Case Study  

CBS Interactive

CBS Interactive Increases Reader Engagement with Taboola Feed

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CBS Interactive media outlets leverage several Taboola products, including Taboola Feed and Taboola Newsroom.

  • CBSi, Network Wide 31% Increase in Organic Click-Through-Rate (CTR)
  • CBS News 60% Increase in Desktop Organic CTR
  • CBS News 15% Increase in Mobile Organic CTR
  • CBS Sports 5% Desktop Organic CTR
  • CBS Sports 8% Mobile Organic CTR

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Company

CBS Interactive, a division of CBS Corporation, is the world’s largest publisher of premium digital content and a perennial top 10 Internet company. CBS Interactive’s brands span popular categories like technology, entertainment, sports, news and gaming.

Challenge

CBSi’s main goal was to continue to keep users engaged with organic content on site.

Solution

Find a monetization partnership that provides a good user experience and drive engagement.

Results

The implementation of Taboola products like Taboola Feed and Taboola Newsroom drove positive results—a 31% increase in organic CTR, referring to the click through rate on CBS Interactive editorial content.

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Introduction

CBS Interactive, a division of CBS Corporation, is the world’s largest publisher of premium digital content and a perennial top 10 Internet company. CBS Interactive’s brands span popular categories like technology, entertainment, sports, news and gaming.

Properties include the websites, apps and streaming services of the CBS Television Network such as the CBS All Access subscription service, the 24/7 digital news network CBSN, and CBS Sports’ digital brands as well as digital-first properties in key content verticals, including CNET, TVGuide.com, GameSpot, Last.fm, Metacritic and Chowhound. CBS Interactive’s brands reach approximately 300 million unique visitors each month.

CBS Interactive Improves Engagement in Just One Quarter

CBS Interactive has been working with Taboola for over two years. They’ve implemented discovery technology on CBSNews.com, CBSSports.com, CBS.com, Chowhound, MaxPreps and Download. com.

When it comes to monetization, CBS Interactive values partnerships that provide a good user experience and drive engagement. Before working with Taboola, their main goal was to continue to keep users engaged with organic content on site.

The implementation of Taboola products like Taboola Feed and Taboola Newsroom drove positive results—a 31% increase in organic CTR, referring to the click through rate on CBS Interactive editorial content.

Taboola Feed recommends users the most relevant news stories for them, in an engaging environment much like social feeds. Users enjoy the familiar scrolling experience—they engage with an endless feed that contains sponsored content, organic content and sponsored video, as well as multiple third party cards, which provides personalized opportunities for them to engage with Feed on CBS Interactive sites.

Taboola Newsroom empowers editorial teams with actionable data about the performance of story headlines, thumbnails and story placements in realtime. The platform also provides editors with unique insights on trending topics from Taboola’s Network.

CBS News Sees a 49% Increase in Organic CTR with Taboola Feed Overall

CBSNews.com is dedicated to providing the highest quality journalism across all digital screens.

For CBSNews.com, user experience is a primary focus. Taboola Feed helped them to increase session depth, or the number of page views that each unique visitor consumes. With personalized content recommendations from Taboola Feed and increase session depth, CBS News Digital was able to drastically increase engagement and organic CTR.

Just over the course of one quarter, Taboola Feed has given a 49% increase in organic CTR overall.

CBS Sports Increases Organic CTR by 8% on Mobile Devices

CBSSports.com covers the full spectrum of sports, from preps to pros, and provides premium content across all digital screens. With a focus on serving fans live coverage every day, CBSSports.com offers exclusive access to the biggest sports events, live and on-demand video, in-depth analysis, breaking news, scores and statistics, and a wide range of fantasy games and advice.

CBSSports.com is seeing a bigger shift to mobile devices, and mobile users are more difficult to engage and monetize. After implementation of Taboola Feed, CBSSports.com increased organic CTR of 8% on mobile devices.

CBS Interactive values the account management team at Taboola, who they feel provide effective and fast recommendations for monetization success.

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We needed an effective way to monetize our organic content across all platforms. With Taboola Feed’s personalized recommendation engine, engaging design, and ability to keep people on-site longer, both our organic CTR and revenue are increasing—especially on mobile devices, which is particularly exciting for us.

- Julie Boswell, Director, Partnerships at CBS Interactive