Posts Tagged ‘publishers’

« Pocket Blog

Introducing Pocket for Publishers: A New Way to Embrace ‘Save for Later’

March 26th, 2013  •  By Mark

For more than 8.5 million users, Pocket is changing how we consume content. “Save to Pocket” can extend the life of content by weeks and months—and for users, Pocket increases the amount of quality content they can consume, across multiple devices, at any time.

This longer lifespan means stories can find a new life beyond their original run. Imagine if serial TV dramas like “Breaking Bad” or “Downton Abbey” had been on television before the DVR: If we only had one chance to watch them, at one specific time, would they have thrived?

“Save for later” is ushering in a similar era for web content. It means creating new possibilities for publishers—to better understand the life of their content in Pocket, and make the experience better for their audience.

Today we’re excited to introduce Pocket for Publishers, a new, free way for publishers to look beyond real-time trends and start exploring what it means to consider the lifetime of their content—and use new tools that make the most of the Pocket ecosystem.

More than a dozen major publishers are already participating, including The Washington Post, Vox Media (The Verge, SB Nation and Polygon), WordPress, USA Today, Time.com, Wired, BuzzFeed, Bloomberg Businessweek, New York Review of Books, The Awl, Mother Jones, The Next Web, Matter, Aeon Magazine, and more.

If you’re a site publisher, you can sign up today to request access.

Here’s What’s in Pocket for Publishers:

 

1. See How Your Content Is Performing in Pocket

As more sites embrace timeless, high-quality content, impact and longevity matter. Publishers can now access a custom dashboard to view the extended life of their stories or videos over weeks and months. The dashboard includes lists of top content and authors, and new metrics you’ll only see from Pocket that focus on longevity and engagement.

2. Create Custom Footer Messages in Pocket

With Pocket for Publishers, you can add a custom text footer message that will appear at the bottom of any article saved from your site. Use it to highlight related content, your apps or social media accounts, or even a newsletter or subscription. We’re excited to see how publishers use it.

3. Add a ‘Save to Pocket’ Button to Your Site and WordPress

Adding a ‘Save to Pocket’ button on your site makes it easy for your readers to access your stories anywhere, on every major mobile and tablet platform. You can also include a save count badge to show the total saves to Pocket. View an example of the “Save to Pocket” button on The Awl.

Add a “Save to Pocket” button for your site.

We’re also thrilled to announce the “Save to Pocket” button is available for all WordPress.com sites and very soon will be available for self-hosted sites using the sharing feature available with the Jetpack plugin.

4. Integrate Site Subscription for Paywall Content

Because Pocket is already available on every major mobile and tablet platform, sites can focus on compelling content, not app development. For publishers with premium paywalled content, our Site Subscription feature lets your paying customers access paywalled content from right inside Pocket. Recent partners include The New York Review of Books, VQR and Matter.

Learn more about Site Subscription

5. Add Pocket Integration to Your App

For publishers who already have an app, “Save to Pocket” is one of the most popular share menu options, and you can save to Pocket from the most popular apps, including Twitter, Flipboard, The Verge, Zite, Tweetbot and more.

Learn how to use Pocket’s SDK in your app.

***

This is just the beginning, and we’re excited to hear what you think. If you have questions or comments, you can reach us at publishers@getpocket.com.

Get started with Pocket for Publishers

 

Special thanks to all of our early publisher partners:

Posted in News , , , , , , , ,

How Pocket Extends the Life of a Story

March 19th, 2013  •  By Mark

Pocket users already know this: The ability to “save for later” can completely change how we consume content, and how much of it we consume.

Just like the DVR changed how we enjoy TV—and even what types of shows we watch—”save for later” is having the same effect on web content. After the initial flurry of tweets and Facebook posts dies down, stories can find an extended life in Pocket.

So, how long do stories live in Pocket?

To find out an article’s extended life, we can look at its most active consumption period on the web compared to Pocket. For the purposes of this post, we’ll measure the number of days it takes for an article to reach 80% of its total consumption.

