What animals teach us about customer relations

Scientists and philosophers have spent a lot of their time and energy trying to describe what makes humans different from animals. So have economists.

Blue-striped cleaner wrasses at work. Photo by Gregory R. Mann

But it turns out that animals have economic market behaviors similar to humans, such as customer differentiation (a fish called the cleaner wrasse) and bidding out their labor (the paper wasp).

For this blog post I am indebted to Stephen J. Dubner's "The Invisible Paw" podcast. He interviewed a scientist who described how the cleaner wrasse, which removes parasites and dead scales from other fish, treats its "clients" in line with the principles of market economics. (Photo is from the WildCoastBlog).

How publishers can overcome loss of Facebook traffic

Now that Facebook has made clear that it will not be promoting journalism to its users, all of the publishers who were getting much of their traffic there should look elsewhere. (Frederic Filloux of Monday Note has one of the best analyses of the company's announcement.)

What now? Well, there are several tactics and strategies that publishers can take to replace what they have lost (and will lose) from Facebook's pivot away from news. (I have also written about such strategies in Spanish.)

1. A tactic: start an email newsletter with links to your content. Think of it as a walled garden that protects you from Facebook.

Daily, weekly, or monthly newsletters create a more intimate relationship with users. Some publications have several on different topics, such as technology, business, public safety, or politics that users can select from. Local news sites in particular can benefit from daily newsletters.

The links to your content send users directly to your site, and any ad revenue goes to your business rather than Facebook. Many digital news publishers report higher response rates from email subscribers to offers of subscriptions, premium content, or memberships.
 

2.  Focus on the quality of users instead of the quantity: relationship rather than scale, engagement rather than volume.

The metrics of the "attention web" focus on showing the value of the audience's relationship with the media brand rather than with an advertiser's product.

5 dirty words journalists have to learn to say without blushing

Versión en español aquí.

Journalism is the best job in the world, and working with journalists is fun. They’re funny, irreverent, intelligent and excellent storytellers.

Still, as a group we tend to be arrogant, self-righteous and holier-than-thou (I include myself in this criticism). We tend to view ourselves as high priests of an exclusive profession and bearers of a special ethical standard that few others can live up to. We see ourselves as purer, more objective, less affected by the prejudices of the mere mortals we cover.