Own Thy Audience

Advertising is still one of the most significant sources of revenue for publishers. Digital publishers are always looking to increase their ad revenue using different methods. According to a survey by Digiday, almost 36 percent of revenue to Publishers comes via programmatic sources. Header Bidding is an advanced programmatic technique where publishers offer their ad inventory for advertisers to bid on. In this episode, Aditya Shenoy, Senior Content Manager at iZooto talks to Tomer Treves, Co-Founder and President, Adnimation to understand how Header Bidding works. Tomer also explains the difference between the different types of header bidding, while revealing the best practices that every publisher should follow to maximize revenue.

Plagiarism plagues the news publishing industry, over 62% of articles published by major publications aren't unique anymore because of plagiarism. This causes articles to rank poorly on Google Search, not returning views to its fullest potential for the news publisher. But what should a news publisher do in order to tackle plagiarism? In this episode, Vivek Khandelwal, Founder at iZooto talks to Jeremy Mauboussin, Founder, Plagiashield to understand the impact of plagiarism on website traffic. They also steps that a publisher can take to safeguard their content from plagiarisers. If your content has been copied in the past, you can prevent it in the future from steps discussed in this podcast.

AI-generated text and articles have been contemplated by multiple publishers at different points in time. However there have been apprehensions about it being flagged down by Google. Can Google’s algorithm detect AI written content? What different types of content can be generated by AI? Annkur Agarwal, co-founder PriceBaba.com; Ankur Pandey, co-founder LongShot.ai and Aditya Shenoy, Senoir Content Marketing Manager, iZooto try and get answers to all these questions. Tune in!

In the next two years, more than 200 small-to-large media houses will put their exclusive and analytical content behind a paywall. This is bound to fragment the subscription market and cause further confusion among consumers. Not to forget, this can result in an uproar caused by subscription fatigue. Statistics indicate that existing subscribers and loyalists are more likely to experience subscription fatigue. So how do publishers conquer this? Join Vishal Dembla, SVP - Asia, The Economist, Nash David, Content Marketing Director, iZooto and Sunny Sen, co-founder ConsCent for an in-depth conversation where they discuss 5 ways publishers can help subscribers beat subscription fatigue.

According to Search Engine Land, zero click searches rose to 65% in 2020. It's interesting because Google then responded to this claim, alleging it as false, and that, “In reality, Google Search sends billions of clicks to websites every day, and we’ve sent more traffic to the open web every year since Google was first created.” To put an end to the debate, we decided to call in Chelsey Heath, NEWS SEO strategist at Trisolute Software Corporation, Hisham Khalil, CEO, Content Ventures Investments , Tarek Abougabal, Director of Sales - MENA, iZooto and Nash David, Director of Content Marketing, iZooto. The panel discussed what zero-click content means for publishers, the difference between visibility on Google Search and Google News, how SERP has evolved and much more. Tune in now!

Gen Z is a tough nut to crack, but engaging with them is now more crucial than ever. Tapping into this audience has marketers pulling their hair. They are social, proactive, and most importantly have massive spending power. How should one reach out, grab their attention and retain them? Ayush Wadhwa, founder and creative director at OWLED Media, who himself is a podcaster and an influencer opens up on how GenZ can be engaged. Here is what is covered What is the sutra to build a GenZ audience on social?Does GenZ engage in email?Dipping toes into Augmented reality and Virtual realityUnderrated engagement hack for driving your podcast?101 of influencer marketing for businesses out there. Encouraging genZ to subscribe

What is your top priority when it comes to ranking? Do you focus more on Google News or Google Discover? How do you measure the impact of link building alone on organic performance of the site? When so many other on-page and technical factors could also be contributing to the performance. These are some real burning questions that editors and SEO guys have been asking, for quite some time now. Which is why we got Kyle on the podcast. He had tons to contribute to the topic and also shared his viewpoints on core web vitals, amp and his relationship with editors.

Did you know that NEWS articles have less than 48 hours to rank on Google? The bread and butter of newsrooms, have a very small window to shine. Which makes getting your NEWS SEO on point even more important? So how do you do that? Listen in to Barry Adams in this episode where he talks about nailing NEWS SEO, the difference between NEWS SEO and classic SEO, and why URL and site name are no longer important.

Imagine waking up on a random day and losing 98% of your traffic and millions of dollars of revenue to Facebook? And then going ahead and creating India’s biggest regional OTT platform? That’s the story of Vinay Singhal, the founder of STAGE. In this episode he has extensively talked about what it takes to create an ultra niche product like STAGE, the vision behind it and how it has grown to become Bharat’s own Netflix. He has also focused on how he establishes maximum audience ownership, and his views on how ready India is for subscriptions.

