The content presentation wasteland: An opportunity for corporate newsrooms and content providers

You’ve seen it, been annoyed by it, clicked away more than once because of it.

Ad-driven web sites are ramping up their assault on readers in an increasingly desperate chase for revenue. It's all about more. More ads. More intrusiveness: ads that bleed onto the content you are trying to read, or take it over altogether. In the tug-of-war between the reader experience and short-term monetization, guess what's winning?

And then there’s the click tricks, like breaking a story into five separate pages. Or turning list-based stories into "slideshows" that require you to click ... on … every … single ... list … item. So aggravating, especially from a mobile device. (Mashable, you’re better than this!)

(By the way: having an option to “view as one page,” as Mashable offers with its slideshows, doesn’t excuse the assulat on readers. If the setup were reversed – with the one-page view as the default with an option to click to a slideshow version, would anyone choose the slideshow? Of course not.)

For a more thorough, and therefore more depressing, look at the state of reading on the web, check out Rian van der Merwe’s take. Zanex not included.

In the darkness shines an opportunity

But in the midst of this smoldering wasteland, there is opportunity for companies branching out into content marketing and corporate newsrooms. And it's an easy opportunity: make it easy for people to read your stuff. Corporate newsrooms aren’t relying on ad revenues – they have a different agenda: engagement, and often lead generation. In an ever-increasingly difficult competition for attention, removing barriers between your content and your community offers an easy win. Here are a couple of ways to do that:

No pop-overs, bleed-overs, or screen take-overs of any kind. Ever. Don’t put barriers between the community and your content. Many standalone sites need ad revenue. You don’t -- so leverage the opportunity. Even if you have lead generation goals, be unobtrusive. In the long run, your return will be greater for the business if you are reader-friendly. Stand strong!

Avoid click abuse. You’re not playing a page view game. So don’t do slideshows. Go ahead and create compelling list posts. Supplement them with beautiful photos. But then format it into a nice, scrollable story that is easy for people read.

Finally, don’t break up a longer story into 52 separate pages. If you need a couple of pages for formatting purposes, fine. But people prefer to scroll, even on mobile devices.

Take the long view, the view that shows your content is truly geared around serving the needs of your community. Be reader-friendly and avoid anything that puts barriers between your community and your content.