Feb. 27, 2019

Roundtables offer opportunity for sharing among Mega-Conference attendees

Top row: Bill Bradley, Tim D'Avis, Julie Foley and Maggie Louie
Bottom row: Christopher Prinos, Jonas Rideout, Rob Ristagno and John Temple
Top row: Bill Bradley, Tim D'Avis, Julie Foley and Maggie Louie
Bottom row: Christopher Prinos, Jonas Rideout, Rob Ristagno and John Temple
Posted


Seven roundtable discussion groups will give Mega-Conference attendees the opportunity to exchange ideas and share their best practices on the closing day of the conference. 

Don't leave early and miss these sharing sessions!

Charity Huff, co-executive producer of the Mega-Conference, said: "We have the hottest topics set for our Roundtable sessions Wednesday morning. Bring your burning questions. We are covering the most pressing topics in the industry, including: membership models, ad fraud, audience data development and more. Join in to learn the best ideas in the industry."

Two 45-minute roundtable sessions will be held on Wednesday, Feb. 27, with attendees choosing from the following discussions:


9:45 a.m. on Wednesday, Feb. 27

Making Every Offer Count

Converting users into subscribers isn't always easy – yet in modern media, it's become increasingly vital to success. More and more, media providers – trying to keep up with their revenue and audience goals – are realizing the importance of creating the right offer to convert. But conversion starts long before users view an offer. It begins with engagement and an understanding of what drives audience loyalty and requires the right user experience and motivation to build toward success. Even then, the wrong offer can fall flat when key components are ignored. In "Making Every Offer Count: Turning Users Into Subscribers in a Modern Media Landscape," Piano draws on data from more than 1,000 media providers, to find out what works and what doesn't when it comes to building a subscription base.

Moderator:
Jonas Rideout, global director, business development, Piano

Digital Subscription Strategy: Driving Leads

Join us for a jam-packed session full of proven ideas and tactics that will dramatically impact your digital subscription strategy. Find out how to leverage promotions, interactive content and newsletters to drive leads and results for your business and your advertisers.

Moderators:
Tim D'Avis, director of email success, Second Street
Julie Foley, director of affiliate success, Second Street


The Cost of Bad Ads: Audience Trust, Security Risk and Revenue Loss

Ad fraud costs publishers $51 million a day, but few executives know it's happening with increasing frequency on their sites, exposing their users to malware and potentially robbing them of personal data that will be sold on the dark web, generating even more money and motivation for bad actors. Did you know that a successful harvesting of consumer data earns on average $3 per attack?  LMA, DEVCON, OpsCo and AdHack.org teamed up to provide local media publishers the most comprehensive research study of ad fraud across local media sites. More than 38 million exploits have been blocked since the launch of the study, carrying the potential to generate over $114 million in criminal gains.

Moderator:
Maggie Louie, CEO, DEVCON

Best Practices in Driving Automotive Growth in Local Markets

According to the 2018 NADA Dealer Survey, newspaper companies are receiving approximately 9 percent of local franchise dealers' marketing budgets.  In the late 90s and early 2000s, newspaper companies could expect over 80 percent of franchise local dealer marketing budgets.  To compound this problem today, on average we have penetration into less than 20 percent of dealers in the local market. Typically, 80 percent of the dealer universe isn't interested or willing to give us their time. How do we "earn the right" to gain their time? What are some effective ways to gain access to key decision makers (GMs) at dealerships? How are we changing the conversation? Are we aware of the current national trends: new car sales down (-1 percent to -2.5 percent YOY) and inventory levels bloated (+3 percent January YOY). Pre-owned sales are expected to see double digit growth in 2019. Greater emphasis on fixed ops (service) due to new car softness. Based on the forecasted environment, what are the solutions that are resonating with dealers? What are the value drivers that close deals?

Moderator:
Bill Bradley, senior director automotive, Advance


10:45 a.m. on Wednesday, Feb. 27

Membership Rewards and Incentives

The word is out: memberships are a proven way to add new revenue streams to our publishing businesses, in a time where we all NEED new means of generating income. But it's not as simple as just slapping a paywall on your site and hoping readers will start paying. During this roundtable, learn answers to important questions and leave with specific ideas to launch or grow your membership business:

  • Who are our best readers – the ones most willing to enroll in a membership? How can we find this pool of readers?
  • What membership promises (value propositions) resonate well? What specific components support this promise and thus drive conversions and renewals?
  • How can we assemble resources to build, launch and optimize our program? What technology is needed? What services are needed?

Moderator:
Rob Ristagno, founder and CEO, Sterling Woods Group and author of "A Member is Worth a Thousand Visitors"


The Future of Investigative Journalism

Participants at this roundtable will be discussing how to make investigative reporting a core part of any newsroom, no matter the size or economics. Journalism is defined by judgment, by decisions about what's important and what's not. If a newsroom approaches the news with an investigative mindset, it will produce a different type of report than if it approaches the news with a stenographical mindset. This session will explore how to instill an investigative mindset.

Moderator:
John Temple, director of the Investigative Reporting Program at the University of California, Berkeley, and chairman and co-founder of Amuse Labs


Streamlining Sales & Ad Ops: Doing More with Less

Publishers face several market challenges, including changing consumer behavior, variance in product mix and diversity of markets. Ad product development and fulfillment strategies must become as real-time and digital as the product itself. Intuitive technology can enable this digital transformation of publishing workflows and processes. If the products and the consumers have changed, why shouldn't the process of building, distributing and delivering these products go through its own disruption?

In this session we'll discuss disruptive technologies and approaches that can immediately transform ad operations for media companies both large and small. We'll talk about: 

  • The main ad ops challenges that publishers face in the cross-media advertising sales environment.
  • Appropriate solutions that are available to streamline ad operations.
  • Lessons on integrating systems like Salesforce, Order Management and Google Ad Manager.
  • Approaches to measure ad operations efficiency, cost and profitability.
  • Trends in structuring teams across sales, ad ops and fulfillment to do more with less. 
  • Themes in "Ad Process Optimization." 
  • Implementing effective outsourcing strategies.

Moderator:
Christopher Prinos, CEO, INDIGO TRIGGER

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