user engagement Archives

How to Generate News Article Ideas

Digital media brands and web publishers are keenly aware of the importance of new articles, especially feature stories. These content pieces draw in and hook an audience; they inform, entertain, provoke, and stimulate readers to elicit responses. Viafoura provides a fantastic array of software options that allow those readers to share and discuss their thoughts, which leads to community development and brand investment. But without an interesting, appealing flow of content, your audience is unlikely to stick around long enough for any of that.

The solution is simple; continuously generate fresh new content that everybody will love, of course!

But let’s get real – it’s not nearly as simple as it sounds. Writer’s block is very real, and you might struggle to find the right kind of material to cover despite your best efforts. But don’t worry – if you’re looking for ways to get news article ideas, we’ve compiled a list of helpful strategies and approaches you can use to find the right topics for your platform and audience.

Focus on local issues and incidents

If you’re looking to start from the basics, going local is one of the best ways to get compelling news article ideas for your pages. The biggest benefit of this approach is that you’re living in the middle of what’s happening. You or your team may have come across a story waiting to be told just by going about your day. Or you might end up hearing an interesting tidbit from your social circle that could make for a great feature story idea. And often, many outlets usually skip over local news for being too niche or small scale. But there will always be an audience for the small stuff, which means you’re the digital media brand they turn to for more.

Look up what's trending

Social media has its ups and downs, and one of its big ups is that it’s got its heart on the pulse of what’s hot right now. Looking up trending terms can be like following a trail of breadcrumbs to your next big news article idea. You’ll eventually come across a big event, an impactful announcement, or something else that’s getting a lot of buzz, which will give you a good idea of where your brand should focus and what your take should be.

Turn to pop culture

Tried and true, pop culture gossip and coverage have always been a staple for reliable views and attention. From shocking headlines to entirely false information about which big celebrity did what to who, they’re compelling enough that most readers will at least stop to take a look if only to see how much they believe it. Of course, your digital media brand could take a much more professional approach towards these topics when gathering news article ideas. Still, it stands that the appeal for this type of content is undeniable, and you can always choose to focus on smaller yet relevant niches such as music or book releases for feature article ideas.

Dive into self-help

These types of articles and columns are a surprisingly effective source of news article ideas, especially when building a group of returning readers and audience members. Many readers find these kinds of articles uplifting, form connections with their own needs, or are sometimes just curious about the issues that others might be facing. Self-help articles can range from how-to-do-x style, step-by-step manuals to weekly columns where a qualified responder selects and answers a reader’s question. As long as you’re tactful and write with the intent to help, you’ll find a lot of success in coming up with news article ideas with this approach.

Cover international angles

Most members of your audience would love to hear about far-off lands and stories on different cultures or lifestyles. That’s why international stories make for fantastic news article ideas; you get to introduce a little exotic flavour in the content they read, which is a great way to get people talking, discussing, and sharing their own experiences in your community space. Of course, using international stories for news article ideas does require you to sponsor your writers for some globetrotting, which may or may not be within your means – but we’d highly recommend giving it a shot!

Turn to science

Technology and science is wild, and it’s getting wilder by the decade. There’s always some new discovery or research that’s making waves in the scientific community, but that doesn’t mean your average reader can’t appreciate the magnitude of what’s happened. Providing a layman’s breakdown on a scientific or technological topic while also going over what exactly that means for us as a community is a great way to bridge the gap while giving you some great news article ideas.

Read the news

Yes, that’s right – oftentimes, the best way to cover a topic is to find out what’s being covered! Even if you’re not the first one to use it as a news article idea, you can choose to write updated or follow-up stories based on the topic, which can let you provide additional insight or follow up on a topic competing media brands might not remember to follow. While it probably won’t be the primary source of all your news article ideas, it can still be a great way to supplement them.

Conclusion

And there you have, some varied yet effective strategies for overcoming writers’ block and generating some interesting news article ideas for your platform. Remember that while content is the backbone of what drives your audience’s interest, it’s the experience and journey they go through with your brand that ultimately gets them coming back for more. Viafoura’s software suite can provide you with everything you need to elevate your digital media brand to the next level, so don’t hesitate; contact us today to schedule a demo and see how we can support your content efforts.

