Salon Berkeley Google Conference (092909)

Salon Media Group Richard Gingras

September 30, 2009

Design News Products from a Search-centric Perspective

Traffic flowsTraffic flowsInbound traffic: Home Page versus Rest-of-SiteInbound traffic: Home Page versus Rest-of-Site

50%

50%

Traffic flowsTraffic flows

Source of rest-of-site traffic Search Engines Referral Sites: aggregators, email,

blogs, news-ranking sites (e.g. Digg, NewsTrust)

Behaviors: query-driven as well as browsing 83% use search to access news; 53%

frequently 15-35% of news site traffic comes from

search/aggregation It’s not only a good traffic but it’s a

great source of new “uniques” and an opportunity to drive product discovery

Ephemeral anthrax attack article Persistent anthrax attack resource

Rethink Content ArchitectureRethink Content ArchitectureNecessary to work the “matrix” from every dimension

Topic PagesTopic PagesThe new article page

Salon ArticlesSalon Articles

Audience EngagementAudience Engagement

Twitter StreamTwitter Stream Real-time micro-sites on important issues, ongoing stories, hot topics

Locus for engagement Editors as experts of

their domains Widget structure

supports variationby topic

Background InfoBackground Info

Aggregated CoverageAggregated Coverage

OwnershipOwnership

Increase search rank Draw new users Drive product discovery Increased ad relevancy

Rethink Focus and OutputRethink Focus and Output“Every new medium begins as a container for the old” “Every new medium begins as a container for the old”

The article is not the end product of the reporting effort. It’s that topic page. The full representation of the coverage of a beat

Rethink roles What is the day-to-day role of a reporter when creation and

publication can be in the reporter’s hands?

What is the day-to-day role of an editor in an edition-less environment? Editor, harvester, curator, leader of a crowd of trusted participants?

Salon Media Group Richard Gingras

September 30, 2009

Design News Products from a Search-centric Perspective