Below is a breakdown of web activity for BuzzFeed’s 4,500-word story on the history of Atari’s Pong, published in November and written by Chris Stokel-Walker. The story’s most active consumption period on the web was 10 days—but when we look at “opens” in Pocket, the story’s most active period was 35 days:

 

It’s important to note that BuzzFeed’s traffic for the story is much larger than Pocket’s activity, but you see a clear extension of that story’s lifespan when you compare the two.

We see similar behavior when comparing an article’s activity on Twitter versus its activity in Pocket. For this Verge article about the Microsoft Surface by Tom Warren, its Twitter activity had a most active period of two days. In Pocket, it was six days:

 

And here’s the life of a video, “The ABC of Architects” by Federico Gonzalez, posted on Vimeo. The most active period for Vimeo views was 12 days, and in Pocket it was 18 days:

Why Does Lifespan Matter?

As users continue to consume content across multiple devices, including tablets and phones, we think it’s important to investigate not just the popularity of a story or video, but its longevity. When high-quality content can continue to thrive for more than a month, as in the case with BuzzFeed, we view that as a positive development for publishers.

The longer you let people hold on to content, the better the odds that they’ll end up consuming it. The more they consume it, the more likely they are to share it across social media—and the longer that story lives everywhere.

At Pocket, we’re excited to work with publishers to explore how longevity can help high-quality content. If you’re a publisher and want to learn more, or see the lifespan of your stories, email us at publishers@getpocket.com.

 

Posted in News , , , , ,

More Magazines for Pocket’s Site Subscription

December 7th, 2012  •  By Mark

 

This week we introduced an improved way for readers to access the content they love inside Pocket: Called Site Subscription, this updated feature lets you easily log in from Pocket to access websites that require a paid subscription or registration.

Today we’ve added two new publishers to Pocket’s Site Subscription, and they’re two highly acclaimed magazines—The New York Review of Books and VQR.

The New York Review of Books ($74.95/year) and VQR ($32/year) both feature an expansive digital archive for their paid subscribers, so we’ve made it easier for their subscribers to access those stories in Pocket.

Here’s how Pocket’s Site Subscription works:

1. You can save subscriber-only articles just like you’d save any article to Pocket. When you open that article in Pocket, you’ll be prompted to login to the site.

2. Enter your credentials for that site’s subscription, and then Pocket will automatically pull up the full text of the article.

3. You’re all set! Once you’ve entered your site credentials you won’t need to do so again, unless you delete the app or log out of your services.

If you’re a publisher with a digital subscription or paywall, it’s easy to make this feature available to your readers—at no cost, and with no development work on your end.

Just email us at publishers@getpocket.com and we’ll be happy to get your site subscription working in Pocket.

Pocket is committed to helping publishers and readers make the most of save-for-later, and we’re excited to share more news in the weeks and months to come.

-Mark Armstrong
Editorial Director, Pocket

Posted in News , , , , ,

Announcing Pocket’s First Publisher Partnership, with Kickstarter-Powered MATTER

December 3rd, 2012  •  By Mark

Digital publishing is evolving rapidly, and earlier this year, we met two journalists, Jim Giles and Bobbie Johnson, who decided to launch their own project on Kickstarter, called MATTER.

Their goal was to create a digital publishing company for original longform storytelling in the realm of science, technology and the future.

They hoped to raise $50,000. Instead, they raised more than $140,000.

Today we’re thrilled to announce that MATTER and Pocket have teamed up to help readers enjoy these new stories with Pocket—on any tablet, phone or computer, even offline.

When you subscribe to MATTER for 99 cents a month, it means you can also access their stories in Pocket. Using our Site Subscription feature, you’ll be able to quickly save MATTER stories to Pocket—and when you’re in Pocket, you can log into MATTER to begin reading it.

Pocket has become an important tool for millions of people, and we’re excited to help publishers like MATTER make it easy for their subscribers to save and enjoy those stories anywhere.

