Most publishers at our summit said they track all the typical content metrics when measuring the reach of sponsored content — views, unique visitors, time spent, etc.
Most also share these metrics with sponsors but guarantee little or no specific results. Publishers that maintain more control over the content seemed to feel more comfortable guaranteeing some performance results.
The most-common metrics to prioritize are impressions and engagement (measured both in time or in social sharing).
The Minneapolis Star Tribune plugs in other advanced data services to track the demographics of sponsored content readers and to measure offline actions, such as purchases that they make after reading the content.
There’s room for improvement here. Many at our summit noted metrics they would like to be able to track and to show sponsors in the future, including reading completion rates, offline behavior or purchases after viewing, and social media data to know how the readers are connected to the sponsor via those networks.
Share with your network
- Understanding the rise of sponsored content
- Why sponsored content is promising for news organizations
- The definition of ‘sponsored content’
- The four business models of sponsored content
- Managing risks, maintaining standards and ethics in sponsored content
- How sponsored content is created
- How to measure success of sponsored content
- Unsolved challenges of sponsored content
- Appendix: What specific publishers, brands and analysts are doing with sponsored content
- Appendix: Participant list and related readings from the sponsored content summit
You also might be interested in:
The next API Local News Summit will be on how local and community-based media might engender a local identity and embrace their geography and history. We’ll help news leaders consider how they contribute to a community’s well-being by fostering a sense of place — and how, when done with care, this might offer new ways to sustain local news.
This guide features strategies tested and proven by local news organizations that participated in the Table Stakes Local News Transformation Program along the themes of product thinking, revenue, engaged journalism, collaboration and managing change.
Examples of how newsrooms have spun up live events, products and third spaces to experiment with new sources of revenue while fostering community belonging.
