Doing Big Stuff: Network News

Friday, August 8, 2014

What DoStuff’s Doing: E6 Wrap-up and E7 KICKOFF

2 comments: Posted by Anonymous at 2:45 PM Labels: Episode Update

With Episode 6 finishing up the first week of July, it’s time we updated you on DoStuff’s progress over the course of E6 and what we plan to do in E7.

Episode 6 Wrap-up

You’ll remember that Episode 6 was the first time we tried a new voting system based on a prioritization method developed by Pandora. That means that the projects we set out to complete over the course of E6 were decided by representatives from some of the metros, as well as the DoStuff team.

While we didn’t finish everything we wanted to, we accomplished a lot and are pretty happy with the new collaborative method of choosing projects. Here’s a recap of what got done:

Product

What got done?

Radmin! - The biggest focus of the Product team in E6 was getting Radmin ready for real-world use, and they delivered. Events, Pending queues, Scrapers, Artists, Venues, People, and Advertising were all finished and tested over the course of E6 so that we could begin the transition away from Admin.
Front-end - Tags were added to Event pages along with new Artist cards, and the Latest Page got a big update of its own to improve editorial content on your site.

What didn't?

Lense creation and management - we had planned for lense creation and management to be included in the list of Radmin features completed in E6. Instead, it’s been added as a top priority for Episode 7 (see below).
Ad reporting - Radmin ad management was completed during E6, but linking ad reporting to Google Docs was pushed to E7.
Front-end - While Tags and Artist cards were added to Event pages in E6 (see above), we decided to abandon plans to add related lists/posts/events/venues until we can figure out a better way to display them.

Delivery

What got done?

Do210 - We officially launched Do210.com to add San Antonio to our growing list of metros!
Bootcamp reboot - We changed how new metros prep for Bootcamp and what we cover down here in Austin.
New email templates - We built an all-new newsletter template for MailChimp, and we’ll be working on streamlining the process for adding new templates in the future.
ECP/Lense Documentation - We sent out documentation for how to request ECPs and hire a designer, plus a template email to send to ECP developers.
CSS customization documentation - We added a new tutorial in LearnStuff for customizing Promo User and List pages, and a lot of you have already been putting it to use. We’ll be adding more CSS tips to LearnStuff in the future.
Overhaul KPI Reporting - Our new “How You (and the network) Did Last Week” emails are meant to give you more insights into what’s moving the needle and what isn’t.

What didn't?

Content & editorial guidelines - This is going to be such an important focus in the future that we decided to pull way back and start from the beginning. In E7 we’ll be studying the current editorial mix on the Network and measuring engagement so we can figure out what our goals should be.
Standardize network communications - We started on this in E6, but with the loss of Katie and the addition of Ted this has been pushed into E7.
LearnStuff updates - We’re still working on how to improve LearnStuff so that it stays the most up-to-date resource for support info.

NBD

What got done?

New metro! - Louisville was added as added as the newest metro in the Network. Keep an eye out for Do502 to launch this fall.
New hire! - We hired Mollie Brown to help with sales and marketing efforts. Mollie comes to us from The Orchard in NYC.
New deals! - Ballantine Ale signed a big deal with DoNYC, and we’ve been in meetings with American Express, Converse, Deep Eddy, Goose Island, Pabst, and MillerCoors.
Future Folk - Our first creative tour promo collab wrapped up this week in Austin, and we couldn’t be more excited with how well it went Network-wide. The success of Future Folk signals good things for similar programs in the future.

What didn't?

New sales templates - The metro/brand sales deck templates we’re working on to help improve the deals process carried over to E7 (see below).

Episode 7: The Next Episode

Episode 7 kicked off the second week of July, and while we tried a shorter episode term for E6, we’re going back to a three month term for E7.

Here’s the list of the projects that got “funded” for Episode 7:

Product

Now that a large portion of the daily workflow has been transitioned over to Radmin, Product’s primary focus in Episode 7 is on expanding the functionality of Radmin and continuing to sunset Admin.