Deep dive: What a digital customer experience should look like

Customer interactions with brands are increasingly being carried out in the digital space. As a result, the digital customer experience has become a major, if not the major, aspect of customers’ overall journey with digital media brands. In addition, with technology continuing to push the way we interact with each other online, content providers and media companies have also changed radically to accommodate their audience in the digital landscape.

But catering to a digital audience isn’t as simple as “post content, get benefits”. Readers and subscribers are increasingly looking for added value from their interactions and looking for a holistic experience rather than just a great product or service. More than these, it’s the lasting impressions made on an audience that’s the key to having them come back time and again to your platform; the kind of impressions you can build through Viafoura.

In this article, we’ll go over why you need a digital customer experience strategy, what the key aspects of this experience look like, and how it’s essential to the growth of your digital media brand and its orbiting community.

Why bother with a digital customer experience strategy?

There are some essential facts about today’s online audience that highlight how important it is to tailor a digital customer experience around your brand. Consider the following:

Two out of three consumers expect brands to understand their needs and what they expect from them
Consumers are 26% more likely to recommend a brand to their friends and family if they feel emotionally connected
73% of brands that devote resources to an improved customer experience perform higher than their competitors

From both a financial and audience retention standpoint, it’s clear that an elevated digital customer experience plays a huge role in the success of a digital media brand. If your customer doesn’t feel valued or feel that the unsatisfactory aspects of their interactions aren’t reasonably addressed, they’re more than ready to leave without looking back. As we head into an ever-growing digital era of interactions and commerce, taking the time to make sure your web platform supports a healthy digital customer service experience will be virtually mandatory to sustain audience interest.

Key insights into crafting a digital customer experience strategy

A digital customer experience strategy is usually tailored to the specific needs and circumstances of a brand, so we won’t be able to provide an assessment, nor the exact steps you need to take to improve your own customer experience on the web. But we can identify some critical components that form a solid foundation for good digital customer experience management. Making sure your strategy takes these into account will show results through increased engagement and satisfaction with your brand.

Prioritize convenience

Consumers aren’t switching channels because they want to ride the bandwagon; it’s because, above all, consumers value convenience and ease of use. As long as elements of your strategy take the hassle out of things and provide the most convenience, your audience will respond favourably. Making it easier to find content, share opinions, have discussions, and contact you are just a few ways your brand can provide convenience.

Pay attention to audience needs

Your audience is unlikely to be interested in all the content you offer, because everyone has their own tastes and preferences. Recognizing this and adjusting what you offer them is key to keeping them interested and engaged. Most digital customer experiences involve using gathered consumer data to make smart, automatic decisions about content recommendations. While external services and tools can do this for you, the best practice is to collect and analyze this data on your own and adjust your digital customer experience strategy accordingly.

Consider the audience's whole interaction

The digital customer experience starts when they arrive on your site and ends when they leave it on a web platform. Everything from how they log in, the content they read, and the tools they use to engage with the platform and each other, are part of the impression that’s made. It’s also important to consider any non-digital interactions since your audience will not differentiate between their online and offline experiences.

Empower mobile usage

A significant portion of your audience is highly likely to engage with your platform and content through mobile devices. In fact, consumers actively prefer to use multiple channels and methods to engage with brands, so it’s essential to make sure that your mobile digital customer experience is just as highly tuned as your desktop interactions. Ensure your platform has an alternative, mobile-friendly formatting and maximize how many features carry from desktop to mobile browsing.

Drive engagement

Since consumers are driven by the emotional impact and engagement they receive from a brand, supporting the ability to participate beyond simply reading your content is key to a successful digital customer experience strategy. Consider integrating the ability to comment, reply to posts, and like their favorite content to have your audience switch from passive to active interaction. These interactions are more likely to leave a lasting impression on your audience and, in turn, more likely to get them coming back for more.

Conclusion

Having a digital platform isn’t enough to keep your audience engaged with your brand; it’s important to consider the overall digital customer experience. Remember that an audience looks for convenience, consideration, responsiveness, and lasting impressions. Your audience will also respond well to active engagement, and one of the best ways of doing so is through online community engagement and management software. Viafoura offers you the tools you need to take your engagement to the next level – so if you want to build upon your digital customer experience, contact us to schedule a demo and learn more about how we can help you connect with your audience.

