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Tag: Mariam Mammen Mathew

  • ManoramaOnline enhances user experience with Google’s strategic partnership

    ManoramaOnline enhances user experience with Google’s strategic partnership

    Mumbai: ManoramaOnline, a digital media, has significantly advanced its platform through “ManoramaOnline 2.5,” an ambitious project aimed at revolutionizing user experience on both web and e-reader platforms. This major upgrade made possible through a strategic partnership with Google, marks a significant step forward in the platform’s commitment to delivering high-quality content to the Malayalee community. Over the past quarter-century, ManoramaOnline has become a trusted source of news and information, consistently excelling in online content delivery.

    The primary goal of “ManoramaOnline 2.5” was to create a modern, user-friendly interface that aligns with contemporary trends. The project addressed key issues such as UX/UI, content discoverability, and CMS architecture. The redesign features a sleek, intuitive interface that makes it easier for users to find relevant content quickly. Enhancements to the CMS architecture streamline the content publishing process, offering greater flexibility for editors and ensuring a more dynamic content presentation. Additionally, the project met the growing demand for enhanced e-paper services among subscribers.

    The collaboration with Google has yielded impressive results. Since the roll-out of the redesigned platform, user feedback has been overwhelmingly positive. Post-redesign, there was a 55% increase in the average engagement time per session for direct traffic, indicating a significant improvement in user engagement and satisfaction with the redesigned platform. Additionally, there was a 6% increase in engaged sessions per user for both direct and organic search traffic referrals, indicating a notable enhancement in user interaction and interest with the revamped platform. Users now enjoy a more engaging and satisfying interaction with the platform, reflected in increased engagement times and higher satisfaction rates.

    The success of this project was made possible through a strategic partnership with Google. Google’s expertise and resources provided invaluable insights and support throughout the project, helping ManoramaOnline leverage cutting-edge technologies and best practices to significantly enhance the platform’s performance and user experience.

    The ‘ManoramaOnline 2.5’ project, initiated in partnership with Google, undoubtedly accelerated our efforts to improve reader experience and engagement across all our platforms,” said ManoramaOnline, chief executive officer Mariam Mammen Mathew.

    “ManoramaOnline has been a pioneer of high standards in the news and information space. Partnering with the brand and the hugely committed team to improve their news delivery across digital channels has been an invaluable experience. Having credible news reach the language user is a core part of Google’s mission and we could not be happier with the results”, said Durga Raghunath, Head of News Partnerships, Google India.

    With the successful launch and operation of the redesigned platform, ManoramaOnline continues to evolve, leveraging the use of the latest technology to meet the dynamic needs of its users.

  • The Quint & ManoramaOnline partner with Ideabrew to distribute podcasts

    The Quint & ManoramaOnline partner with Ideabrew to distribute podcasts

    Mumbai: Ideabrew Studios has partnered with The Quint and ManoramaOnline to create, host, and distribute podcasts. As part of this partnership, Ideabrew studios will host, distribute, and monetize over 30 existing shows, including top shows like Urdunama, Qisse Kahaniyan, and The Big Story. Together, they will also work to create rich content through new brand-led shows that appease the listener as well as benefit the brand partner.

    The Quint executive editor Shelly Walia said, “The Quint has been a leader among digital news media companies in leveraging the power of sound through its episodic and serialised podcasts. Collaborating with Ideabrew Studios opens exciting prospects for us in terms of not only reaching out to our habitual listeners and finding a new audience – but also getting to know them better.”

    She further added, “The data provided by Ideabrew is helping us better measure user numbers, understand user behaviour, and study demography in a more systematic manner. This year, there’s been an uptick in listenership across podcasting channels as the world returns to post-pandemic normalcy – and for The Quint, the tie-up provides a timely opportunity to capitalise on this revival.”

    Ideabrew and ManoramaOnline launched a strategic podcast collaboration in early 2022, resulting in significant amplification and reach for their podcasts as well as scale for the business partnership.

