by Daniel Anstandig

As Digital Media has matured in the marketplace, many models have emerged for strategic development of websites. At McVay New Media, we consult for media companies who are entering the digital space, and we design and implement digital media strategies for companies on eight cylinders: content, community, communication, commerce, monetization, movement, management, and measurement.

Without thoroughly considering and planning for any one of these areas, the digital media strategy of that company may be vulnerable.

If your company is developing a digital media strategy, these are some of the questions that must be addressed to ensure your success.

Content

• What type of content will be featured on your website?
• Who will be responsible for producing this content?
• Will the content be delivered in the form of text, audio, or video?
• What type of technical platform will this content require?
• Is the content going to be syndicated to iTunes, Shoutcast, AudioRealm, or any other "Internet Yellow Pages" site?
• Will the content require any "RSS" feed functionality?
• Is any of your content going to be repackaged for e-mail distribution?

Community

• Does your site give the audience freedom to establish a community around your content? This may be in the form of "social networking" from forums to comment-posting functionality.
• Does your content lend itself to augmentation from "user generated content?"
• How are you harnessing the traffic on your site? Are you managing a database of users on the site?
• Are you maintaining active e-mails as part your user database?

Communication

• How will visitors interact with your brand?
• Do you have a dedicated “Listener Relationship Manager” at the station who is designated to reply to all general communication that comes into the station?
• Do you have a policy for air talent on how quickly listeners should expect a reply to any e-mail or other communication?
• What type of technology will you use to facilitate communication between visitors and your station staff? Are you going to limit communication to e-mail? Or, are chat rooms, instant messengers, and/or “live operator” modules going to be available?

Commerce

There are two sections of this strategy that account for revenue. Commerce is the part of your revenue strategy that accounts for businessàconsumer transactions. This may be in the format of merchandise: t-shirts, hats, concert tickets, etc. It may also be in the form of digital downloads or digital access, such as online classified ads, loyalty clubs, or password protected content.

Some of the questions that must be answered in this portion of the strategy are:

• What type of store front / shopping cart functionality will you need for your site?
• Do you have a merchant account?
• What is your strategy for controlling inventory in your store?
• Who will serve as the customer service representative at your station when a visitor has a problem?

Monetization

The second section of this strategy that accounts for revenue is Monetization, which pertains to businessàbusiness related transactions.

• What exact product will you be selling online?
• Who will sell the product, and what type of training do they require?
• Do we need to recruit someone to lead the interactive/digital media sales efforts?
• What is the revenue potential in this marketplace? (often, we provide this analysis for clients based on regional revenue audits)
• What is the best way for this station’s sales staff to integrate selling interactive—without distracting important attention from the core product (on-air advertising)?

Movement

This portion of the strategy accounts for how you will "traffic" listeners onto and through your website. This includes recruitment of audience onto the site as well as navigation through the site.

• What is your strategy to move visitors onto your website?
• How will you utilize search engines to direct interested customers to your site?
• Has your site been optimized for search engines, and what is your plan to maintain healthy-search-engine-friendly sites?
• What type of on-air cross promotion will be utilized to support the website?
• If you are streaming, are you diligently cross-promoting to your on-air properties?
• How will you retain visitors on the site for more than three pages--the average number of pages viewed on any site?

Management

• Who will lead this initiative inside the radio station?
• Do you have a Content Management System that is accessible to the entire staff, so that content may be manipulated online by anyone?
• What systems do you have in place to traffic your ads?
• Who will manage your streaming technology, and who is responsible for technical problems?
• Who will lead the sales initiative for interactive? (In many cases, it serves radio stations best to have someone other than the GSM responsible for championing interactive sales behind the scenes).

Measurement

Responsible tracking of your site’s metrics is essential. You will need to have an analytics program such as Google Analytics or WebTrends.,/p>

These analytics/measurement systems will help you define popular areas of your website, how long visitors are staying and where they are coming from.

Remember that streaming measurement is just as important as website measurement; make sure every tune-in or view is counted.

• What metrics program will you use?
• Is it necessary to commission third party audits for this site? (this is dependent on your sales strategy)
• What types of reports will be opened to the sales staff on a regular basis?
• How often will our consultant review the metrics with us to refine our content strategy? (How can our content creators learn from the metrics?)

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