How the Online News Association Captivated Audiences at a Virtual Event

Spotlight:

Online events can be successful when organizations back them with an audience engagement strategy.
The Online News Association (ONA) turned to Viafoura to prevent passive video consumption and provide a seamless user experience during its digital event, ONA20.
With Viafoura’s support, ONA encouraged its 1880 attendees to be highly attentive throughout the event.
At a time when 53% of people experienced screen fatigue in their daily lives, ONA20 attendees stuck around for an average of 70% of each live video session.
By building outstanding digital experiences, Viafoura helped ONA convince event attendees to view around three live video sessions each.
Virtual events will continue to drive success for organizations in the future — and Viafoura can help companies secure audience interest and attention.

Ever since the pandemic started, organizations have been moving to embrace virtual and hybrid events. However, some industry professionals are still stuck on a common misconception about online events: They’re all unengaging.

Many companies have actually experienced incredible success by building an audience engagement strategy to support their virtual events.

The Online News Association (ONA) is just one organization on a growing list of companies that had an extremely positive experience hosting a digital conference.

With help from Viafoura, the news association was able to captivate 1880 attendees online in its annual event, ONA20. Explore the text below to discover how Viafoura’s partnership with ONA combatted screen fatigue, leading attendees to view 70% of each live, online session.

The Fight To Activate Passive, Disconnected Viewers

Until the pandemic hit, ONA’s annual events were typically held in person, where media professionals could come together and exchange industry information and best practices. But the emergence of COVID-19 in 2020 meant that ONA had to move its event to an online space. Unfortunately, it quickly became clear that hosting digital speaker sessions wouldn’t be enough on its own to make the conference impactful and memorable.

With 53% of people experiencing screen fatigue throughout the pandemic, event staff needed to find a way to emulate exciting, in-person social experiences online.

And yet, it seemed like basic event solutions couldn’t engage attendees adequately to prevent passive video consumption.

ONA’s staff knew that an out-of-the-box webinar solution wouldn’t offer attendees a noticeable live chat tool that would stand out from its video streams. Nor would many social tool providers offer a frictionless login experience for users that wouldn’t require people to make multiple accounts or go to another website.

Ultimately, ONA had to capture viewer attention around a distinct social tool, allowing attendees to connect with each other — and somehow not break the user experience or disrupt session speakers.

Paving the Way for Outstanding Event Experiences Online

ONA selected Viafoura as its partner in audience engagement for ONA20, which gave the news association all the tools it needed to create captivating digital experiences.

By embedding Viafoura’s live Community Chat tool next to its video streams, attendees could ask questions and talk without interrupting the session speakers. This meant that speakers could address questions and comments from audience members in real time and collect valuable feedback. And with the addition of chat managers to greet users and prompt conversations, viewers were quickly drawn to the social spaces.

Thanks to these collaborative, digital spaces, ONA was able to avoid passive, unengaged consumption around its video streams. Instead, Viafoura’s tools created a safe, social space where industry professionals could share knowledge and expand their networks.

Viafoura’s live chat was also reskinned to align with ONA’s brand and integrated seamlessly with other digital tools. Attendees could even view the speaker sessions and engage during the event through a single login on ONA’s website.

As a result of the partnership, conference attendees remained active and engaged, tuning into the conference for an average of three live video sessions each.

Learn more about how Viafoura helped ONA capture the attention of hundreds of event attendees here.

Embracing the Virtual Future of Events

Many organizations first turned to virtual events out of necessity rather than preference during COVID-19. However, as demonstrated by ONA, virtual events can be just as effective as in-person events and even bring additional benefits to the table.

For instance, digital events remove travel challenges and can sustain high participation and attendance rates. Not to mention that organizations can provide people with unforgettable digital experiences worth sticking around for with the right audience engagement partner.

“If online events have taught [organizations] new skills and a less costly way to bring people together, it makes sense for them to continue online events post-pandemic, whether they are stand-alone or part of hybrid offerings,” Mark Glaser, a news consultant, stresses.

