The Weekly Bulletin | January 17, 2024

Catch up on your members' content, check out the community buzz, and browse through job opportunities

Author

Vahe Arabian
January 17, 2024

Hi SODP community,

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

TIP OF THE WEEK

2024 is a historic election year, with more than 2 billion voters set to go to the polls in 50 countries, including India and the USA. Live blogging is a crucial tool for enhancing News SEO and offers several valuable tactics for newsrooms to implement. 

Live Blogging: Key Benefits

  1. Real-time updates: Live blogging provides timely and real-time updates on breaking news events, making it highly attractive to both readers and search engines. Search engines prioritize fresh content, and live blogs deliver just that.

  2. Improved search visibility: Constant updates and new information keep live blogs relevant, increasing their chances of ranking higher in top stories. This heightened visibility drives more organic traffic to news websites.

  3. Enhanced user engagement: Live blogs engage readers by offering continuous, bite-sized information updates. This keeps users on the page longer, improving overall user experience and engagement rate.

Tactics for Effective Live Blogging

  1. On-page optimization & relevancy: Prioritize relevant angles and clusters in live blog content to improve search engine ranking. Incorporate trending and event-specific keywords to capture a larger audience.

  2. Multimedia integration: Enhance engagement by including images, videos, and social media posts in your live blog. These elements provide a more comprehensive and visually appealing coverage of the event.

  3. Regular updates: Consistently update the live blog with fresh information to maintain its relevance and attract returning visitors. Frequent updates also signal to search engines that the content is active and authoritative.

  4. Clear structure: Organize the live blog with clear headings, subheadings, and bullet points to improve readability and help search engines understand the content's structure.

  5. Social sharing: Encourage readers to share live blog updates on social media platforms. Social signals, such as shares and likes, can positively impact SEO rankings.

  6. Mobile optimization: Ensure that the live blog is mobile-friendly, as an increasing number of users access news content on mobile devices. Responsive design and fast loading times are essential for SEO and user experience.

  7. Live chat and interaction: Incorporate live chat or comment sections to foster interaction with readers. Engaging with the audience and addressing their questions or comments can boost user engagement and time spent on the page.

  8. Post-event recap: After the event concludes, create a summary or follow-up article that recaps the live blog's highlights. This consolidated content can serve as a valuable resource and further improve SEO.

Considerations when planning your live news/blogging strategy can include:

  • Choose the right live blog software

  • Plan your coverage before the event

  • Develop data integrations for events and election centres (where applicable)

  • Make sure your hosting has a good infrastructure to manage concurrent traffic

  • Create templates to prevent replicating the creation of live events

  • Plan for one or two main live coverage avenues to start with, and then expand

  • Use existing audiences across channels i.e. email/push notifications to get initial momentum

In conclusion, if you are seriously considering to implement live blogging, ensure you have the dedicated resources and infrastructure to execute it comprehensively, because with great efforts come great rewards.

SODP REPORT

Local Publisher Content Strategies in Australia

Local Publisher Content Strategies in Australia

We are excited to share with you our inaugural study of independent, locally focused publishers in Australia. This study examines small-scale publishers' strategies to grow their businesses to provide others with insights they can apply to their operations.

WP PUBLISHER SUCCESS WEEK

WP Week

We are delighted to announce the latest educational opportunity for digital publishers – WP Publisher Success Week.

WP Publisher Success Week features four sessions – 1 per day – during the last week of February. A mix of panel discussions, workshops, and presentations, the sessions present an opportunity for digital publishers to learn WordPress best practices from leading experts. Register for one or all sessions.

  • Day 1: What's in store for 2024

  • Day 2: Automation and AI

  • Day 3: Workflow and website performance

  • Day 4: Monetization and improving revenue

Don't miss out!

JOB BOARD

➡️ TimesOfAI is currently in search of an editor (Remote, EMEA). SEE MORE

➡️ Inc. Business Media is looking for a digital executive editor (Hybrid, NYC, US). SEE MORE

COMMUNITY BUZZ

Industry News

➡️ Substack is changing the way people in-the-know buy clothes. Recently, it’s seen a huge surge in fashion content, with subscriptions in the fashion and beauty category up 80% year-on-year. READ MORE

➡️ Kevin Systrom says news sharing app Artifact will shut down after concluding that “the market opportunity isn't big enough to warrant continued investment”. READ MORE

Social Media Discussions

➡️ Niklas Buschner on LinkedIn:

Skip the SEO guesswork and expensive tools. This FREE Looker Studio dashboard makes sense of your search data for free. 100% based on Google Search Console data.

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These are the highlights for the last week.

Until next!

Vahe Arabian and the editorial team at SODP