We’re also working on improving SEO across the Network and improving integrations with MailChimp and Google Analytics.

Ad reports to Google Docs - Being able to export Radmin ad reports to Google Docs will give you flexibility in displaying and manipulating data.
Radmin Dashboard - A brand new dashboard in Radmin complete with user counts, ad impression numbers, and upcoming RSVPs and Giveaways.
SEO improvements - It’s time to get serious about improving search rankings for the entire Network. Do206’s Scott Porad is already working with DoStuff on some SEO tricks.
Putting Metros in control of all transactional emails - We’re moving all transactional emails (RSVP/Giveaway reminders, followed Artist activity, etc.) to Mandrill so metros can customize email layout and get better analytics.
Automating ECP request and setup - This one’s for Stuart. We’re moving ECP creation over to Radmin so anyone can create one easily.
GA reporting cleanup - We’re cleaning up how Google Analytics reports new users, so you can see how many you gained over a certain time period and where they came from (ECP, RSVP, Giveaway, Facebook, etc.).
Syncing MailChimp and DoStuff databases - All email subscribe/unsubscribe data (including 21+ info) will automatically update in MailChimp.
Moving ~~site design~~ and assets to Radmin - Site design functionality is already up and asset management is being transitioned now.
Improved WISYWG functionality - In addition to improved image and video support on the front-end WISYWG editor, you will have the ability to embed Event, Artist, and Venue cards.
Overhaul send RSVP list - You will have the ability to send RSVP lists from Radmin, and customize the email template that goes with it.
Enhanced ECP functionality in Radmin - We’re building more ECP controls into Radmin, including the ability to pick what Featured Events run on each property
Show reviews - This is one we’re really excited about. We’re building a Rotten Tomatoes-style concert review system that will tell users what others thought of the previous shows on that tour.

Delivery

The core of Delivery’s focus in E7 is on improving communication. As the Network continues to grow, it’s becoming more important that we streamline how we message updates, provide support, and share best practices.

Network-wide Fantasy Football bracket - Yeah you read that right. We’re starting a new DoStuff Fantasy Football league. Every metro manages one team. Big prizes and bragging rights will be on the line.
Improve metro support communication - Our abilities to manage all support requests via email and the Google forum are becoming stretched. We’re working on ways to improve support across the board.
Finish local sales ingredients list - We’re wrapping up new templates you can use to kickstart your local sales game.
~~Launch New DSD Queue~~ - The New DSD Queue launched last month and will help improve organization and transparency of the DSD process.
Editorial mix audit - The Delivery team is going to review what content performs best, so we can set goals and guidelines for how to improve editorial and social across the Network.
Program delivery reporting audit - We need to figure out where our Program reporting needs improving, so we can keep pitching to bigger and bigger national advertisers.
Test metro email lists - We want to use MailChimp to target inactive subscribers and see if we can re-engage them.
Festival debt audit - We need to assess where our Festival platform rests right now, and what it will take to bring it back up to speed.
Standardize Network communications - As the number and importance of our Network emails grow, we need to standardize when and how we communicate different information to everyone in the network.
Update LearnStuff for Radmin - The launch of Radmin means a lot of the documentation on LearnStuff is already out-of-date.
Summit 2014 - November will come up sooner than we all think, so we’re starting on planning and logistics now.
Implement/test ClientPulse - ClientPulse is a cool tool that will help foster more communication between DoStuff and the metros. We use a similar tool here internally.

NBD

After growing the team and wrapping up the first Network-wide tour, NBD is doubling down on going after big name “whales” in E7.