Whether organizations plan to host hybrid or online events in the future, Viafoura’s tools can enhance the experience around any event, supercharging attendee excitement and attention.

How to Host a Virtual Conference, Webinar or other Event

Most organizations are aware that making connections in person is a valuable aspect of growth and development. But in recent years, there’s been a major shift to fully digital conferences, meetings, and events, which has resulted in an influx of new social engagement and networking methods. As a result, it’s a good idea to understand the importance of virtual events like conferences and webinars, and how to successfully host one through your web platform.

Some businesses have had it harder than others when it comes to making the switch to digital and may be considering holding off on such events until large-scale in-person interactions are viable again. However, you can still take advantage of the positive aspects of conferences, webinars, and panels on an entirely virtual level while also enjoying additional benefits exclusive to this format.

If you’re unclear on how to host a virtual conference, don’t worry; this article will take you through the basics of how to host a virtual event as well as some virtual event best practices. Let’s get started by taking a look at some key concepts.

What Is a Virtual Event?

The majority of the North American population has likely become very familiar with virtual events in the past few years. These events are hosted digitally with content being streamed or shared in a communal setting, which allows people to participate in an event regardless of their location using their digital devices.

Depending on your goals, there might be different types of gatherings you can organize, from virtual webinars to discussion panels to live streams of performances or readings. That’s why the first thing you need to do is determine what kind of event you want to host according to your objectives. Remember that the focus of these gatherings is engaging with the audience like you would, for instance, with live blogging or informational streams.

Virtual Event Checklist

When it comes to hosting virtual events, there are some practices you need to follow.

Determine the length of the event

In the past, public expectation was that conferences would last a whole day, which allowed all participants sufficient time to network and make connections. However, this doesn’t work with virtual webinars. Nowadays, people prefer to register for virtual events that last for a short amount of time, a maximum of 1-2 hours long. Of course, we understand that sometimes this might not be enough for your needs, but note that you can always organize a one-week virtual conference and have all the events spread throughout the week.

Creating an agenda

Just like an in-person event, you need a plan for virtual webinars. Often, panels and conferences are long and can last for several days. Having a proper agenda can allow attendees to choose which sessions they would like to attend. Remember, as a rule of thumb, when organizing an online conference, you should line up all the essential information at the beginning of the event. Then, to close up the entire event, schedule your most dynamic speaker

Rehearsal

If you are thinking about hosting a virtual webinar, a round or two of rehearsal is a must. In this regard, you can find software that allows you to have a practice room, where you can go over some points with speakers, test the quality of the video/audio, and make sure the slides and tools are working before all the attendees connect. In addition, there are some platforms where you can even record your practice sessions. Doing so can improve parts of your online presence to make it more engaging.

Internet connection

Having a solid internet connection is non-negotiable when hosting an online conference or event. Any disruptions in the quality of Internet connection can prompt many attendees to drop off. That’s why every event-hosting software offers you the chance to check all your levels. Remember that it is also crucial to make sure that your speakers and microphones provide high-quality audio.

Virtual Conference Best Practices: How To Host A Virtual Conference?

Organizing and hosting a virtual conference is not an easy task. We’ve put together a list of actions you can take to ensure your online event will go smoothly.

Choosing the right webinar software

Some of the best platforms you can find online for digital events include GoToWebinar, WebinarJam, BlueJeans Events, and even Zoom. To pick the perfect platform when learning how to host a virtual event, you need to look at the platform’s features. Remember to check the maximum number of attendees, engagement tools, analytics, and community chats and plan your schedule and budget accordingly.

Presentation tools

Depending on the type of software you choose, there are different presentation tools you can use. For example, some of them allow you to present a pre-recorded presentation that way, and you can be more engaging with the audience through real-time conversations. Depending on the nature of your event and its intended purpose, some tools may be better than others.

Picking topics and speakers

Like in-person conferences, choosing relevant, engaging topics is key to maintaining engagement throughout your event. Otherwise, your overall conversation might be spread across such a wide range of topics that attendees might find themselves confused, distracted, or unsure of what to take away from your presentations. Also note that selecting your speakers is also integral to the success of your event; try to have a panel that offers different perspectives about the subject. Three to five industry experts would be an ideal amount for most events.