Read their first piece, “Do No Harm,” a haunting story by Anil Ananthaswamy about “being at war with your own body.”

***

We talked with MATTER co-founder Jim Giles about the launch. 

How did MATTER first come together? 

It was a combination of frustration about science and technology journalism, together with the emergence of a new business model. Bobbie and I feel that there isn’t enough really great long-form reporting on sci/tech, particularly investigative work. We know lots of sci/tech reporters with strong stories to tell and nowhere to publish them. Then we saw The Atavist and Byliner make a success of what’s being called the “singles” model: selling individual long-form articles on e-reader platforms like the Kindle store. We figured we could adapt that model and use to publish this missing content.

Why did you decide to use Kickstarter? 

There’s an obvious answer: it’s a great way to raise money. But an equally wonderful thing about Kickstarter is the community that you build by raising money on the site. We’re now connected to over 2,500 people who really want MATTER to succeed. We want to use this community to help guide the evolution of MATTER. The first step is collaborative commissioning—we’ve using an online tool called All Our Ideas that allows communities to prioritise ideas, in this case stories.

What are your own personal reading habits? (i.e. What devices do you use? Where do you find your reading material? When do you do most of your reading?)

I’m a huge admirer of the traditional homes of long-form journalism, places like The New Yorker, The Atlantic, Harper’s and the New York Review of Books. I prefer reading them in print, but I now do more reading on my iPad. I have a long Pocket list! I’m also excited by the long-form material that’s being published by blogs. Wired’s Threat Level blog has published some really strong pieces and Adrian Chen at Gawker has had a string of excellent pieces recently. There are also some startups that are producing very thoughtful stuff, like Aeon Magazine in the U.K.

How much is in your Pocket list? And does that concern you? (It shouldn’t!)

Hold on…okay, just checked. About 15 long-form articles. But I’m about to get on an 11-hour flight, so that’s no bad thing :) Top of the list is “The Man Who Smelled Too Much” in LA Weekly.

Where did you go for design inspiration when it came to your site?

We wanted to create a clean, clutter-free reading environment. We also wanted to make the pieces feel valuable. I hope we succeeded! I’ve been looking at the site for so long that I can’t tell. For inspiration, we turned to sites like Fray.com, The Great Discontent and The Bold Italic. But, most importantly, we were lucky enough to work with an amazing team of designers at Clearleft in the U.K.

 

Posted in News , , , ,

Introducing the New Pocket API for Developers and Publishers

November 7th, 2012  •  By Mark

 

It has been an incredible year for Pocket: We’ve grown to more than 6 million users, and we’ve expanded to new platforms including Mac, Chrome and Safari, in addition to our iOS, Android and Kindle Fire apps.

But we couldn’t have done it without you. We now have 10,000 developers integrating their apps and sites with Pocket, and 45% of Pocket’s more than 1 million daily saves come from third-party apps.

“Save to Pocket” is now a core part of the user experience inside the most popular apps and websites—from Twitter and Flipboard to Tweetbot, Digg, BuzzFeed and more. And in content-focused apps like Zite, Pocket is often one of the most-used share services, alongside Twitter and Facebook.

Today we’re introducing the new Pocket API, which makes it even easier for developers and publishers to put Pocket to work in their own apps—and to do so in more powerful ways.

Start Building with the New Pocket API

What’s In the Pocket API

Our new API includes easy integration and access to the great Pocket features available in our native apps. Here’s what’s new:

• Quick authentication: With OAuth 2, users can connect to Pocket with just two taps and without having to enter their username and password.
• Drop-in iOS/Mac SDK: With just a few lines of code, you can drop Pocket’s all new Objective-C SDK into your app, which manages authentication, performs API requests, and provides access to all of the new API features. (See our video demo below.)
• New API Features: Developers and publishers can access all of Pocket’s most up-to-date features, including favorites, content type filters, more robust tagging, and domain searches.
• New developer portal: We have a new developer site with improved documentation including step-by-step implementation instructions and examples.

