With big ticket events like the general elections and the Indian Premier League (IPL) around the corner, media planners are focussing on platforms with sticky content to get maximum ROI (return on investment) for their clients. Websites with sticky content, i.e., content that keeps users engaged and coming back for more, are gold for advertisers.
“Both time spent and page views are important metrics for gauging content stickiness, but they provide different perspectives on engagement. Media planners and advertisers should consider both to get a comprehensive understanding of how audiences are interacting with content, and the effectiveness of advertising strategies,” said Alok Kapase, deputy general manager, Madison Digital.
Since sticky content makes users come back to the platform, it helps in retargeting. Retargeting is a popular way of reaching out to repeat visitors of a platform.
Media planners and buyers said they are looking at platforms where retargeting is easier because retargeting almost always delivers results.
According to Invesp, an American conversion rate optimisation services company, website visitors who are retargeted with display ads are 70 percent more likely to convert on a retailer’s website. Also, retargeted customers are three times more likely to click on an ad than people who haven’t interacted with the business before.
“Advertisers are increasingly prioritising partnerships with websites that guarantee not just views, but sustained user engagement. This means creating high-quality, informative, and engaging content that keeps users glued to the screen, ultimately driving higher returns for advertisers,” said another media buyer working with top digital news platforms in the country.
According to Skandaram Vasudevan, strategy director, 22feet Tribal Worldwide, an ad agency, even before getting into time spent and page views, there are considerations that matter when deciding on a platform.
“We need to gauge the brand requirement, the kind of platforms that might suit the client more for the specific task. It’s a question of the kind of audience that generally consumes a specific platform, and what they expect from that platform. This has to be in line with the brand’s target audience,” said Vasudevan.
Relevance is key here. “Matching the content to the platform it is going to be present on is important,’’ explained Vasudevan.
Platform reach, and by extension content reach, is also an important factor, as also how big is the platform, and where the article will nest. “Presence on the home page will naturally garner more visibility than presence in any of the category pages. This ties in with page views, as the placement and the promotion of the article (and the duration it gets promoted for) are also key factors in determining the page views that an article gets,” he said.
After this would come time spent, which is a function of the relevance of the article, the content, and the interest in it.
Personalisation and interactivity, among others, help drive content stickiness, leading to advertiser interest in a platform.
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