while the latter only has a CTR of 0.07 percent. It’s understandable that small businesses would typically opt for display ads. But a retargeting campaign is still relatively affordable and can complement any ad strategy.

    Here’s the Kicker

    Retargeting is a powerful and compelling conversion and branding optimization tool. However, this strategy is more effective when used in conjunction with a bigger digital marketing campaign.

    Strategies like AdWords, content marketing, and targeted display are good for driving traffic, but they’re not as effective when it comes to optimizing conversion. Meanwhile, retargeting helps boost conversions but can’t drive traffic to websites. It’s best to combine the tools that push traffic and retargeting ads. You’ll get the best of both worlds while helping your brand make its mark.

    [Featured image via Pixabay]

  • 4 Strategies for Enterprise Content Management Success

    4 Strategies for Enterprise Content Management Success

    At the recent Enterprise World 2018 Conference, Stephen Ludlow, VP of Product Marketing at OpenText, spoke about the 4 strategies for content management success. He emphasized that there is actually a shift to content services from Enterprise Content Management. This is because ECM was mostly looked at as the lead application and content services represents a shift to consumable services that can be embedded into business processes and business applications.

    1. Differentiate “ECM: Use-Cases

    “The basics of ECM involving managing large amounts of structured and unstructured information is really differentiating itself into two significant work and use cases,” notes Ludlow. He said that the first one he would consider is the digital workplace, all the tools to make end users more productive in their day to day work, in particular around ad-hoc collaboration and communication. The other side of that is all the things around the digital business in order to make your business process more productive. That’s typically where we see content services being used to extend into business processes and business applications.

    2. Amazing User Experience

    “We think we need to provide an amazing user experience in order to drive user satisfaction, but also to drive efficiency for the end user and by doing so drive adoption of content services,” says Michael Sybala, VP of Product Engineering and Product Management at OpenText.” This is an area that OpenText has excelled at in my experience.

    3. Workspaces Instead of Taxonomies

    “If you ask me the taxonomy organizations that have deployed have ruined more ECM projects in the world than anything else I know of,” said Ludlow. “How many people have dealt with an enormous set of folders that have been created to try and organize permissions, to create and organize metadata and try and organize information? Everybody’s been through that sort of scenario.” He says that unfortunately this typically models the business rather than the business processes. for success Ludlow recommends that you use a workspace instead of a taxonomy to organize your information. “Using a workspace approach will make your users more effective,” notes Ludlow.

    4. Extend Content Services and Ux Into Business Applications

    “The concept of workspace is fundamental to build the integrations, we call it the extensions, into leading business applications,” says Sybala. “In large part that’s actually the secret sauce of our (OpenText’s) success over the last couple of years. It’s centered around how do we integrate into leading applications in order to serve those leading applications and the processes which are driven by them.” Applications may be in finance, procurement, HR, etc., but the key is to embed content management natively into the process so that the employee, partner or even customer can work seamlessly, possibly not even noticing that they are task jumping from platform to platform.

  • Publishers Express Discontent Over Google’s GDPR Plan

    Publishers Express Discontent Over Google’s GDPR Plan

    A group of international publishers is dissatisfied over Google’s compliance strategy for the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) privacy rules. Set to take effect on May 25, the rules require companies to gain explicit consent for personal data collection and use for ad targeting.

    The trade groups, namely, Digital Content Next, European Publishers Council, News Media Alliance, and News Media Association, published an open letter addressed to Google CEO Sundar Pichai on April 30. In it, they criticized the tech giant for passing on an unreasonable burden to them in exchange for continued access to its advertising services.

    Google outlined its consent plan on its AdWords blog in late March. However, the publishers protested that the plan was revealed too late and encumbered them with the bulk of the compliance responsibilities. As publishers using Google ad services, they have to obtain consent directly from EU users. They expressed their discontent in the open letter:

    “As the major provider of digital advertising services to publishers, we find it especially troubling that you would wait until the last minute before the GDPR comes into force to announce these terms, as publishers have now little time to assess the legality or fairness of your proposal and how best to consider its impact on their own GDPR compliance plans, which have been underway for a long time.” 