Brand/Metro Sales Template Decks - Carried over from E6, we’re redesigning our sales templates to score bigger advertisers and bigger dollar amounts.
Finalize two brand case studies - For such a unique media company, we need more case studies to show advertisers that what we do works.
Bi-weekly sales call - We’re working on ways to make this call more interactive so that it can be more valuable for everyone. Step one is to improve call quality.
DoStuff messaging - We’re updating our own messaging in E7 so we can improve how we all describe what DoStuff is to advertisers and partners.
DoStuff marketing - As 2014 comes to a close, we’re finalizing a comprehensive (and awesome) marketing plan to close out the year with a bang.
Network-wide video series - Brands are emphasizing how important video is to them right now. We need to build a “content trail” as a proof of concept for big dollar advertisers.

As always, comment below if you have any questions!

rADmin: Making Your Ads Rad

22 comments: Posted by Anonymous at 1:53 PM

"This post and accompanying walkthrough video focus on setting up and managing ads through Radmin. If you haven’t done so already, check out this post first for an introduction to Radmin."

The ads section of Radmin is here, and while we can toss around a bunch of reasons why it's a great leap forward, we'll instead just let you know it single-handedly cures a whole bunch of headaches of the old ad system. Things like advertisers not always being keen on staying associated with ads. Or the dreaded error message from adjusting weights. ALL GONE.

In the old system's place, we've created a robust platform for ad creation, management, and reporting. We can go on and on about why it's great, but here to do the honors himself is Justin Schaffer, the man behind the design, the Legend of DoStuff. Watch the video for a complete walk-through of how the new system works. Then, if you ever need to reference the more high-level information contained in the tutorial you will soon be able to find it all on LearnStuff. Or you can just check out our summary below this video.

Ladies and gentleman, Justin Schaffer on rADmin:

Video Highlights

Overall Advertising Interface

When you first click into the "Advertising" section of Radmin, you'll see a grid with a similar layout as the other sections of Radmin.

For clarity, you'll see only your current active ads, sorted alphabetically by ad location.
Clicking into the filters section at the top of your ads will allow you to filter by Advertiser name and ad unit, or check "Include Inactive" to display ads not currently running.
The columns displayed on the Advertising homepage include:

Advertiser: The advertiser attached to the respective ad. This controls how ads are grouped together when pulling ad reports. For best results, you should have one and only one advertiser in your system for each respective client/partner that advertises on your site.
Campaign: The campaign attached to the respective ad. This field is purely for organizational purposes, and should be used to group together ads with a common theme/ad buy.
Ad Name: The unique name attached to the respective ad. This is most commonly used to combine the advertiser, campaign, and location to make the ad easily identifiable when scanning the list of ads. Review the below recommended hierarchy of the Advertiser/Campaign/Ad Name relationship-

Start Date: The date the respective ad will go live.
End Date: The last date the ad will run. For Featured Events, the ad will end at the start time of the event. For brand ads, the ad will run through the entirety of the end date, then automatically pause afterwards.
Location: The ad's respective ad unit (Featured Event, Top Right, Listings Middle, User/Venue Widget, Leaderboard)
Weight: The percentage (out of 100 page loads) that a brand ad will be served. Adjusting a brand ad's weight will proportionately adjust the weights of all other brand ads concurrently running in the same ad unit. For example, adding a new Top Right ad with a weight of 50 will cut the weights of every other Top Right brand ad in half. Adding a new Top Right ad with a weight of 100 will set all other Top Right ads to a weight of 0.
Impressions: The number of impressions that the respective ad has accumulated over its lifetime, compared to its Impression Goal (the target number of impressions set during ad creation).

***Note: the daily update of how many impressions a given ad has received will not be immediately live when launching, but should be introduced in the week following when you first have Radmin ads access.