Making a registration form

The best way to plan out your virtual webinar or conference is to create a registration form that tells you the information of the people who will attend. Here, you need to request details like their contact information, age, location, and gender. This form also allows you to share some things about the event, like the list of speakers, schedules, and social links, and also provides some useful data and statistics on your attendees.

Promotion

If you want to know how to host a virtual event, we can tell you that it involves more than just organizational skills. You will also need some marketing know-how to promote your virtual event, and you’ll need to use email marketing and social media to keep your audience posted well in advance. Keep in mind that the objective is not just getting the most number of registrants; what’s important is having the proper attendance ratio scaled for your event so things remain manageable.

Making your platform secure

Having a virtual event means you will be the host of a professional conference. That’s why it is vital to ensure that the platform is secure. To achieve this, you need to look for software that has authentication to protect the entire event. You’ll also need complete administrative control over the event, allowing you to moderate participants as necessary. Various online community management softwares offer these as functions in their software packages, so consider investing in one of them to better regulate your virtual webinar.

Conclusion

In summary, we hope we’ve convinced you that virtual webinars, conferences, and other similar events can be just as productive, profitable, and beneficial as traditional, in-person events. And note that while digital events provide a direct benefit, their effects are proportional to your investment and the effectiveness of your preparations. Consider implementing community engagement and management software to expand your web community and create a space where your brand can develop a dedicated following. Alongside well-planned virtual events, tools like these can help solidify your online presence and help your business grow across the web.

Building a Social Media Style Brand Experience for Any Website

Crafting a brand experience successfully is one of the key goals that a company should work towards to when looking to improve its online performance. It leads to audience engagement which is crucial for conversion and sales on your site and for building a loyal customer base. To achieve a high engagement rate on your site, you need to get creative and stand out from your competitors.

Over the past decade, one of the biggest success stories in audience engagement has been the explosive rise in social media usage and dependence. With so many individuals active on various platforms, organizations have been quick to direct their marketing and engagement efforts through social media. However, it’s important to note that due to how data is exchanged and used on the web today, integrating a web feed for a social media platform doesn’t do nearly enough for your website, as you get almost nothing in data returns while the social media platform continues to receive continued referrals and activity.

So what’s the alternative? The fact is that it doesn’t take much to create the same levels of engagement that can be found on social media platforms. You just need the right tools and knowledge to develop social media-like experiences for your audience. By emulating the beneficial aspects of these platforms to create a digital brand experience, you can build a community that invites members to revisit and engage with your services.

Why use tools to create a brand experience on my company website?

If you are looking to build a loyal customer base, a standard interface is no longer enough in today’s market. Instead, your audience needs to feel intrigued, motivated to participate, and valued for their contributions. Integrating tools that facilitate these events for visitors to your website elevates their experience with your business from a chore to a customer experience. But if you don’t know much about a brand experience or the tools used to make it happen, it can be challenging to visualize how you can take your website from here to there.

Don’t worry; to help you get started, we’ve put together some easy to understand examples of brand experience design, fostering increased engagement that can make a world of difference to your current website.

Brand experience examples

As mentioned above, creating a media feed on your website makes it more attractive for customers who heavily use social media. Creating similar experiences for them likens the positive experience of social media to the brand experience they undergo on your web platform.

Below, we’ve listed several different website features modeled around social media that you can use on your platform.

Complete social wall

The social media feed does a lot of things right; it provides a constant flow of content to engage the visitor, provides vibrant visuals with plenty of imagery, and provides value that encourages them to revisit the website. However, building your own brand wall doesn’t have to rely on social media directly; you can use tools to create a similar social wall built around your brand experience and customers.

Testimonial space

Word-of-mouth is a more powerful tool than ever before. Because of how often the consumer journey begins from references and good reviews, it’s essential to show potential customers that you have a satisfied audience. You can create a testimonial space that shows what people have to say about your brand to achieve this. Showcasing what satisfied customers are saying about their experiences does wonders to foster positivity and encourage new visitors to start their journey with you.