    Under the new privacy framework, there are stricter consent requirements for processing personal data collected from EU users. It protects the rights of EU citizens regarding how their data can be used. The law will also impose hefty fines and significant legal liabilities for noncompliance or mishandling of user data, which will likely fall on the publishers’ shoulders.

    However, the groups pointed out that Google’s singular approach in ensuring compliance from its publishers and advertisers is inaccurate. They added that it only protects Google’s existing business model, given its dominance in online advertising.

    According to the group, Google wants to identify itself as a data controller and asks publishers to share their gathered data. For its other ad services like Google Analytics, the company considers itself a data processor but with extensive rights over gathered information.

    The publishers underscored the lack of transparency under the compliance plan. They are wary of Google’s reluctance to provide specific information about its planned use of data, a must in obtaining legal consent under GDPR.

    But Google pointed out that it will only use the data for testing algorithms, enhancing user experiences, and improving the accuracy of its ad forecasting system.  Google clarified in a statement:

    “Because we make decisions on data processing to help publishers optimize ad revenue, we will operate as a controller across our publisher products in line with GDPR requirements, but this designation does not give us any additional rights to their data.”

    The tech giant also added that the draft on guidance consent was released in December and continues to be revised, prompting Google to put out the new ad policy only this year.

  • What You Should Know About Google’s GDPR Consent Plan for Publishers

    What You Should Know About Google’s GDPR Consent Plan for Publishers

    Google wants its publishers in Europe to solicit users’ consent on its behalf under the new General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) privacy rules. The GDPR rules which will take effect on May 25, requires companies to gain explicit consent for collection and use of personal information in targeted ads. And Google’s consent plan is something that ad giants like Facebook and Amazon can follow.

    “To comply, we will be updating our EU consent policy when the GDPR takes effect and the revised policy will require that publishers take extra steps in obtaining consent from their users,” the company explained in its blog post on Thursday.

    Obtaining users’ permission secondhand is legal, according to the experts. But for own platforms such as Google.com, Gmail, and YouTube, Google will directly get consent from its users.

    Under the GDPR, there are two categories of data handlers, the controller, and the processor. Controllers are identified as the source of data, like website owners and publishers. Processors, such as marketing technology providers, do the actual processing of data collected from external sources.

    Google, with its myriad of products, platforms, and services, cannot be simply classified as a controller or processor. The company identifies itself as a controller for some of its ad products, including DoubleClick for Publishers (DFP), DoubleClick Ad Exchange (AdX), AdWords, and AdSense. On the other hand, Google operates as a processor of personal data gathered in services like Ads Data Hub, and Google Analytics, among others.

    Image result for gdpr scale google

    However, Google said that it will introduce new contract terms and take on the role of co-controller of user data for its publishers. This gives the tech giant autonomy over gathered data and its for their own purposes. At the same time, Google is sharing the burden of protecting the data especially since noncompliance with the new law could result in hefty fines.

    “The concern with GDPR is, everybody in the data supply chain could become liable. If the publisher fails to get sufficient consent for Google when [Google’s] tags or pixels are on [the publisher’s] site, the publisher could be potentially liable. Google, of course, could certainly be liable for collecting that data without the proper GDPR compliance process,” Gary Kibel, partner at law firm Davis & Gilbert, explained.

    By formulating its own consent plan as a joint controller, Google may be able to ensure compliance from its publishers. Likewise, it reduces the risk of publishers collecting data without obtaining consent.

    But as more people decline to give consent for personal data use, publishers might have a hard time earning money from targeted ads. As a countermeasure, Google plans to roll out non-personalized ads to help publishers. It will also be working with industry groups, such as IAB Europe, for other solutions ahead of the May 25 deadline.

