Deep links and Android Instant Apps

Benedict Evans picks up on something important for Google. From his newsletter… Cartoon from xkcdxkcd - Content, Commerce Deep Links

… the new Instant Apps feature for Android is hugely important. If you tap on a deep link anywhere on Android, then that app itself will immediately be downloaded from the app store and start running, and show you the piece of content linked to … This effectively removes the ‘is the app installed or not when we link to it?’ problem, letting people experience an app seamlessly without bouncing out to the app store and opening up huge new opportunities for engagement (and advertising). It also challenges a major premise behind chat bots (they don’t require you to install a new app). Read More 

Content publishers underestimate the “shoppable content” challenge

You would think by now two of the major components in marketing technology stacks, content management and e-commerce systems, would be more widely and successfully integrated. In most cases the main roadblock remains organizational. But the combination of revenue requirements and competitive seamless buying experiences will eventually force change. This could be another capability led and controlled by social and computing platforms. Publishers and e-commerce sites need to get moving to at least influence the outcome. Read More

Facebook testing “shoppable” video ads

Facebook needs to prove to retail marketers that it can drive sales, not just provide brand exposure. One way to do that is by launching “shoppable” video ads next month so people can browse products without tapping out of a video ad. Read More

Google tests feature that lets media companies, marketers publish directly to search results

AMP pages may get preferential treatment because they are fast, but this experimental feature treats the search results page as a publishing channel – take that Facebook News Feed!

Google has built a Web-based interface through which posts can be formatted and uploaded directly to its systems. The posts can be up to 14,400 characters in length and can include links and up to 10 images or videos. The pages also include options to share them via Twitter, Facebook or email. Each post is hosted by Google itself on a dedicated page, and appears in a carousel in results pages for searches related to their authors for up to a week, … After seven days, the posts remain live but won’t be surfaced in search results. Rather, they can be accessed via a link. Read More

Google open sources SyntaxNet and English parser

… we spend a lot of time thinking about how computer systems can read and understand human language in order to process it in intelligent ways. Today, we are excited to share the fruits of our research with the broader community by releasing SyntaxNet, an open-source neural network framework implemented in TensorFlow that provides a foundation for Natural Language Understanding (NLU) systems. Our release includes all the code needed to train new SyntaxNet models on your own data, as well as Parsey McParseface, an English parser that we have trained for you and that you can use to analyze English text. Read More

Despite stumbles, news outlets flock to Messenger

The Takeaway – News organizations looking for fresh ways to reach readers see big potential in Facebook’s Messenger “bots.” But early efforts have not done well, and news publishers are still experimenting with the platform to figure out what users want to see. Read More

End of the online advertising bubble

Kalkis Research are not the first to predict the end of the ad bubble, but their compelling report pulls no punches and has caused quite a stir with its dire predictions. They have been responding to some of the comments and the whole bit is useful. Read More

Gilbane Digital Content Conference
Main conference: November 29 – 30
Workshops: December 1, 2016
Fairmont Copley Plaza, Boston

Short takes

Big step for Medium. Looks good but are they ready for the slippery slope of formatting support?… How to Make Your Publication Look Great via Medium

Watch out for the The Non-Monetizable Product Blind Spot via The Information

Very welcome feature… Tie your sites together with property sets in Search Console via Google webmaster blog

Good type design is worth the effort… How typography can save your life via Pro Publica

Probably good for EPUB… W3C and International Digital Publishing Forum (IDPF) explore combining via w3c.org

As it should be… 85 percent of Facebook video is watched without sound via Digiday

HTTP/2 Server push rolling out… Get Ready to See Seconds Shaved Off Web Page Load Times via Technology Review

How many martec vendors does it take to…? Did Morgan Stanley just kill the single-vendor marketing suite? via chiefmartec.com

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The Gilbane Advisor curates content for our community of content, computing, and digital experience professionals. Subscribe to our newsletter, or our feed.

The Gilbane Digital Content Conference: Content Management, Marketing, and Digital Experience helps marketers, IT, and business managers integrate content strategies and technologies to produce superior digital experiences for customers, employees, and partners.