Google every once in a while throws an update bomb and it is usually a nerve-wracking experience for publishers. Monetizing has been a challenge for publishers and still is, especially with updates making drastic changes. It becomes vital for publishers to know everything about an update to act accordingly. While E-A-T, played a central role in 2020, the Core Web Values have become an important ranking factor in 2021. Jeremy Fermont, the Director of Business Development at Multidots will talk all about the new update and tell you all about what needs to be done to make your mark out there with CWV. About Multidots Multidots is one of the most popular WordPress development agencies in the world. They help content publishers and digital agencies to accelerate their performance. Enterprise brands and global corporate groups such as Storyful, which is a NewsCorp Venture, National Associations of Broadcaster, Accenture, and MIT are few of their customers who trust them with complex and large scale WordPress and multi-platform implementations. What is Core Web Vitals all aboutThree pillars of page experience and how to measure them?Jeremy’s experience when it comes to content and page experienceHow to improve the CWV score? Top 3 things Jeremy advises customers.SEO tools you recommended to measure the CWV performance? Multidots being a WordPress-focused agency- top 3 things advise your customers to do

In a recent study of DNR 2021, the median number of subscriptions held by those who pay for news was consistently 1. This means that it has become tricky to monetize the audience through subscriptions. How can publishers stand out with their subscription offerings? What should they do to make the readers pay? Abhishek Dadoo, founder and CEO, Few Cents, talks about all this and a lot more in this episode. What should mid-size and small publishers do to get more subscriptions Building a subscriber funnelWho is a never-subscriber and how can they be encouraged to try out subscriptions? How should publishers make sure that subscribers retain and not churn?​​How can marketing play a role to increase subscriptions? How can AI help along this journey? What are important things that publishers need to look at when it comes to choosing a payment gateway?3 things publishers need to keep in mind while starting off with subscriptions?Other revenue options for various audience segments that publishers need to look atNorth star metric publishers need to track

According to Google’s Andrey Lipatt Sev, links are one of the three major ranking factors in Google. Newsrooms strive to build links but most are unaware of the different ways to do it. But it goes without saying that link building is crucial especially in the long run. Easier said than done, it has become tricky to rank well on search engines. While some say that off-page SEO is dead, Michel strongly disagrees with it and tells us why. In this episode, we have Michael Bertini, an SEO expert who specializes in enterprise-level SEO. He talks about how one can build links, measure success, and how to maximize it, and reveals some untold secrets of link building. Important to get a link back, and if ‘no follow’ links are better than do-follow links in Google’s eyesMeasuring the success of link buildingEarn a backlink from authoritative sites Off-page SEO for new publishers Ranking on Google News Influence of social media mentions in a news publisher’s performance in Google News SEO Embedding the anchor text and full URL links in news releases? Unlinked mention and the approach.

Did you know that the Google search team has a 160-page document ( book ) that outlines how the search algorithm works? Even better - Google updates this every 6 months. If you are an SEO, it really qualifies as your first starting point. Question is - how many people do you know to print that document and keep it on their desk? This is why Lily Ray stands out. Also, because she usually DJ's in the New York circuit.. But back to where we are. News, SEO, and EAT. Lily has expertise in EAT. And in this conversation, I got a chance to ask Lily about how news publishers should go thinking about their implementation for EAT. Of the various things that matter, EAT has a massive impact and most publishers haven't quite cracked it yet. We chat about the outlook on AI content, the need of building trust with the audience, and most importantly how newer publications have a shot at establishing their expertise. Lily's updates on Twitter and LinkedIn are fire and her default position on SEO is - optimize for the user and Google will follow. Google has been saying this for..... Wait. Forever. Tons of new learnings and a fresh breakdown of what EAT means for news publishers. Go ahead and give this a listen.

Building vs Buy is a decision that almost every software category struggles with. Software is eating the world. Building new tools, products, solutions is easier than ever before. The only question that remains is - Should you build it or let someone else build it for you. This is what Vivek and Aditya Bhelande - founder and CEO @ YuktaMedia sat down to answer. Aditya has been selling software to publishers and media businesses for well over 5 years and he has had his share of adventures. Right from deals going cold because internal teams wanted to build it to teams circling back after 6 months to resume sale negotiations, Aditya has seen it all. Aditya talks about the build vs buy dilemma and breaks how teams should approach this problem. Build vs Buy is a frequent conversation even internally at iZooto. We often resort to Wardley maps to figure out what is it that our customers want the most and what is it that will help us unlock maximum value. Wardley Maps is an incredibly powerful framework that helps builders, founders, product managers to identify what is it that they should be investing their time in building and what is it that they should be buying off the shelf. Listen to Vivek and Aditya chat about all things media and answering the question of build vs buy.