    [Featured image via Google]

  • Google Wants to Bring Fast-Loading AMP Technology to the Entire Web

    Google Wants to Bring Fast-Loading AMP Technology to the Entire Web

    Google has been trying to relieve publisher concerns over its Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP) technology. On Thursday, the company announced that it wants to make the technology available to the entire web by turning it into an industry standard.

    By using Google’s AMP, websites load quicker on mobile devices like smartphones and tablets. However, AMP uses a nonstandard web technology from Google’s domain wherein published articles resides on the company’s servers. This means that web addresses link only to Google, robbing publishers of site visits and potential ad earnings.

    On the upside, articles posted on AMP are prominently featured on Google’s Top Stories “carousel” in the mobile search results, giving publishers the spotlight.

    Google also wants to help drive traffic to non-AMP websites by featuring them in its carousel, but on one condition: these sites must have speed benefits similar to that of AMP’s. Faster site loading times are primarily traced to AMP’s nonstandard technologies, such as Web Packaging, Feature Policy, and Paint Timing, among others. In simpler terms, Web Packaging is like a compressed file for web content while Feature Policy is useful in switching off particular browser features. Among the long list of features, the AMP team underscored the importance of Web Packaging technology in allowing pages to load offline.

    “Based on what we learned from AMP, we now feel ready to take the next step and work to support more instant-loading content not based on AMP technology in areas of Google Search designed for this, like the Top Stories carousel,” AMP Project tech lead Malte Ubl said.

    “This content will need to follow a set of future web standards and meet a set of objective performance and user experience criteria to be eligible,” Ubl further expressed in a blog post on Thursday.

    Though Google seems committed to using AMP to improve the web, It wasn’t able to give a clear-cut timeline for implementing the changes it proposed. For now, the tech giant is simply encouraging publishers to continue utilizing AMP.

    “Meanwhile, AMP will be Google’s well-lit path to creating great user experiences on the web. It will be just one of many choices, but it will be the one we recommend,” Ubl wrote.

  • Rupert Murdoch’s Solution to Facebook’s Fake News Problem: Pay the Publishers

    Rupert Murdoch’s Solution to Facebook’s Fake News Problem: Pay the Publishers

    Days after Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced a new strategy to determine which news outlets can be trusted, Rupert Murdoch proposed another way to solve the fake new problem that has been bugging the social media platform. Murdoch, executive chairman of publishing empire News Corporation, proposed that social media platforms pay publishers for “trusted” content.

    Murdoch is specifically targeting Facebook and Google, the two companies that are now acting as gateways exercising considerable influence on how news gets distributed. Of course, the two companies are considered a duopoly in online advertising, owning the lion share of the market.

    Instead of popularizing “scurrilous news sources through algorithms that are profitable for these platforms but inherently unreliable,” Murdoch is now urging Facebook and Google to pay money for content from trusted news sources.  Murdoch proposed an arrangement similar to carriage fees or a charge paid by satellite and cable television providers to local broadcast stations as payment for the right to broadcast locally. Murdoch expressed his opinion via a statement on the News Corp website.

    “If Facebook wants to recognize ‘trusted’ publishers then it should pay those publishers a carriage fee similar to the model adopted by cable companies. The publishers are obviously enhancing the value and integrity of Facebook through their news and content, but are not being adequately rewarded for those services. Carriage payments would have a minor impact on Facebook’s profits but a major impact on the prospects for publishers and journalists.”

    Fake news is a persistent issue that Facebook has been facing lately. Previously, the social media giant was accused of enabling the spread of fake political news during the U.S. and French presidential elections. Last August, this prompted the company to block ads from publishers who share fake news. Just last week, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced a new way to combat news by letting the platform’s users decide for themselves which outlet they think is reliable.

    At the moment, neither Google nor Facebook issued a comment on Murdoch’s proposal.

