News & Information Market Analysis

Architectural Record Applies Low-Cost Social Content as a Service
Case Study
Barry Parr - September 13, 2008

Architectural Record, the official magazine of the American Institute of Architects, is published by McGraw-Hill.

The Washington Post Mixes Homegrown and Purchased Social Content Systems
Case Study
Barry Parr - September 13, 2008

The Washington Post has a large Web site with significant local, national, and international audiences. Before implementing its current social content system, it was using a homegrown system. In addition to the new system, The Post has blogs in Movable Type as well as a city guide with comments that it created.

Social Content
Best Practices in Audience Engagement
Vision Report
Barry Parr - September 13, 2008

Increasing adoption of social content by online users, growing availability of social tools from third-party vendors, and rising competitive pressure have made it a strategic imperative for media sites to become more social for their users.

Serious Sports Fans
Programming for a Lucrative Audience
Concept Report
Bobby Tulsiani - July 11, 2008

Online sports destination sites are moving beyond relying on fantasy leagues and are now competing for fans using richer programming experiences.

Site Registration
Motivating Users to Establish Relationships
Concept Report
Barry Parr - June 27, 2008

Media sites have always struggled with motivating visitors to become registered users. With the move toward increasingly social media, the need for users to register becomes even more urgent and strategic.

ShopLocal Uses Search Engines to Increase Discovery
Case Study
Barry Parr - April 25, 2008

ShopLocal helps retailers drive in-store sales using the Internet. Its customers include nearly all of the major big-box retailers, including Best Buy, Target, Circuit City, and Kohl's. ShopLocal provides a facility for retailers to distribute their weekly flyers to consumers by ZIP code on the retailer's Web site, and helps consumers find products locally using ShopLocal.com.

Think Locally, Search Globally
Exploiting the Local Influence of Search
Vision Report
Barry Parr - April 25, 2008

Traditionally, local media have seen their Web sites as destinations that users find by name. Currently, leading local brands must acknowledge that search engines are playing a larger role in how online users find things locally as well as globally.

Topix Aggregates News Stories to Create Search-Friendly Local Pages
Case Study
Barry Parr - April 25, 2008

Topix is a news aggregator based in Palo Alto, CA. One of the site's key strengths has been its use of keywords to improve the targeting of Google ads on its pages.

Best Practices in Networked Media
Countering Audience Fragmentation
Vision Report
Barry Parr - March 6, 2008

This is a difficult time for content producers. The market is fragmented, growth is flat, and competitors are proliferating and innovating. In this environment, it is essential for content producers to focus on the things they do best, outsource everything else, and find new sources of revenue through services. New technologies and ways of doing business are making this easier.

Political Communication
Mobilizing Online Voters
Concept Report
Barry Parr - February 25, 2008

The 2008 presidential primary season is now in full swing, and later in the year, the parties' chosen candidates will face off for the presidency. Online media are key elements in all the presidential campaigns, but everyone is still trying to understand how to use them.

US Local Online Advertising Forecast, 2007 to 2012
Concept Report
Barry Parr - January 15, 2008

Local advertising is becoming a key battleground on the Web. Online yellow pages have more than doubled their share of Web traffic, newspaper publishers are seeking to make up for lost print revenue, and search engines are sharpening the quality of their local results.

Widgets
Delivering Applications Users Want
Concept Report
Barry Parr - October 22, 2007

Users of social networks, bloggers, and others have quickly adopted the use of widgets—small programs that add utility or outside information to their pages. Use of widgets is quickly becoming a key element of networked media strategies.