It’s not new information that content has transcended from print media, onto the virtual space. As digital content continues to flourish, content creators see the need to adopt the latest technology trends. In 2019, digital ad revenue surpassed the previous years, in a first. While the quality of the content will be given the highest priority, focus will also be on highly specialized audience segmentation. Established media organisations have turned towards multi-platform integration, with a united vision in place. As digital content creators, it is imperative to understand not only the medium but also the application of it, to garner visibility and viewership.
What is currently a trend in digital publishing may as well grow to be a norm. With the speed and the potential reach, some trends will not take very long to be a norm. Therefore, it is essential to understand these trends to be able to streamline your digital content towards success.
Content Remains At The Pinnacle:
With the availability of content online, and the magnitude of it, focus remains on content. Content of any kind is not randomly disseminated. It is done after a thorough research and understanding of who the end consumer is. Highly specialized and in-depth studies are conducted to understand audience demographics and behaviour. It isn’t just man-power that is utilised for this, rather artificial intelligence and machine learning provide first hand data on consumer behaviour. It works on understanding the intrinsic details of the consumer, therefore giving more insight on how a content creator would target that. Conducting content audits should also be helpful. By doing so, you simply analyze the work you’ve done and strategize on how you could make it better and optimize the same.
Optimizing Search:
Search engine optimization essentially works to generate traffic into your website or page. As a publisher, it is equally important for you to reach your audience. Using the tools available to do so, it becomes easier to reach them. Ranking on top of search is pertinent to getting traffic to the website. By investing in thorough search engine optimization, publishers will be able to gather their audience. As digital content publishers, you understand that content is ephemeral and the chances of going viral is a million to one. Therefore, search engine optimization would enable sustaining an audience over a period of time. One must also remain conscious of not over-doing it. If you were to fill your content with excessive jargon and keywords, it would be cumbersome for the reader to understand and gauge the authenticity of the content.
User-Friendly Interface:
Something that is so integral to digital content but goes unnoticed is user-friendly interface. Overtime, if there isn’t a technological overhaul to meet new demands that publishers have, the interface is rendered redundant. It is important to update that interface so as to increase the ease of visiting and staying on the page. Aspects like the time it takes to load the page, the navigation of the content in terms of organisation and the like. It helps to have dedicated tech teams who look into optimizing the page to perform best under all circumstances.
Requirements From A Content Management System:
Many digital publishers depend on external content management systems to disseminate their content. While there is full control over the content, the lack of control over the front-end elements contributes to a stagnant interface. Firstly, as a digital content creator you will have to choose what kind of CMS would work best for you. The key factors which should help you make a decision is what extent of control you will have over the overall interface. The intuitiveness of the CMS to understand your needs as the publisher is important. Your CMS should support cross-channel publishing and across different categories of people like clients, potential clients and other stakeholders.
Monetizing Content:
One way for digital publishers to create valuable content and have it reach the target audience is through monetization of their content. A new successful revenue model that's largely used by publishers are paywalls, where their audience has to pay to access content. Creating a subscription-based content increases the potential of a loyal target audience who will invest on the content, hoping to get a worthwhile return on their investment. For the digital content creator as well, it gives more definition and shape to the consumer behavior. This further makes it easier for the publisher to know the audience.
As a digital publisher, you understand that content determines your success or failure in the domain, but without a strong CMS, you will not be able to deliver the content to its full potential. All aspects of digital publishing work in tandem and it’s best to seek out maximum compatibility of these with each other.
At Quintype, we focus to build a suite of products that allows digital publishers to manage content, engage audience and monetize content with ease. Learn more about our products at www.quintype.com.