    [Featured image via YouTube]

  • IBM: Watson to Predict the Future and Truly Change the World

    IBM: Watson to Predict the Future and Truly Change the World

    Within 10 years, IBM believes that it’s artificial intelligence driven Watson will literally predict the future. “It won’t be long before Watson is predicting the future,” said Dr. John E. Kelly III, IBM senior vice president of Cognitive Solutions and IBM Research, at the World of Watson conference in Las Vegas yesterday. “Doctors, for example, may use Watson to help predict when a diabetic patient is about to have a blood sugar spike.”

    He added, “When that happens, then we truly, truly, have changed the world.”

    “The technology is not even moving fast,” he says. “It’s accelerating. It’s moving faster and faster every day. Honestly, it blows my mind and I’m an optimist.”

    Can Watson ever become creative? He noted the difficulty of that question and then realized that Watson is already being creative with Chef Watson and Cognitive music, where it’s actually writing songs.

    We are potentially reaching a world-changing moment with AI and its capability to think, create and even predict.

  • AdSense Publishers Can Add Ads to Matched Content

    Nearly a year ago, Google announced the launch of Matched Content for AdSense publishers. This is a free content recommendation tool that shows more of your content to users. It generates what Google describes as “contextually relevant and personalized” article recommendations from the pages on our site.

    The company announced on Friday that you can now use Matched Content units to directly generate revenue by allowing ads to appear alongside the recommended content.

    “With the new ‘Allow ads’ feature, relevant ads will appear within your Matched content units, and will be styled to complement the look and feel of your content recommendations,” explains product manager Tobias Maurer. “We’ll gradually roll this feature out to all Matched content eligible publishers across the globe over the coming weeks. To enable ads, visit your My ads tab and choose ‘Allow ads’ for your Matched content units.”

    “Matched content is available for sites with multiple pages with unique images and high volumes of traffic,” says Maurer. “Have a look at the site management settings in your account to see if your sites are eligible and to get started with Matched content. Matched content units don’t count towards your Google content ad limit per page.”

    To see if your site is eligible for Matched Content, you’ll have to check in the “Site Management” section of your AdSense account. Google regularly checks the eligibility. More on this here.

    You can also read up on best practices for Matched Content here.

    Image via Google

  • Big Facebook News For Anyone Publishing Content

    Big Facebook News For Anyone Publishing Content

    Facebook announced that on April 12, it will open Instant Articles to all publishers. This means that any publisher, regardless of size, will have this same content advantage as the major players Facebook has already catered to with the offering. If you create content, listen up!

    Do you plan to implement Facebook Instant Articles? Do you expect it to be an advantage? Share your thoughts in the comments.

    So far, Facebook has been allowing a few hundred publishers to take advantage, but this should mean a better user experience for many more pieces of content in users’ News Feeds.

    To be clear, Facebook says it’s extending the offering to any content publisher or blog. If you have a blog, you’ll be able to utilize Instant Articles.

    If you don’t have a blog, why the heck not? As we recently saw in a study from TrackMaven, blogs are frequently overlooked by businesses these days in favor of social media channels like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, etc. But blogs can still be very effective and utilizing them more often can help you out a lot. Hopefully Instant Articles will only add momentum.

    You can sell and serve your own display ads in Instant Articles and keep 100% of the revenue. You can also monetize unsold inventory using display ads from Facebook’s Audience Network.

    You don’t have to create original content for Facebook. It’s just another way to distribute content you’re already producing. When someone shares an Instant Article on Twitter or by email, it also shares a link to your site.

    Beyond loading quickly, Instant Articles offer publishers some other interesting functionality such as autoplay videos that begin as readers scroll, the ability to zoom in on photos while tilting the phone, the ability to like and comment on individual photos and videos in a story, geo-tagged images, and swipable photo galleries.

