Maya Schadeck
05.04.2024
How Publishers Can Successfully Navigate the Never Normal
Publishers around the globe have spent the past few years adapting to the new normal. Rethinking their strategies and services to respond to periods of global change and uncertainty. This uncertainty marks a new era – the never normal – and requires that publishers are agile and open minded by turning challenges into business opportunities. Â
Advertisers are adapting and embracing new consumer attitudes, behaviors, and purchasing habits. This behavior also influences publishers who are looking for overall search quality, which means displaying relevant ads in their inventory.Â
This new era’s ever-changing mentality requires that publishers stay on top of quality requirements while always adapting to newest industry trends.Â
What is the never normal?
The world we live in is shaped by constant technological, ecological, societal, and geopolitical change. With the Covid-19 pandemic we entered a new era which we thought would be temporary. Instead of returning to pre-pandemic peace and quiet, we entered an era of constant changes and challenges, the never-normal.Â
The never normal is an era of accelerating tech development, digital disruption, and bold innovation, which entail lots of uncertainties and challenges. To keep up and future-proof their businesses in the long run, publishers must embrace these challenges by always adapting and fueling innovation.
Challenging The Status quo
Adapting to constant change and fueling innovation comes with great agility. Although agility might be already part of your company culture, today’s fast paced world requires publishers to put an even sharper focus on adaptability. But what does this adaptability look like?
A first step could be replacing the 5-year plan with a more agile approach. This doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t have a long-term vision in mind, but the secret of agility is to understand that the path towards it won’t be a straight line.Â
This could mean to start off the week with a focus point and recalibrate the next day, all based on instantaneous changes, analysis, consumer feedback, and obviously common sense.
Opportunities for publishers
Publishers who adapt to the never normal with agility ensure that they are part of real-time conversions, and not chasing after them. Meaning, they have to think about what is next in their strategy the moment they still have the budget, the capacity, the manpower, and the assets to make it happen.
Part of this shift in strategy are the tools and services publishers integrate in their day-to-day work. These are now more sophisticated than our ability to fully appreciate their effects. Meaning, publishers need to collaborate and stay up to date with the latest industry trends and requests in order to stay relevant and ahead of the game.Â
How to keep up with quality standards?
The never normal comes with a new value mindset. Although very agile and fast-paced, publishers need to understand how they can uphold quality standards in this new landscape. First and foremost, it’s very important for the ecosystem and advertiser marketplaces that publishers send quality traffic to the feed providers. The feed providers are the one’s displaying the advertiser’s ads and ensuring advertiser budgets. Sending quality traffic helps maintain and ensure a good return on investment (ROI) for the advertisers that are fueling the marketplace.
So what else can be done to ensure quality? Quality needs to be addressed at every level starting with the publisher traffic and optimizations on publisher traffic sources. At Rise, we have made significant improvements in order to further address these items and have formed a dedicated quality team equipped with advanced systems, including ML features and in depth technical tools, to help us identify and verify traffic sources, highly relevant users, and all other metrics that help us improve overall quality. This is a major focus point for 2024 and here at Rise we are taking quality measures to the next level.
Bottom line
The never normal provides publishers with a lot of exciting opportunities. Those who adapt quickly in the fast-paced environment of the never normal and stay on top of their game are bound to succeed. Embracing innovation and remaining agile will not only ensure survival but also pave the way for thriving in this dynamic landscape of change. By continually reassessing strategies, leveraging emerging technologies, and staying attuned to evolving audience preferences, publishers can carve out their niche and establish themselves as leaders in the ever-shifting publishing industry.