Personalized user profiles

Having a system in place that allows your visitors and customers to create an identity is key to crafting a brand experience. It’s much easier to remain engaged and participate as part of a community when viewers can record and build on their actions and overall experience with your brand. Software tools can let your users create an avatar, respond to likes and follows, and view their historical activity. Features like this provide the infrastructure you need to have your brand members keep up with their interactions and contribute to the growth of your audience.

Likes and follows

You can argue that the ability to like, follow, and share content on social media platforms is one of the defining features of the core social media experience. Integrating these options directly into your platform through software tools can be a straightforward and effective way to capitalize on user preferences, and build a social media-style, branded experience that promotes continued engagement and association with your platform.

Community Chat

Having great content on your website is a fantastic way to develop your brand experience and promote engagement. Providing a way for your community to discuss and share their thoughts on that content is even better! Community chat systems like the ones provided by Viafoura offer real-time, active engagement that can be extremely effective at letting your users feel like they’re part of the conversation and within a larger circle of association. These tools will often provide the ability to capture user data, which can be used in a variety of ways to increase conversions and tailor your brand experience to user needs without direct reliance on social media.

Conversations and Comments

Users often have immediate reactions and responses to content, posts, articles, and updates that you might offer on your website. Providing a space to comment on your content and begin conversations with fellow users is a great way to allow your users to interact with each other and enjoy a brand experience. Like social media platforms, certain software tools also allow for likes, badges, and other meaningful means of recognizing noteworthy contributors, which rewards positive contributions and provides your users with a means to identify helpful or exciting content.

Moderation

It’s important to note that while most users in your community will add to and build upon your brand and its level of engagement, some users may detract from building positive brand experiences. For example, troll posts and toxicity are a very real part of any online social community, and they’re most likely an aspect of the social media experience that you’d want to avoid actively. Good software tools like our content moderation tool will have ways to quickly and effectively flag these types of comments and posts and remove them while also offering a means to moderate walls, active feeds, and comment sections actively.

These are just a handful of examples that show how you may engage with your users and grow your community and note that none of these require direct integration of social media websites into your website. Instead, you can incorporate these features straight into your website to start building a community within your own digital space through social media-like experiences. Viafoura provides an incredible array of community-building tools and solutions that can help you establish a strong web presence, so if you’re still wondering how to increase brand engagement, look no further! Click here to request a demo on how we can help you meet your engagement goals.

How to Increase Website Engagement: 5 Ideas Included

As Generation Z and Millennials make increasing contributions to global shopping trends, it only makes sense that they are driving the online shopping revolution. With more than 2 billion people making their purchases online, it’s loud and clear that the web is the place to be for global companies.

However, with the abundance of online products and services, modern companies need to find a way to stand out amongst the thousands of websites. It’s easy for your web platform to fall into obscurity if you aren’t engaging with visitors to your website and converting them to loyal subscribers.

If you’re wondering if optimizing site engagement is necessary when you already have good website traffic, we can assure you that it definitely is! Website engagement is critical since it’s the key to converting visiting traffic into members of your online community.

This article will discuss some fundamental audience engagement concepts and how you can incorporate them into your web platform and foster a growing online presence.

What Is Site Engagement?

Website engagement is the process of building relationships with your customers to create a community around your brand, which you can then interact and participate in to foster trust and brand loyalty . An engaged audience is more likely to continue to use your products and services, and is more likely to share your brand within their communal circles, which helps attract more like-minded people to your site.

You can build relationships with your customers on the site through different methods. Below are some key links between your brand and your customers that have a lot of influence on web engagement.

Content

Web content is the backbone of the material that your community will read over, discuss, comment on, and share. This means it’s vital that you provide content that is interesting, relevant, and as close to what your audience wants as possible. These can be updated on specific programs, new products or services available for your audience, community spotlights, and more.

It’s also important to provide content at a steady, reliable pace, as this is a big part of what makes your audience revisit your website and increases overall web engagement. In addition, this lays the foundation for the establishment of a community within which your users can feel included.

Social-media style features

Social media is popular for a good reason; they utilize several popular functions and tools to foster community engagement. Using social media style features such as likes and follows, comments, community posts, news feeds, and engagement carousels are a great way to get your community involved in your brand and creating a buzz about what you have to offer.