    Product manager Josh Roberts says:

    Media organizations and journalists are an integral part of Facebook, and we’re committed to delivering products that will create the best experience for publishers and their readers. With Instant Articles, publishers have full control over the look of their stories, as well as data and ads. They have the ability to bring their own direct-sold ads and keep 100% of the revenue, and track data on the ads served through their existing ad measurement systems, or they can monetize their content through the Facebook Audience Network. Additionally, publishers can use their existing web-based analytics systems to track article traffic or use third-party providers. They can do all this while accessing a rich suite of multimedia tools to create dynamic, interactive stories, that will load quickly everywhere on Facebook, regardless of where in the world their readers are.

    We’ve made it easy for publishers to join by building a system based on the tools they already use. Instant Articles uses the languages of the web and works with publishers’ content management systems, and we have documented an open standard that is easy for publishers to adopt. We encourage all interested publishers to review our documentation and prepare for open availability in April, at which point they will be able to share this fast, interactive experience with their readers.

    Regarding content and audience analytics, Instant Articles supports comScore attribution, and publishers can use their existing analytics systems or third-party providers like Google Analytics or Omniture. The company is also in talks with European attribution and measurement providers.

    Facebook also lets publishers track reader-engagement with its own analytics tools. In addition to aggregate activity data, it provides info on article reach and engagement, time spent in each article, scroll-depth and engagement with rich media assets like photos and videos.

    The Instant Articles themselves so far appear for iPhone and Android users. Facebook says they work for any article type from daily coverage to long-form, in-depth articles.

    In case you’re wondering how much work it’s going to take to implement Instant Articles, Facebook says it has tried to make things as easy as possible.

    “After some basic setup, publishers can automate Instant Article production directly from their own content management systems, via RSS,” the company explains in an FAQ document. “Facebook provides tools so publishers can see all the items in their Facebook publishing feed and edit or revise content manually. Facebook also provides tools for publishers to preview articles before publication.”

    You’re no doubt wondering if using Instant Articles will help you in News Feed ranking and organic reach. Facebook’s official answer is no, but I’m sure it won’t hurt. They certainly seem to favor Facebook videos over YouTube videos.

    The April 12 launch date coincides with Facebook’s f8 developer conference, so there will no doubt be plenty of related takeaways coming out of that.

    F8 registration opened up earlier this month. You can apply here. They’ll also stream the event online.

    Google’s answer to Instant Articles – the open source AMP (which is being adopted by a variety of other organizations) – will get its real start for users this month when Google starts sending search traffic to the pages.

    Between AMP and Instant Articles, the mobile user experience in general is probably about to get a lot better over the coming months.

    Are you going to implement Instant Articles with your content? What about AMP? Let us know in the comments.

    Image via Facebook

  • StumbleUpon News Could Be Good News For Content Creators

    StumbleUpon News Could Be Good News For Content Creators

    What once was one of the biggest drivers of traffic to websites has been struggling a bit, but could be poised to make a significant comeback. In fact, it still is a significant traffic-driver for some sites, but it sounds like new corporate changes could create renewed focus, and that should only mean good things for websites that do get traffic from it.

    Have you seen significant referral traffic from StumbleUpon at anytime over the years? Would you like to see it make a comeback? Share your thoughts in the comments.

    We recently learned that StumbleUpon was reportedly in the process of laying off dozens of employees, though when we reached out to the company for comment, we were unable to get any.

    Now, the story is becoming a little more clear. Garrett Camp, who co-founded the company back in 2001 (while still in grad school) announced that he is finalizing the process of becoming the majority shareholder of the company, and will be advising the management team on the “best way to bring serendipitous discovery to a wider audience.”

    In other words, the guy who made StumbleUpon great in the first place is getting more involved again.

    The company sold to eBay back in 2007 before being sold back to Camp and partners two years later. He held the CEO role of the company up until 2012 and has remained chairman while he worked on other companies like Uber and Expa, which is a startup studio.

