At ESOMAR’s LATAM event, earlier this year, Pablo Giudici explained how he and his team guided Argentina’s leading newspaper through digital transformation. We asked Giudici how he mapped out this data-driven strategy.
Clarín’s primary aim is to generate high-quality content to keep its readers informed. Pablo Giudici describes this activity as “important in the consolidation of a democratic society.” The news supplier operates mainly in Argentina but attracts readers from all over the world, all of whom are looking for high quality, transparent and relevant content. But times are changing for those in the news industry, and like other content providers Clarín needs to apply a data-driven technology strategy in making business decisions. The biggest issue Giudici and his team faced in this respect was the cultural change regarding the value of the data. “Before creating the big data area, there was no data culture to rely on to make decisions. There were various data-processing cells, each with their own style, no data-processing expertise, and different objectives. This meant that in response to a question, there were different answers depending on who answered it.” This type of structure was of course prone to incorrect decisions, and the data was often questionable and unreliable. “Another problem was the lack of analytical profiles. Talent was needed to interpret data and make decisions based on evidence.”
Clarín wanted to get a deep understanding of its audiences and its readers’ habits. The analysis would allow the newspaper to understand the different target groups and act accordingly in order to generate greater loyalty. The other important objective was for big data to generate economic value for the company, and to improve operational efficiency and costs. “Everything we do is aimed at boosting data culture: a data-driven, data informed company. This must be the central axis for decision-making.”
Teams and tools
In order to achieve these goals, Giudici needed a multidisciplinary group of people who were able to cover the entire funnel of data-processing and monetisation. The team was divided according to the following disciplines:
- Data architecture: responsible for the collection, quality and governance of data.
- Business intelligence: data delivery to business users via reporting and dashboarding.
- Advanced analytics: machine learning, IA, NLP and clustering models.
- Audience analytics: building and analysing the 360° view of readers, subscribers and customers.
- Digital marketing: multichannel digital campaigns.
- Project management office: organising, prioritising and tracking the evolution of big data projects.
“These types of profiles were absolutely unthinkable in the publishing industry 10 years ago”, comments Giudici. The tools his people used were based on the latest generation technology for big data processing, such as: Hadoop + Cloud DB Tools for storage and data-processing, Python + Tensor Flow for the development of predictive models, Microstrategy as a BI platform for insights delivery via reporting and dashboarding, and Eloqua and Bluekai for multichannel campaigns. “We are also constantly testing new technologies that help extract and deliver the value of the data to the business units faster.”
Essential metrics
All the editorial and content metrics were key in understanding reader behaviour. This helps in the making of crucial decisions, such as when and how to implement a content paywall, or what kind of content to deliver across the different channels. More recently an algorithm for personalised content recommendation was created, based on the deep knowledge of reader behaviour. Metrics are also used in Clarín’s 365 Loyalty Program, a key subscription model to maintain and increase the volume of the paper’s daily printed edition or – more recently – its digital subscriptions. Currently, the big data team are developing new areas of analysis, such as commerce or finance. This keeps the company firmly on the path of making smart decisions supported by data. “The ultimate goal of the digital transformation is a data-driven company. The essential metrics all help to understand the habits and interests of our readers in-depth, so that we can think about new ways of producing and distributing content.”
The essential metrics all help to understand the habits and interests of our readers in-depth.
The deeper knowledge and segmentation of the audiences already had a direct impact on ad sales, thereby creating real value and new revenue sources. It lets Clarín position themselves as media leaders with innovative proposals and value-added advertising that combines content marketing with real-time segmentation and targeted mailing. “We can also act quicker in certain segments, based on analysis of behaviours and geographic location,” says Giudici. “This allows us to communicate more efficiently and to better capture and retain users of Clarín products.”
Pablo Giudici’s top tips
Other organisations may want to embark on a similar journey as Clarín by implementing a data and tech-driven strategy. For them, Giudici offers the following top tips:
1. “Do it and do it now. There is a lot of value that comes from good data-handling.
2. Investment in modern big data technology is a must to create a successful project.
3. It takes time before an excellent big data project meets expectations. In our case, we took 18 months to fill a data pool with high-quality data that creates real value.
4. Keep in mind that the objective of data-processing must always be to generate value for the company. This can be generating new revenues, improving processes and costs, or promoting the brand image through excellent services and products for the consumer. This last objective is achieved by understanding the behaviour of the consumers as well as the results of the company’s actions.”
About Clarín
With a long-standing journalistic and commercial leadership consolidated in its 73-year track record, Clarín is the most prominent Argentine newspaper in terms of outreach to its readers, circulation and advertising. Circulation in 2018 was around 185,000 daily copies while Sunday’s sales stood at 429,000 copies, accounting for almost 24.5% of the Argentine newspaper market. In the capital Buenos Aires Clarín has a 44% market share. Clarín’s website is the most visited news website in Argentina, attracting almost 53 million visitors per month, according to Google Analytics.