Through use of an online community engagement and management software, you can employ many of the tools we’ve mentioned to increase community engagement. If you’re interested in learning more about these features, check them out here to learn more about how to use them within your own web platform.

Active participation

In addition to providing tools for your audience to engage with your content and their fellow members, it’s also important to note that as a brand, your contributions to the community’s growth are just as important, if not more, than those of your users. Your audience wants to know that you care about their opinions, and that you’re willing to directly engage with them regarding their praise, feedback, complaints, and contributions.

Make sure to assign someone to manage your community and engage with them regularly, if not daily, and regularly go over the audience engagement data to examine what your community has to say about your brand.

Website Engagement Analytics

Now that you understand what web engagement is, you need to know how to process the data you receive from your platform to adjust and modify your engagement strategy.

Some of the metrics that you can check regularly include page views, time on page, bounce rate, pages per session, and new visitors. These can be easily accessible via Google Analytics, and it is strongly recommended and if you’re not already doing so, to utilize this tool to analyze data and make informed decisions on how to continue to promote site engagement.

How To Increase Website Engagement

This section will talk about five effective tips that you can use to increase your site engagement. This is not a comprehensive list, but it will go a long way towards resolving any major complications that are proving to be a roadblock for your web engagement.

Faster page loading

Let’s say you are looking for something on Google. What happens if the page you click on takes a long time to load? Chances are, you are going to bounce back and select another result. This is definitely something you want to avoid; your website should load in two to three seconds as a rule of thumb. If that’s not the case, then you are potentially losing traffic and chances at community growth.

There are numerous ways to improve the loading time of your website, such as image compression, combining files, avoiding redirects and reducing HTTPS requests. Talk to your web designer/programmer to discuss how you can optimize page load speeds to ensure your web traffic successfully reaches your platform.

Simplify your navigation

Your users need to reach any part of your website within two to three clicks to increase web engagement. Therefore, you should create an easy structure for them to navigate; in this regard, many people focus on internal linking. This is how you direct the users from one part of your site to the other. You can do this using images, CTAs, and even navigation links embedded in your content. Make sure that you are linking to other pages on your site in a natural way to provide value for your customers and help them find similar content to what they’re interested in seeing.

Mobile friendly

Today, most web users prefer using mobile devices to browse the web and engage with the web platforms. This means that it is vital that your website be properly optimized for mobile users.

There are several steps to creating a mobile-friendly website, such as format optimization, making navigation easy through the internal linking strategy we explained above, and testing if everything is in order through Google’s mobile-friendly test. Any issues outlined need to be addressed by your web developer.

Adding chatbox

Providing a chatbox service can be a great way for users to get the answers to frequently asked questions and narrow down where they need to be to find content. Using a live chatbox service is a great way to increase audience engagement by having users communicate with your brand’s reps directly through your platform. Having one of these on your site is one of the most powerful website engagement tools.

Guide users

Guiding your users can help your online engagement while achieving conversions at the same time. Here, you will need to use different CTAs (call-to-action) that are persuasive while avoiding direct commands. For instance, instead of a button that says “Buy Now,” use words such as “Subscribe” and “Learn More.” As a result, users are less pressured to decide and won’t feel that they need to commit to your brand right away. This also does wonders for fostering trust and a sense of community because the user feels valued as an individual and not a sales figure. It is key to regularly go over key engagement tool metrics in order to keep up to date with the current state of your sites online engagement.

Study your audience

Your audience are living, breathing people, with their own individual tastes and preferences. There’s a lot of information you can obtain from them when they visit your website, and you can put that information to good use by customizing their experience with you when they return from time to time. Using tools like Google Analytics can be a great way to visualize your audience’s behaviours, and on a personal level, using cookie data to suggest content similar to their previous choices allows for simple personalization that makes it much more likely that they remain engaged with your brand and website.

We hope this has been useful in helping you come up with your own website engagement strategies. We also recommend you check out our webinar on a new approach to engagement and our suite of online community management solutions to learn more about how they can help you construct your virtual community and increase overall site engagement for your organization.

