Overview: Communications Tactics

"Canadian researchers have confirmed what most people suspected all along: that internet trolls are archetypal Machiavellian sadists.... via Heather-Anne MacLean's post: https://www.linkedin.com/today/post/article/20140730175026-5723090-don-t-feed-the-trolls-research-reveals-psychopathy - Online trolls are psychopaths and sadists, psychologists …

A beautiful, HTML5 exploration of the HEART methodology: Happiness, Engagement, Adoption, Retention, Task Success. " different members of your team have different ideas about the goals of your project. This process provides an opportunity to build consensus about where you're headed." - How to Choose the Right UX Metrics for Your Product

"The original converted 7.6% better than the new variation... The leads from the long form version of the page were better in quality ... in most cases long form copy doesn't just boost your conversions, but it also increases your rankings too." Indepth and (inevitably) long analysis. Huge feedback. - How Content Length Affects Rankings and…

Great case study of how shallow A/B testing can send you in the wrong direction: "...there are a few things to watch out for. The first is statistical significance ... Another is the common mistake of assigning a goal that measures the short-term effect of a test rather than the long-term effect on your business. We made this mistake at Segment.i…

Sometimes long form content helps with conversions, and sometimes it hurts, and sometimes, long form content is better for SEO, but other times it’s worse" Read the full article to understand why ... and how, and when. Key point: " the best long form content marketing doesn’t make one feel like they’re being marketed to...." - Why Long Form Cont…

"a new media startup aims to bring the ProPublica approach abroad, creating Germany’s first nonprofit investigative news organization... completely focused on data journalism... The team intends to compile and share large datasets that map people in power to the money behind them, collaborating with local open data organizations as well as other n…

"Two of the biggest trends in news today: the rise of mobile and the rise of data visualization. The unfortunate reality is that they’re often in conflict. ... If you want to do better, check out MobileVis ... Ros also pulls out a set of best practices for doing visualizations for mobile. Data visualization is good. Data visualization that works …

You've probably seen "articles that seamlessly transition to new content, without requiring readers to click or tap headlines and then wait for new pages to load." Time seems to be using it to bait-and-switch - bring in users using social-optimised content, and then present the 'serious' news that they 'should' be reading: "World news typically …

"The Post's new online vertical, Storyline, will cover policy topics through articles, videos and charts -- or "chapters" -- that follow a particular storyline.... avoid "hypothetical policy debates" ... We are going to tell stories with people, with characters, with human drama, in a way that other policy sites don't do very often... depar…

"Could “all you need to know” be the most insidious, reductive, and lame story formula currently conquering our reading life? Everywhere you turn there’s another purported ne plus ultra explainer purporting to tell us “absolutely everything we could possibly need to know” about some current event, some curiosity of history, some deep mystery of li…

"Any time something as complex as SEO is painted in such broad strokes – which many blogs do in order to appeal to a larger audience – there are going to be things left out. And unfortunately for many marketers trying to improve their search rankings, they’re often very important things." Good guide. Particularly like: "Your first priority shoul…

Apart from 3 good videos to watch, a good example of content curation... "We have all heard (ad nauseam) about the “power of brand storytelling,” and I know that I have read more than one blog that spits off a numeric list of tips that I just “can’t live without” as a content marketer..." - 3 TED Talks That Uncover the Secrets of Storytelling | …

"those that know how to tell the stories of their work are heard (and subsequently funded) while those who are poor at storytelling are often forgotten and neglected" - Quantum Computing And The Value Of Storytelling In Science - ReadWrite - Station Q, Microsoft: http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/news/stories/stationq/index.html

"Creating a beautiful presentation requires a symphony of visual elements to work together for a “big picture.” Designers seek to make the entire vision work together in terms of how each part interacts. This includes layout, typography, and imagery, which all add up to a cohesive set of design elements. So, how can you orchestrate the chaos of de…

What does Wierd Al Yankovic have to teach the EU about communications? Watch the video and agree: “Everything, basically”.

IAB/Edelman study on in-feed sponsored content: "The potential success of sponsored content is directly linked to how consumers already feel about the brand advertiser and the publisher hosting the content.... [Brands must] Create value for audiences ... publishers should ... be willing to walk away from advertisers who aren’t relevant/trusted" …

"efficient, consistent approach ... with a focus on quality content... something that isn’t created by an algorithm or a bot, but by people who understand and know what their audience want." - How to build a successful newsletter: advice from Quartz

Totally agree. enewsletters help subscribers manage the stream.Still get a lot from them, and they still drive a lot of traffic.. "Newsletters are clicking because readers have grown tired of the endless stream of information on the Internet, and having something finite and recognizable show up in your inbox can impose order on all that chaos....…

"Online video is very much here to stay... Even companies such as Vice admit they don't have everything cracked – Vice only launched a news vertical a few months ago after realising its current affairs content was the most popular on YouTube. With that in mind, the three approaches to online video from News UK, Meredith, and Don't Panic may prove…

"The parliamentary process is indeed so similar to a collaborative software development workflow that it is only natural to try and use a version control tool such as Git to track individual legislative changes." - OpenGov Voices: How GitLaw turns the French parliamentary process into open data - Sunlight Foundation Blog

"blogs are ... just one specific kind of publishing format, with posts that appear in reverse chronological order.... this is a little like saying that a sonnet is just a specific way of ordering text, featuring iambic pentameter and an offset rhyming scheme. Obviously not every blog post is a poem, but there is something inherent in the practice …

As if blogs were just a question of conversational tone and reverse-chronology ... "We’re going to continue to provide bloggy content with a more conversational tone ... We’re just not going to do them as much in standard reverse-chronological blogs.” " - ‘Almost half’ of the NYT’s blogs will close or merge | Poynter.

"1. Expert credibility comes from having knowledge others do not. People want experts they can understand and trust, especially when trying to understand complex or ambiguous topics like new technology, engineering, advanced science, or law... 2. Harness hierarchical credibility 3. Seek referent credibility 4. Take advantage of associative credib…

New data supporting old news: "According to Gallup ... of 18,000 consumers surveyed, 62 percent said social media had no influence on their buying decisions. Among millennials, 48 percent said social media didn't make a difference... Many social media advertisers have ... neglected the essence, and potential, of social media: people talking to …

"In the end, meetings turn out to be a waste of time — just people sitting around, chatting, wasting hours of precious time (even preparing for it). Approximately 15 percent of your time working in any company is spent in meetings. That number is more than doubled for middle managers, while executives spend 50% of their time stuck in meetings."

"steering the storyline between a brand and its consumers must create programs that remember the code, deploy many different types of content at the correct time and inject humanity and purpose into every story..."

Good example of CMS innovations emerging from newsrooms - wish I'd added to my recent weekly LinkedIn tour: "a multi-faceted piece of newsroom infrastructure, a set of building blocks that will allow organizations to turn on or turn off various engagement features with relative ease ... a bunch of parts that you can assemble and reassemble ... …

Part 2 of my second weekly roundup, where the overriding theme is innovation.

@baekdal explores "a complete and total blind spot in the newspaper industry ... based on a business model that used to work in the old days of media, but was as a result of scarcity." Newspapers, he argues, are "the supermarket of news ... [but] upermarkets only work when visiting the individual brands is too hard to do... But on the internet, e…

Good piece from @digitaltonto pointing out that "data journalism ... falls short when confronted with complexity and nuance... Traditional journalists could benefit from more data literacy and objective analysis, while data journalism would be much improved by real world context. Unfortunately, little integration has occurred. Traditional journa…