When people think about the traditional newswire service, they likely conjure visions of old teletype machines spitting out the latest datelines from parts unknown as anxious editors hover to see what should be included on tomorrow’s front pages. Times have changed, though contemporary wire services aren’t so different from the days of teletype. But not for long.
The wire services of tomorrow won’t be syndicating just media like traditional wire services, but code, features and even the means of monetizing the content. There are several factors at work driving this move to the new newswire, as indicated in this diagram:
As these forces conspire to both challenge and even undermine traditional media, it also creates opportunity. For instance, the new newswire need not be the sole province of organizations like the AP – though it is a natural candidate. Any organization can choose to set up and manage a private newswire, and leverage all the benefits that come from controlling the means of distribution, presentation and monetization.
By exporting world-class content and associated feature / functionality, a publisher can monetize their investments in content development more completely. Content is re-circulated and used to its fullest extent, thereby extracting the maximum value from it. And premium publishers can also exert greater control over which third-party publishers are using their content, as well as how that content is presented, thereby preserving and extending hard-won brand equity.
There are three main features of the new newswire:
- Content Cloud;
- Content and Feature Syndication; and
- User Engagement and Monetization
Content Cloud
Simply put, the feature of the new newswire that is the Content Cloud is a virtual repository for any type of media.
But the Content Cloud not only ingests media of any type from wherever it originates, it also includes sophisticated semantic algorithms that can analyze the content, extract key metadata and then make that content smarter. By making content smarter through semantic analysis, it becomes possible to redeploy media in whatever way is needed, and ensures that all content delivered conforms to the curatorial and / or editorial choices of those making calls to the Content Cloud.
For conglomerates with multiple publishers under a single corporate umbrella, each with its own content management system (CMS) and back-end infrastructure, the new newswire makes it easy to aggregate content from each constituent organization into the centralized Content Cloud.
Content and Feature Syndication, and User Engagement
The new newswire also makes it possible to simply and easily export media from the Content Cloud into preformatted presentation modules – essentially, Content Apps – that publishers can literally drag-and-drop into any Web page. These lightweight apps enable the presentation of media in highly interactive ways – photo galleries, for instance, or polls relating to a given topic on a page. And because you’re transmitting both the content you’ve created and the means of its presentation, you have more power over how your content is consumed.
Because Content Apps can be instantly dropped onto or deleted from a page, editors and curators have maximum flexibility to test a variety of presentations of content, and to measure which performs best in terms of user engagement. Importantly, Content Apps are CMS-agnostic, so they enhance workflow and make editorial teams more efficient.
Monetization
By controlling the creation of content, the means of its distribution, and the standards for its presentation, publishers can add one more feature to the new newswire: monetization. Publishers can choose to embed targeted ad units within Content Apps or choose to charge a subscription to their private newswire before a third-party publisher can access it. Undoubtedly, there are many other ways an enterprising publisher might decide to use the power of their private newswire to pad the bottom line. The point is the new newswire provides options to publishers that haven’t existed before now.
To be a successful publisher in today’s world, where media is multiplying geometrically and demand for fresh content is a minute-by-minute constant, a publisher’s owned and syndicated media should not only be managed in the cloud but also distributable via a private newswire. The challenge for many publishers, however, is that they lack the appropriate infrastructure or the developer resources to create one.
That’s where Daylife comes in. Our unique infrastructure makes it possible to easily create private newswires for publishers of all sizes looking to extract the maximum value from their content investments. The Daylife Content Cloud includes market-leading semantic algorithms. Our full range of Content Apps ensure the beautiful presentation of content in highly interactive formats. And the Daylife API provides a powerful set of pipes to move content, code and the means of monetization, thereby creating a powerful private newswire.
Let us know if you’d like to learn more about the new newswire and how you can put it to work for your organization.