What Developers Are Saying About the Pocket API

“‘Save for later’ has become an essential part of mobile news consumption, and I wouldn’t even consider launching a news app without Pocket integration.” -Mike Klaas, co-founder, Zite

“Pocket integration continues to be one of most asked-for features in the new Digg, and the new SDK made implementation super easy!” -Jake Levine, general manager, Digg

“Saving articles to Pocket is a must-have feature for a content-driven application like Readingly. And Pocket users are some of the most engaged users we have.” -Alex Kristofcak, founder, Readingly

“Save-for-later support is an important feature for TweetCaster, which makes integrating with Pocket essential. From a development perspective the new API and iOS SDK couldn’t have been easier to implement and we think our users will appreciate how seamless the integration is.” -Evan Conway, president of OneLouder Apps

Get Started Now 

Developers can get started immediately with the Pocket API: Just sign up here and start building.

More Resources: Pocket SDK Demo

Pocket Objective-C SDK Screencast from Pocket on Vimeo.

Posted in News , , , , ,

More from Our ‘Most-Read Authors’ Report (and Why Bylines Matter)

December 14th, 2011  •  By Mark

The response to our report last week on the “most-read authors” in Read It Later was incredible. One thing is clear: We can learn a lot about the value of great content, outstanding writing and what resonates with people by paying close attention to who’s creating it, and how readers are consuming it. We’re now at 4 million readers and viewers—the largest time-shifting platform on the web—and we feel a responsibility to show how content accessibility can change the way we enjoy what’s out there.

Some notes from last week’s coverage: The New York Times’ David Carr and others reported on our “most-saved” authors, as well as the new concept of “return rates.” That is: It’s not just which authors our users saved, but which authors they returned to. That can say a lot about loyalty to a byline, and the longevity of what they create.

Most-Read Authors: Not the Same as Most-Read Publishers

It’s important to add that our data reflected only the most-saved and ‘most-read’ authors—not the most-saved publishers. As you’ll see soon, Read It Later’s most-saved publisher list is quite different than who ranked highest on our author lists. For example: While Lifehacker’s individual authors were top-ranked on our most-saved authors list, The New York Times is five times more popular overall as a publisher.

One reason has a lot to do with the sizes of various publications’ editorial staffs. The New York Times has hundreds of writers, so their engagement is spread across many different bylines.

Gawker Media properties all did extremely well in the most-read authors report, and there were some fascinating examinations of why Lifehacker ranked atop the “most-saved authors” list, while Deadspin ranked at the top for “highest author return rate.” But why did Gawker Media do so well? Again, look at the Gawker Media mastheads. Small staffs, high volume of traffic.

The Power of ‘Return Rates’—and the Writer’s Voice

The New York Observer’s Foster Kamer also noted some interesting similarities among the writers with the highest return rates—they all have strong, very distinct voices, which suggests a loyalty to the individual writer that we’ve always guessed was true, but could never quite quantify.

Kamer also had a very funny take suggesting all those Lifehacker people saving their to-do lists were not actually getting around to crossing anything off their lists. But actually, most Lifehacker authors had above-average return rates. So maybe our users are pretty productive, after all.

Finally, Nieman Lab’s Megan Garber had a sharp take on what engagement looks like in a time-shifted world, and we think this underscores what’s so interesting and important about “Return Rates” as a way to judge depth, longevity and loyalty to an author, publisher or topic. Many of our highest-return rate authors came from the category of sports, TV, and politics. But there’s a lot more to explore in terms of how those categories resonate in terms of reader loyalty.

More than anything, we hoped last week’s report would start a whole new conversation about how we measure the quality of what’s on the web: After all, it’s the content, created by writers, editors, producers and publishers, that make people so passionate about time-shifting.

Through transparency we at Read It Later hope to give them more insight into how their work is enjoyed. We will continue to share what we know with our users.

Posted in Trends , , , , ,