Express Case study

CASE STUDY
Express Newspapers increases page views, maximises archive content and develops
new revenue stream with content discovery platform Outbrain
Express Newspapers, publisher of The Express, Daily Star, OK!, New and
Star magazines, wanted to drive more traffic and increase page views
across its portfolio of titles. The publisher also wanted to explore
options for developing additional revenue streams.
Results – from March to July 2012:
Traffic on Express.co.uk increased by 15.5% after implementing
Outbrain
Improved internal engagement and page views with 82% of
clicks to internal content
To meet these goals, Express implemented Outbrain’s Total Discovery
platform in March. Outbrain, the leading content discovery and content
recommendation platform, recommends interesting internal and
third-party content to audiences on article and video pages. Content
publishers can work with Outbrain to recommend additional internal
content at the end of articles in order to keep traffic recirculating within
their network, and they can work with Outbrain to have their content
recommended on third-party sites on a Pay-Per-Click (PPC) basis.
Content publishers with a large volume of traffic can also work with
Outbrain to generate PPC revenue by recommending third-party
content on each article page.
Express leveraged Outbrain’s full range of services in order to A) keep
traffic within the Express Newspapers ecosystem by making organic
article recommendations B) drive traffic from third-party sites to the
Express ecosystem and C) generate revenue by recommending
third-party content on Express sites.
Geoff Marsh, Express Newspapers online editor says: “It’s been a pretty
extraordinary result considering the normal ad conversion rate is less
than one per cent. Outbrain works because readers understand it is
editorial content, so the click-through rates are much higher than they
would be for any other form of commercial model.”
Development of a new revenue stream with the remaining 18%
of Outbrain clicks generating revenue on a PPC basis
Increased interest in archive content which traditionally
becomes less popular after 12 hours
On the Daily Star Outbrain has 9.5% average CTR rates, with
87% internal and 13% external, paid links
On OK! Magazine, Outbrain now delivers 11.9% CTR, of which
88% is internal and 12% is paid
Generated PPC revenue by recommending third-party content
on Express sites
Outbrain is helping the majority of users find additional content within
Express Newspapers’ sites – of the 15.5% uplift, 12.8% has been internal,
meaning that the vast majority of people who click on
recommendations from Outbrain stay on Express Newspapers’ sites to
read other internal content. This demonstrates how Outbrain has
improved the user journey and increased engagement. Geoff Marsh
says: “The stats prove that Outbrain works as a tool to increase interest
in editorial content, rather than simply drive them off the site.”
We were looking to build loyalty and anything that
reduces bounce rates and increases the number of
pages per user is something quite exciting. Plus
[we also] see it as a success because it’s an
incremental revenue stream.
UK NEWS
- Geoff Marsh, Express Newspapers Online Editor
SIMPLE WAY TO BEAT DIABETES
By Jo Willey
A FEW simple changes in our
“toxic” lifestyles would prevent two
in three cases of diabetes, saving
thousands of lives a year.
The publisher has also seen a growing interest in older articles on its
news sites where stories become less popular past the 12-hour-old
threshold. Marsh says that while archive content usually does not make
up a huge part of their traffic, it is an untapped asset: “We have this
enormous archive which is of great use to people so having a tool that
flags up some of that content where it’s relevant to individual users is
hugely advantageous.”
This is the finding of a 20-year British study into Type 2 diabetes – now at epidemic
proportions.In all, 2.9 million Britons have the disease, 24,000 die from it every year
and one in five is diagnosed by the age of 80.
The study is the first to reveal the full implications of ethnicity, with the risk almost
doubling for people of south Asian, African and African Caribbean descent.Most
deaths could be avoided if people ate healthy food, drank less alcohol, took more
exercise and had regular check-ups.
Dr Therese Tillin, from the National Heart and Lung Institute at Imperial College
London, blamed a “fat-rich diet and not taking enough exercise”.
A significant proportion of traffic to news sites like Express
Newspaper’s comes from referral sources like search engines or social
networks, and it is very important that publishers do all they can to
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retain those users once they arrive. “It’s a commercial dilemma,” Marsh
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She added: “The urban environment is a toxic environment. There are implications
for everyone.“Be as physically active as possible and keep to a healthy diet low in fat
and with plenty of green veg. Start young, but it is never too late.”
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outbrain.com
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