Building an audience-first culture has become critical, now more than ever. Marketers are gunning for ways to build an audience to take their business to new heights, but most marketers do not know how to begin. It becomes tricky when you have to just rely on experimentation without any playbook in hand. Bonnie Roche has been helping publishers build an audience for many years now. Bonnie, in this episode, shares her operating playbook to build an audience-first culture where she talks about how one can start building an audience, how it is essential to inculcate the audience-first culture within the team, and how to build a loyal audience. Key points covered - Impact of the audience first culture for the editorial teamOperating playbook she has been following for yearsBrands in the media ecosystem that share the values of audience first cultureChange in the content consumption and what it means from an audience development standpointIncreasing subscription retention and loyalty

Podcasting is the new low-hanging fruit for pubs looking for new revenue streams. The podcasting ad revenue in the US has crossed $700 mil last year with News podcasting leading the charts. But all said and done, scaling it needs an expert intervention. And that’s exactly why we invited Wil Williams, a co-founder at the Hug House Productions, to address the challenges and their workarounds while monetizing a news podcast. Here’s what the episode will help you learn -

In a country like India, there are 121 languages which are spoken by 10,000 or more people in which has a population of 121 crores. Just having content in one language does not cut it. Not anymore. The need to strategize to put together a plan to serve readers with content based on the language and region is now more important than ever. Optimize the website content according to the region the reader is in or the language that they prefer consuming information. But coming up with an SEO strategy is where most publishers get stuck. Chanpreet Singh has been doing all things SEO for over 2 decades now. In this episode, he will open up his operating playbook so that you can start off with optimizing your SEO strategy. Important points covered How should a digital publisher zero down on the languages?What parameter does Google use to identify if a page is targeted for a particular region?Different subdomain or different subdirectory? What performs better and why?Should publishers go multi-lingual, multi-regional, or does it make sense to optimize it for both? How should one optimize for multilingual search? What are the things that need to be in place before starting off with off-page SEO?How should publishers mitigate duplication content?How should one measure and track if their regional content is performing well?

42% of businesses fail because there is no market need for their product. Well, building a new product is not easy. Sometimes it so happens that one ends up building something entirely different from what would provide value to their audience. And just like that, all that effort goes down the drain. That’s why achieving product-market fit becomes critical. It could make or break a product’s success in the market. In this episode, Arie shares the checklist that you need to follow every time you build a new product. He has helped build many products for KapanLagi Universe managing the full product lifecycle, from the requirement to launch, and has also led the product team of CNN and CNBC Indonesia. Important points covered- Process of building new productsThings to check off before starting off with building a product for the readers3 must-ask questions every product manager should ask readers before working on a productHow to adapt and evolve in this ever-changing market.Once the product is built, what’s next?How can one find out if it was poor marketing or lack of product marketing fit if the results are not as expected?The most effective way to find out a product-market fit for an existing productKey metrics to track for a product that is just built? Monitoring and analytic tools publishers should make use of3 publishers, one should draw inspired fromTips and strategies for all things growth?

Podcasting has been in the marketing arena for quite some time now. They have surpassed the video wave, making audio as a medium one of the best ways to engage the audience. 80% of people listen to all or most of each episode, whereas the average reader spends just 37 seconds reading a blog post! Podcast is an intimate channel and has become a companion be it while commuting, talking a walk, or taking a break on a lazy Sunday afternoon. Unlike the video medium, which requires dedicated attention, the audio medium gives one the freedom to multi-task, helping marketers boost engagement like none other. And it is needless to say, the number of podcasts on various platforms has shot up like crazy! In this episode, we have Rob Walch, who had started podcasting way before Apple started supporting podcasts and had helped Senator Edwards, the first politician to have a podcast, produce one. Rob shares his 16 years of podcasting experience, points all the do’s and don'ts, shares the secret sauce to kickstart a podcast and outlines what marketers should be tracking.

With the duopolies ruling over, revenue from ads has become unreliable. Publishers are on a hunt for ways they increase their revenue and build their own audience. On the other hand, readers are hungry for authentic news in this era where fake news and privacy breaches are rampant. Finding news that is trustworthy and reliable has become a real challenge. The reader revenue model has seen quite an adoption, especially in the UK where readers pay for exclusive content. India is not far behind. Readers get what they pay for and publishers increase their revenue. Nandagopal Rajan tells us where the reader revenue model stands in the Indian landscape and shares insights on the what, when, and how of starting off with the reader revenue model.