Ad Creation

Ad creation for all ads now takes place in the same area. No more navigating between different sections of admin for each ad unit. Simply click "New Ad" in the top right of your Advertising home page, and you'll have an option of creating an ad for any ad unit on your site. Much of the basic ad creation process is the same as admin, with a few differences highlighted below:

Required Advertiser/Campaign Fields: It is now impossible to create an ad without associating it with an advertiser. This should prevent any problems with ads not showing up when ad reports are pulled. For brand ads, you must associate it with a campaign before creating the ad.
Duplicate Advertiser Prevention: It is also impossible to create two advertisers that have the same name. You'll get this error message instead:

(Note: you could still create one advertiser called "Live Nation" and another called "LiveNation" so always try to add an existing advertiser before creating a new one)
Venue/User Widget Mutually Exclusive: When creating a venue/user widget, once you associate it with a user OR venue, the other option will no longer be available. In other words, you can't associate a widget with both a venue and user. Once associated with a particular venue/user, that will automatically become the Advertiser for the widget.
Impression Goal: How many impressions a brand ad needs to deliver to the advertiser for the respective ad. Used for comparison against how many impressions the ad has actually received to date, which will display for each ad on the Advertising home page.

Ad Management

Most of ad management will be controlled from the icons at the furthest right column of your Advertising home page. The icons serve similar functions as icons in other sections of Radmin, with the following specific actions:

Magnifying glass: View the details page for a previously created ad.
Pencil: Edit a previously created ad (adjust an ad's weight from this page).
Play/Pause: If the ad is active, click the Pause icon to make the ad inactive. If you wish to make a currently inactive ad live on your site, apply the "Include Inactive" filter, and then hit the Play icon. This tool is especially handy for monitoring impressions and controlling which ads show without having to constantly adjust ad weights.
Graph: Pull an ad report for the respective ad and all other ads attached to the same advertiser.

You're a rADmin grAD

At the end of the day, we recognize that easy ad setup and management means happy advertisers, and happy advertisers means happy metros. That said, if there's something here that's making you less than giddy, we want to hear it. We're still in the early stages of this, so any feedback is welcome.

That's all for now; start making some rADs!

Radmin Introduction: Your Faster, Prettier, More Intuitive CMS

No comments: Posted by Anonymous at 1:52 PM Labels: Product Updates, Redesign

It’s alive!

After nearly a year of work from the Product team over here at DoStuff, Radmin is finally up and running and ready to put to use.

How Do I Get Started?

Before you log in and start clicking around like crazy, the best way to get started is to watch the Radmin Introduction walkthrough video put together by our own Justin Schaffer. Thirty-eight minutes and thirty-six seconds may sound like a long time, but just think of it as your own personal Radmin crash course.

Plus, we know some of you would be sitting on YouTube for the next 40 minutes anyway.

Radmin Highlights

While you’re watching the walkthrough video and testing out Radmin for yourself, here are some of the important changes and features we want to make sure to point out:

Fast, Simple User Interface (UI)

The first thing you’ll notice when you come over to Radmin from Admin is the completely redesigned user interface (UI). It’s faster, prettier, and more intuitive.

From the very start, we focused on designing Radmin around the way you work. In addition to the new menu bar on the left side of the screen, there are a number of elements that are consistent across the site so you can always find what you need:

Magnifying Glass: Always takes you to that item’s detail page
Pencil: Always takes you to that item's edit page
Cog: Always drops down additional options (takes place of that massive sidebar in Admin)

Better Sorting

In Admin Pending Events were always sorted by most recent. That meant that you might have to go through pages of pending events before you found out that Kanye West announced a new tour date over the weekend.

In Radmin Pending Events are sorted by popularity rating automatically, so the most important shows are the ones that will be edited and approved the soonest. From now on, if you're keeping up with your queues, there will be no question that your site is the best resource for up-to-the-minute event listings in your metro.

New Media Search Function

Speaking of Pending Events, you may have noticed all the red and green bubbles in your queue. That color coding system is part of the all new Media Search function being seen for the first time here in Radmin.

When you see an Artist or Venue name surrounded in red, that means that it’s missing a matching Facebook account, a YouTube video, or it’s been 6 months since either were updated. Green means all media is up-to-date.

For a full run-down of the new Media Search features, check out Justin’s tutorial here.

Duplicates Queue

We made two major changes to the Duplicates queue in Radmin that will make it faster and easier to sort through duplicate events.

