Vimeo Is Making Visual, Interactive Brand Journal for a ‘Post-Text’ Internet with Prowly App

I bet you know Business Insider and BuzzFeed. They are out to conquer the web by generating content on a massive scale. And when I say “massive,” I mean billions here. Billions of content views monthly - this is what BuzzFeed reported earlier this year. Referred to by others as “a modern publishing phenomenon” and described by themselves as“ content worth sharing,” Buzzfeed is best known for listicles, GIFs, and, click-bait headlines. But the main thing is that they’re the representation of content that works in the internet.

Now another example - one I love the most since this project saw the light of day last year. The Outline - a new media experiment which looks like no other news site around. Joshua Topolsky, to whom it is important “to reach the right people, not necessarily the most people,” wrote in his opening essay, “If we have a central goal, it's to feed your curiosity and intelligence every day with as much respect and honesty as possible. No games, just something fucking interesting.”

When I read it, I thought: „this is it!”. This is the factor that should motivate all brands creating their own content. If you really want to “floor” your audience. Be - as Topolsky said about his project - “a new kind of publication for a new kind of human,” in times when lots of people are still stuck in the idea of what branded comms should be like. With such brands, we really love to cooperate. You know exactly what you need and how to get it, we give you a data-driven software with a tailored and eye-catching Brand Journal, a buzz-feed-style story creator, and an effective Audience Pitch module. The outcome you can expect? Just take a look at the Vimeo Brand Journal powered with Prowly app.

“We needed a flexible newsroom design that would be transparent and easy to navigate for any journalist,” says Jessica Casano-Antonellis, VP of Communications and Head of Diversity at Vimeo. “But it also had to show our thinking, the creativity behind our brand. Prowly was a natural fit for that”. She admits that their former press room was archaic and had very limited functionality when it came to sharing. “We now have the ability for people to share press releases and assets direct from the newsroom, and while this is not necessarily ground-breaking, it simplifies sharing across the social web.”

At Prowly, we truly believe that data is the nucleus of the brand publishing flywheel, the power source that drives the machine. You just need the right combination of people and technology, right? That means a team of great storytellers to create fantastic content, and software to manage all of them. Such cooperation is an excellent example of a functional symbiosis. Wondering how many people has Vimeo engaged in this project? “Three people from the Communications team, all very excited to start tracking such data as email pitch open rates,” reveals Jessica.

Vimeo’s Press Center is a variation of a digital newsroom we call the Brand Journal. The Communications team can post press releases, news, articles, as well as set up brands’ social media streams and press kits. All content is filed under a few tags at the top of the site. You can always change it quickly. The same goes for the color scheme—we know how important it is for you to choose a color which will be compatible with the visual identification of your brand. Thanks to our Journalist Toolbox feature, reporters can download your assets just with one click. The pitching module also allows you to share press releases with your media contacts directly from the app and then track each contact’s behavior. The whole platform is SEO friendly. 

Which features does the Vimeo team like the most and why? “The ability to embed assets - including video embeds - directly in a press release. As a leading video platform, not being able to embed videos in our press releases was very problematic,” Jessica comments. According to her, video is a critical component of any content marketing strategy, and Vimeo continues to iterate on its product for businesses to help engage customers through video marketing, most recently launching all-new review pages and a dedicated panel for Adobe Premiere. If you’re a seasoned content marketer like people working on behalf Vimeo - and we bet you are - there’s no doubt you will understand the importance (and appreciate the possibility) of including high-quality video content in your content marketing strategy.

Modern newsroom is like the heart of your communication. Don’t narrow it down only to your media relations. Show the real life of your brand, express yourself through your social media channels.

Thanks to our integration module you can add them (Facebook, Twitter, Youtube, Vimeo, Instagram, LinkedIn, and other platforms via RSS channels like blogs or news sites) to your Brand Journal if you want them to be visible in the social media stream on the homepage. You can also choose a particular hashtag used by your company to make posts tagged with it immediately visible to everyone entering your Brand Journal. We know how important is interaction and being close to your audience nowadays. With this solution, you allow your readers to discover, like, share, or add comments in real-time. Show them that you are active on different platforms. Inspire them. Increase viewership of your channels and at the same time get more insights on your brand in an accessible way. Think about it - integrations give your readers another reason to stay longer on your website and get more knowledge about your brand.

Prowly also offers you the possibility to implement external software into your Brand Journal. You can integrate Google Analytics by simply adding the Tracking ID to the panel to find out more about your readers’ behaviors. You can also integrate other software of your choice, such as AppThis or SumoMe, to improve your site performance by simply including the Javascript code in your Brand Journal settings. This way Prowly gives you enormous flexibility when it comes to measuring your Brand Journal's performance and viewers' engagement and behaviors. 

How about creating multimedia press releases and articles that gain traction? Did you know that press releases with visuals are shared about 3.5 times more often than their plain text versions? Toss out dull and static content in favor of one that is engaging and interactive, and one that will get you more clicks, shares, conversions, and wider reach. Take a look how Vimeo does it:  

In story creator - regardless of whether you take upon yourself to create a press release or a longer piece - you will be able to quickly add (drag & drop) both your own and external visuals. Would you like to cite a particular Facebook post or tweet? Just click on the Twitter or Facebook icon on the right sidebar of story creator and type in the search engine below the right nick, hashtag, or fan page name (depending on the channel). Our browser also allows you to search the Internet for GIFs: choose one that suits your needs, “grab” it and drag to a location of your liking. It is similar to videos (the vast YouTube and Vimeo library is at your disposal) or your other press releases, parts of which you wish to include. Trust me, this game of content has never been easier and more fun. Each of these multimedia elements can also be pasted in the body text using the embed code. It’s entirely up to you.

In our press release about the Vimeo Brand Journal, we alluded that despite the all-digital era being here for some time now, recent research by ISEBOX showed that digital newsrooms are still way behind. 

While most reporters access online press centers at least once a month, these websites don’t meet the expectations of 70% of journalists. Any media opportunities missed here? Unfortunately, plenty. The leader of BuzzFeed, whose name was mentioned at the beginning of this post, stated, “You need to think about how people are engaging with media and then make your advertising and marketing match those behaviors.” The brand newsroom of the future is one that does exactly that. Our flexibility can make that happen.