    Camp says, “Some difficult changes to the product and company will be needed, and these changes will take time. But I strongly believe that systems like StumbleUpon play an important role in helping people discover what matters most to them. I’m excited to work with the team on product once again, getting back-to-basics and improving recommendations, while exploring potential synergies between SU and Expa.”

    He notes that while he is focused on Expa as that company’s CEO, he has never stopped thinking about content discovery and how it can be improved. He is also calling upon StumbleUpon users to make suggestions about how they think the service can be better.

    While StumbleUpon may not be on your mind that often these days, there is still a place for it in the content discovery/social media landscape. Anything the company does to keep users engaged is ultimately good for content creators.

    Four years ago, StumbleUpon was the biggest driver of social media traffic to websites. Even bigger than Facebook. It’s fallen out of favor since then, but based on data released earlier this year by Shareaholic, it still takes the number four spot behind Facebook, Pinterest, and Twitter. It was still leading over reddit, Google+, LinkedIn, and YouTube, and it was even on the rise.

    Camp is right in that content discovery can still be better, and few companies have proven to have the kind of impact in that department that StumbleUpon has over the years. The greatest strength of StumbleUpon can be summed up in a comment that Camp makes in his announcement. It helps people “find content they otherwise wouldn’t have thought to search for.”

    You could argue that others listed in the chart above do the same thing, yet StumbleUpon’s approach has always been unique, and that’s why even today there’s something special about it. It’s the randomness that it allows users to engage in alongside the controlled randomness (randomness within categories) aided by the quality control of the crowd.

    It will be interesting to see what changes are made with Camp back in the fold. Personally, I’d like to see the Explore box make a comeback. The former feature let users “stumble” through content focused on specific keywords as opposed to broader topics. There was a lot of potential there as an alternative search tool, but it ultimately fell by the wayside.

    According to VentureBeat, which first reported on the layoffs, StumbleUpon had just under 100 employees, and would only have about 30 after the cuts. It also said they were “preserving people in engineering and sales roles.”

    Do you see StumbleUpon as being a part of your content marketing strategy moving forward? Do you expect Camp’s return to make a significant difference in the direction of the company for the better? Share your thoughts in the comments.

    Images via Wikimedia Commons, Shareaholic

  • A Multi-Vendor Approach to Handling Today’s Content Management Requirements

    Here is an interesting report I received from Forrester, Plan your ECM Strategy For Business, Persuasive, Transactional, And Foundational Needs by Stephen Powers and Alan Weintraub with Matthew Brown and Anjali Yakkundi. They note that enterprises are now struggling under increasing volumes of varying types of content (aka multi-channel information overload).

    In the past firms have taken a product-specific approach to their enterprise content management (ECM) strategies: “document management for office docs, web content management for online content, records management for corporate records, and so on.” Now the reports argues when “developing a content strategy, they should consider persuasive, transactional, and foundational content functionality to support specific business use cases.”  They suggest taking a content centric approach rather than a tool centric approach to handle this complexity. This makes sense to me.

    They discuss three types of content: transactional, business, and persuasive. Transactional content often originates outside the enterprise from customers and partners. It often relies on complex workflows or business process management to drive processes. Formats include scanned e-forms, faxes, print streams from back-office applications, and electronic records.

    Business content starts within the enterprise and is part of workers daily tasks. Business content includes office documents, presentations, spreadsheets, e-forms, web content, and mobile content. Persuasive content may originate from many sources. There are many use cases including: “multichannel marketing, lead generation, eCommerce, customer self-service, in-store kiosks, and partner extranets.” Here tools such as web content management come into play.

    The authors provide a useful framework that shows how foundational issues go across these three content types. They the look at how the different tool types fit into this matrix. They conclude that you need to remain flexible as you handle the increasing complexity of content types today. I found it a useful way to think beyond traditional approaches to content management that were operating when I helped implement these systems a few years back.

    Originally published at Portals and KM