Civilize & Monetize: How to Highlight Constructive vs. Toxic Comments

Spotlight:

A moderation strategy keeps your digital spaces safe, but should also include how to drive positive conversations
Positive, active communities are lucrative for publishers
1. 80% of all user registrations are triggered on pages that feature onsite engagement tools and user-generated content.
2. Registered users spend 225% more time-consuming media content per week.*
  1. *Viafoura study data collected Jan 2019 – May 2019, sampled 14 unique media brands, sampled 85M unique non-registered and 2.5M registered users
Help spark the conversation, pose thoughtful questions
Highlight positive community members, not only does it encourage more engagement, it shows the kind of engagement you’re looking for
Community guidelines must be clear and easily accessible to your community

Online social spaces exist to build value for your community members, generating engagement and loyalty toward your brand. And these tools are most effective when media organizations support them with the right strategies that maximize user activity.

A moderation strategy, for example, is necessary for businesses to keep their digital social spaces civil. But media companies must go beyond reducing offensive comments and trolls in their social spaces to facilitate ideal behavior from audience members.

“Just as it’s important to have a strategy in place to protect the quality of your on-site social spaces, it’s also crucial to have a strategy to drive positive conversation around your content,” says Leigh Adams, director of moderation solutions at Viafoura.

In other words, if you want to drive positive behavior from your community members, you’ll need to take action by encouraging users to participate in meaningful, on-topic discussions.

The Value of Activating Productive Discussion

In the digital world, active communities are incredibly lucrative for media companies.

You can draw on your users’ engagement and behavioral data to personalize their experience and increase your website or app’s appeal to advertisers. Plus, you can assess what people post about to determine the types of content that will resonate the most with your online community.

Keep in mind that digital conversation tools also connect people together, forming long-lasting relationships that are tied to your brand.

But you can’t assume that people will become active, model community members unless they understand what kind of discussions and behaviors are expected of them.

Media organizations that take the time to outline and promote what positive behavior looks like for their communities will be well-positioned to grow attention levels, memberships and various revenue streams.

“The most thriving and profitable online communities are often the ones where positive behavior is encouraged, demonstrated and rewarded by the community host,” Adams explains. “No matter how intuitive and engaging your moderation tools are, you need to develop a battle plan if you want to activate your community effectively.”

Ultimately, media organizations can take a few simple steps to ensure their communities are overflowing with activity:

Pose Questions for Users To Answer

If you want to increase activity from your digital community, you can spark discussions and debates by showcasing thought-provoking questions.

“One of the best ways to keep discussions in your commenting section buzzing and on-topic is to give your readers a prompt through a question that relates to your content,” Adams states. “Not everyone will understand how you want them to behave if you don’t give them some level of guidance to follow.”

Consider highlighting questions for community members at the bottom of your content piece. Or, you can pin them as posts within your commenting widget.

Interacting with your community members, even by just getting a conversation started, will give users the direction they need to post comments that are on-topic and positive.

Reward and Highlight Model Behavior

Your community members play a significant role in the success of your business. So how are you taking the time to reward your most active users?

“By rewarding commenters for positive and productive contributions, you’re incentivizing your most loyal supporters to continue participating in your digital community,” says Adams.

There are several ways you can show readers that you appreciate good behavior.

You can give top contributors badges based on their participation levels, pin their comments to the top of your commenting widget, invite them to help you moderate live events and send them an email to thank them.

Set Up Clear, Accessible Community Guidelines

Your community guidelines essentially act as a blueprint for acceptable and positive behavior on your website or app.

According to Adams, you should be direct in your community guidelines — tell your audience exactly what’s expected of their behavior on your digital properties. That includes outlining what kind of behavior isn’t appropriate.

Adams suggests “your guidelines should make it clear that comments that appear legally objectionable or [encourage/condone] a criminal offense or any form of violence or harassment, will NOT be tolerated.”

Crafting clear community guidelines posted in an easy-to-access spot on your digital property will pave the way for acceptable behavior and positive conversations.

Media organizations must implement strategies to outline, reward, highlight and facilitate positive behavior in their online communities. By doing so, companies can benefit from a closely connected, active and growing audience that can be monetized continuously.

For more information on how to build positive behavior in your community, view a list of community-building best practices here.