Hearst Magazines International’s Melinda Lee on content sharing & developing new audiences

Tell me more about Hearst Magazines International’s 24/7 newsrooms. How are they working to increase the frequency of posts and engagement across Hearst sites?

Melinda Lee: Having Hearst Magazines’ international newsrooms running 24 hours a day, seven days a week greatly increases the amount of content we can share with our audiences. We call this our Global Content Generator (GCG) because we are constantly generating and sharing content across our brands around the world and back into our international newsrooms. Our international regions tap into our global content hub and pull stories that are already getting lift in other regions, increasing the velocity of publications across the board. We currently have 24/7 news feeds set up for Cosmopolitan, ELLE, Esquire and Harper’s BAZAAR, and we’re implementing more across our other brands. It has boosted audience for us around the world, especially for our sites with smaller teams. 

 Above: Melinda Lee

The accessibility to content 24 hours a day has allowed our brands to increase focus on social media audiences as well. Our brands can post more frequently on platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and Instagram because they have access to newsworthy and evergreen content that has proven successful in other countries. I think it’s smart to cross-pollinate popular and shareable content, as it helps to ensure that the integrity of the brand voice remains intact across all international iterations.

The traffic to Hearst Magazines International’s sites has grown exponentially in the past year. In addition to the 24/7 newsrooms and GCG, what has contributed to these increases?

Lee: Hearst Magazines’ development and rollout of MediaOS has played a large part in our traffic growth. The content management system makes content creation, syndication and distribution more fluid for Hearst digital editors. Another plus: Content created on MediaOS travels well across devices, including mobile and tablets.

In addition to being a content management system, the platform also features trending content data through Buzzing @ Hearst, which allows editors to see content spikes across Hearst brands. Alerts about trending content also benefit other editors working with the same brands across different regions. Content trend data helps us determine the type of content that performs well in different countries, so we can syndicate across regions strategically.

Read the full article here

Source: Hearst Corporation

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