    ManoramaOnline CEO Mariam Mammen Mathew said, “We are happy to start our relationship with podcast creators and hosting platform IdeaBrew. In a short time, our listeners have responded well to the interesting and rich content in English and Malayalam languages on different podcast platforms. Podcasting is disrupting the traditional radio space, making it an exciting time for the news industry. We are happy about creating rich news content that’s true to our brand and a refreshing cultural and technological change across our newsrooms.”

    With 23 popular shows across genres in Malayalam and English, this is already a head start. Mariam added, “This partnership is going to give us a fillip to push out the several projects in our pipeline.”

    Ideabrew CEO Aditya Kuber said, “Whether it’s Covid-19 updates, political discord, a new space launch, or the latest celebrity shenanigans, news channels carry 24-hour news, giving you something to constantly ponder or worry over. Through our medium of audio content, Ideabrew aims to disrupt the way the audience receives and responds to daily news. Our podcasts are designed to engage in healthier outlets that allow our audiences the flexibility to choose when they want to consume their news and also provide stimulating formats in the form of in-depth analysis, interviews, or opinions from experts on the subject to make the news informative, wholesome, and entertaining.”

    He further added, “We are excited about making steady inroads into the news category by partnering with the best news providers across the country to make audio the preferred medium to receive national, regional, and local news in different languages. Our premier association with the HW News Network has been phenomenal, attracting a new and far younger audience through podcasts, giving the brand a distinctive extension to get their content out.”

    Ideabrew Studios’ current partners for whom they create and host audio shows are Sakal News, HW News, and Reason.

  • Malayala Manorama revamps news and entertainment channel with brightcove

    Malayala Manorama revamps news and entertainment channel with brightcove

    MUMBAI: Brightcove Inc. (NASDAQ: BCOV), the leading provider of cloud services for video, today announced Malayala Manorama selected Brightcove Video Platform to power Manorama Online, the online news vertical of Malayala Manorama. As the leading Malayalam-language publications in India, Malayala Manorama serves news and entertainment content to local and Malayalee diaspora audiences worldwide.

    Established in 1888, Malayala Manorama Group is one of India’s largest publishing companies, with more than 40 publications in circulation. ManoramaOnline is the digital arm of Malayala Manorama seeing traffic from 200 countries and 16 million unique visitors per month.

    ManoramaOnline launched its video offering using Brightcove Video Platform in October 2017 with an exclusive video on-demand streaming of a beauty pageant titled ‘Miss Millennial’. Malayala Manorama is also using the Brightcove Video Platform to power the on-demand video content on five of its online properties comprising ManoramaOnline, Manorama News TV, Mazhavil Manorama TV, The Week, and Vanitha.

    “Over the past few years Manorama Online has been hosting video content on third-party DSPs to monetise the videos. We soon realised that the prospects of monetisation on such platforms was limited. As news content consumption continues to shift towards to video, we needed to revamp our video platform to a platform that would give us more control our video inventory and help us to achieve sustainable ad funded revenue model,” Mariam Mammen Mathew, chief operating officer at Manorama Online said.

    “Any buying decision at Manorama is a complex process which involves many stages of testing and feasibility checks. After evaluating close to 12 different video platforms, we decided on Brightcove. When it came to features like quality of service, ease of ingestion, player performance, real-time reports and streamlined workflows, the Brightcove platform met all of our stringent requirements. Our decision was put to test during Manorama’s recent web streaming of ‘Miss Millennial’. Brightcove clocked half a million video plays and more than 2 million minutes of stream consumption for the Miss Millennial event over a week. It is interesting to note how a simple adjustment to our video experience can make a big difference to our viewership rate,” Mariam Mammen Mathew said.

    “Publishers like Malayala Manorama are going all in on video and placing an imperative on monetising video as part of their revenue stream. Brightcove is right there to partner with them to help scale their business as they adapt to the shift in how news and entertainment content is being served and monetised,” Ben Morrell, General Manager, Asia, Brightcove, said.

    Malayala Manorama is one of the first publishers to use the latest in video compression technology called Context-Aware Encoding (CAE). CAE is Brightcove’s patent-pending encoding method designed to deliver quality video at the lowest size possible, reducing video operations and delivery costs by up to 50%.