The Weekly Bulletin | March 12, 2024

Hi SODP community,

Let’s recap on what’s been happening, the new content, industry updates, tips, and more.

TIP OF THE WEEK

Google's latest experiment, the "Popular Opinions" search carousel, is making first-perspective-driven content discovery. However, amidst all this, one thing remains constant: the importance of quality content and adherence to Google News policies.

Here are some practical tips to enhance your strategy:

1. Optimize Your Open Graph Tags: Elevate your social media metadata with user scent copy. If your CMS has an AI feature for this, do leverage it.
   

2. Increase Google Publisher Centre Followers: Expand your follower base to curate a user-centric content environment.
   

3. Leverage Paid Social Traffic: Amplify your reach by tapping into trending topics with strategic paid social campaigns. Time will tell the effectiveness of this outside of meta/FB.
   

4. Reverse Engineer Content Performance: Analyze metrics and double down on successful content strategies to drive engagement.
   

5. Focus on Interest-Driven Headlines: Craft compelling headlines that resonate with your audience's interests to optimize click-through rates.
   

6. Refresh Evergreen Content: Stay relevant by periodically re-optimizing and refreshing your evergreen content during trending periods.

Remember to uphold Google's News policies by ensuring:

• Clear disclosure of sponsored content to maintain eligibility for news surfaces

• Transparency is your watchword

• Your content is free from misleading information.

SODP POSTS

Sponsored
Labrador CMS Q&A: Moving Beyond a Headless CMS for Greater Publisher Flexibility and Speed

The landscape of Content Management Systems (CMS) in the realm of digital publishing and newsrooms is rapidly evolving.

The shift toward headless CMS solutions is gaining momentum among publishers seeking greater flexibility and agility – the headless CMS software market was valued at $592.43 million in 2022 and was projected to reach $672.09 million by the end of 2023.

Labrador CMS aims to take it a step further, distinguishing itself by offering an API-driven approach that transcends conventional headless systems. With this in mind, we sat down with the CEO of Labrador CMS, Jan Thoresen, to discuss what advantages journalists, newsrooms, and publishers in general have when utilizing Labrador CMS – “a tool of modern journalists”.

How Meta’s Refusal to Pay for News Affects Australian Journalism – And Our Democracy

When we speak of media freedom, we generally mean it in terms of freedom from unnecessary legal restrictions, so journalists and their sources are not threatened with prosecution for exposing the misdeeds of governments.

But a recent announcement by Meta (Facebook’s parent company) that it will stop paying for Australian news content poses a different kind of threat to media freedom.

The most progressive media freedom laws in the world are meaningless if news companies can’t afford to hire experienced journalists to run expensive investigations. It doesn’t matter how free the laws are if there are no journalists to do the reporting.

A key part of any successful democracy is a free media, capable of interrogating the powerful and holding governments to account. Even in a world overflowing with digital content, we recognise the need for good journalism, produced to ethical and professional standards, to help inform public debate and good policy-making.

JOB BOARD

➡️ CNET is looking for a wellness editor (Remote, US). SEE MORE

➡️ Nine is looking for an afternoon editor. (Sydney, NSW, Australia). SEE MORE

COMMUNITY BUZZ

Industry News

➡️ Reuters Institute factsheet: Only 24% of the 174 top editors across the 240 brands covered are women, despite the fact that, on average, 40% of journalists in the 12 markets are women. In 2023, this figure was 22% across the same markets. READ MORE

➡️ New research suggests that publishers may not derive the same benefits from using social media as they did previously. There is no clear connection between social media engagement and page views for news publishers, according to the study. READ MORE

Social Media Discussions

➡️ Simon Doherty on LinkedIn:

Print magazines are making a big comeback. Media research firm Enders Analysis report that there were 330 magazine launches last year.

Most of the new magazines are indie titles with little to no ads and a cover price of around £15.

Why are print magazines coming back do you think? Are people are craving hard copies of things? Are people realising that spending time offline is good for their wellbeing?

READ THE FULL POST

These are the highlights for the last week.

Until next!

Vahe Arabian and the editorial team at SODP