David Arkin Consulting Blog

Good morning! I have a few updates for you before we get into the meat of today’s newsletter: 💵  Branded Content Cash Camp: I’m excited to share that I will again be serving as a coach/trainer for the Branded Content Project’s Cash...

Before I kick things off in this week’s newsletter, there are two things I want to mention: 1. Hello Penny: This week, I shared on LinkedIn that I was partnering with Penny Riordan to help support more of our clients in...

Before we start this week’s newsletter I want to send a special congratulations to Tara Jones, who has been part of our team since early 2023 and has been promoted to the role of Content Operations Manager. Tara and I have...

David Arkin Consulting is pleased to announce the promotion of Tara Jones to Content Operations Manager, a role in which she is overseeing the firm’s growing portfolio of branded content services for media companies across the country. In this position,...

Definitely one of the most common questions I am getting right now circles around AI and what teams should be focused on. To do this effectively, news organizations should outline the opportunities for their teams, identify the most relevant tactics...

Reviewing your analytics is important for lots of reasons:• You should know what your readers and advertisers like and don’t.• You should understand where your audience is coming from and how that’s changing.• You should discover if you need more...

Back-to-school season is right around the corner and with all of the talk about Google’s focus on answering reader questions, it’s got me thinking about all of the ways that media companies could be helpful for their audience while also...

“Tell your unique story.” It’s one of the most common phrases that media companies use when explaining what a sponsored content program can mean and do for a local business. But how well do you tell your own story about...

July is such a great time of the year for a variety of engagement ideas that are fun for readers, can answer their pressing questions and create localization for stories that are trending. Here are 10 of my favorites that...

Imagine having ad units in your newsletter that advertisers sought out, got amazing click thru rates from and were sold out throughout this year. Can you actually imagine? That’s the experience for one publisher in Atlanta that I want to...

I’m seeing more and more useful examples where news organizations are using GPTs to make work faster and more efficient. GPTs (Generative Pre-trained Transformers) offer media companies the chance to build workflows that help save time, generate ideas and boost...

There’s a lot swirling around the industry right now about what the future of search looks like. • Are keywords dead? • Is AI taking over search? • Will AI Overviews kill my traffic? • Where has my search traffic gone? There...

Are editor and publisher notes to readers still effective? They have been around for years and really had become a staple of the first few pages of magazines — both in local and national publications — but, are they still...

David Arkin Consulting is excited to announce the addition of Olivia Sims as its newest full-time Content Writer.  Olivia is the fourth team member to join the growing consulting firm since its inception not even three years ago. She brings...

As we roll into the start of summer, there are a host of ways you can create content that is both really useful for your readers but also ties to what Google prioritizes in their algorithm. Google continues to share...

Media companies have lots of tactics they use to help get branded content distributed, but is encouraging the advertiser to share the content, one of them? It definitely should be. It’s one of those low-hanging fruit opportunities that you can’t...

Have you noticed that Facebook is making a bit of a comeback for publishers?  There have been several stories over the last few weeks that have made mention that publishers’ content is showing up more and more in Facebook’s algorithm....

Graduation season is here and it’s a great time for media companies to create helpful content and showcase these major moments of life in their community. In today’s newsletter, I’m going to walk you through a handful of graduation ideas...

You may have written the most captivating story ever, but without the right headline — one that screams open me! — your story may never reach its full audience potential. That’s why understanding what makes a successful headline and the...

With Mother’s Day around the corner, now is the perfect time to make sure you have a content strategy in place that will engage and help your audience have a great time celebrating Mom. Here are five things to do...

Often when we are visiting with a publisher about their social media strategy, questions about LinkedIn inevitably come up. • Should our news organization be active on LinkedIn?• Should our staff be on it talking about/promoting coverage?• Do we need...

After you have run a branded content campaign for a few weeks, what information are you sharing with an advertiser? And most importantly, are they the right metrics? I’m going to spend some time in today’s newsletter going through the...

Why is my web traffic dropping? This is the most common question I get from publishers: Why is my traffic dropping and what can I do about it? It’s a multitude of things and reasons that are leading to drops...

With more than 250 confirmed cases of measles across several states as of March 2025, many of your readers may very well be wondering what to know and do. This isn’t a widespread infection at this point that’s impacting millions,...

Easter, spring break and Earth Day offer big reader engagement opportunities April is such a fun time of the year for families: The temperatures finally start to feel a little more spring like, flowers start to bloom and there are...