First, you’ll notice that only one match is displayed per page. Instead of stacking all the dupes on top of one another and causing confusion, Radmin only displays one dupe at a time. After you approve, merge, or delete a dupe, Radmin automatically refreshes to display the next match. The result is a faster, easier to navigate queue.

Second, the newer event (the duplicate event) is always displayed on top with the new, conflicting information displayed in red. The older event (the original event) is always displayed in white and appears below. This color-coding will make it simpler to identify what information is different, and what action you should take.

Approved Events

In Radmin the Approved Events queue is sorted by date created by default, but you can quickly sort by event date or popularity rating if needed. You’ll also notice the new magnifying glass and pencil icons that take you to the Event details page and edit Event page, respectively.

And with Radmin, you can now edit the Event Category (e.g. Music, Comedy, Film) and add Event tags right within the edit Events page!

Back in the Approved Events queue, the new cog icon on the far right is now your go-to shortcut for a number of common actions related to Events:

Advertise: Set-up a new ad for that Event in the Advertising tab
Giveaway: Open a pop-up to create a Giveaway for that Event
RSVP: Open a pop-up to set up an RSVP
Slideshow: Enter Flickr information to add photos to the Event
Voting: Quickly vote on event using the email of promo accounts (ex: Top Picks, Free, etc.)
Merge: Merge with another Event (note: this action will take you back to Admin for now)
Copy: Create a new Event using the same information
View: Check out the Event on your metro site
Delete: Be careful! Once you delete an event, it’s gone

Scrapers

Brand new to Radmin is a Scraper support function built right into the site. In the past you would need to email Taro about any issues and remind yourself to check to see if it got fixed. Now all communication and updates are displayed right in Radmin.

To view your Scrapers, look under the Events tab in the Radmin menu bar. In the far-right column you’ll see a chat bubble icon that pulls up the support window. If you log a problem, the scripter will be notified by email automatically and will then report any updates within Radmin. You'll also receive an email any time a new update to the scraper happens and is communicated in the chat section.

Also new to Radmin, the Venue list will display any Scraper associated with that Venue in green, red, or gray. Green means that scraper is functioning properly, red means it’s broken, and gray means it’s been paused.

No More Sass

The final feature we want to highlight is the addition of all the Sass editor functions into Radmin! For now your Sass editor will still work as before, but Radmin makes it possible to avoid it altogether.

The first place you’ll want to look is the Site Design tab in the Radmin menu bar. This is where you can control all the design elements for your metro site, including adding custom CSS, JavaScript, and AB testing code. Your search suggestions and what you call your Tastemakers/All-Stars/Unicorns is controlled in the Metadata tab.

You can now also bust caches on your site right from Radmin. Look under the Advanced tab in the menu bar and you will see the option for Caches. We’ve worked to improve the way site changes are updated, but there may still be times when you need to bust a cache to force an update to appear.

Advertising and more

There is way too much to cover in one blog post alone, so be sure to refer back to the Radmin Introduction video as many times as you need to get a feel for the new platform.

Once you’ve had time to familiarize yourself with the basics, the next step is to move onto advertising. Start by checking out this short Radmin Ads video and accompanying blog post. There we’ll walk you through the completely streamlined process of creating and monitoring ads in Radmin.

Enjoy trying out Radmin and let us know if you have any questions or feedback!

What DoStuff's Doing: Welcome Do502, Do312's Pizzafied Punk Albums, and Front-end Updates

No comments: Posted by Anonymous at 1:29 PM Labels: DoStuff's Big Stuff, FrontEnd, Product Updates, WINS

It's been a few weeks since out last Network Update and there's a lot to cover, so let's get right to it!

Product Updates

Big Front-end Rollout

This week saw a big rollout of some of the front-end features we’ve been working on the past few months.

In addition to the Artist Cards, Event Tags, and Latest page updates profiled here, yesterday’s rollout also added a sold-out button to the front-end edit tool and the inclusion of hours of operation to Venue Pages.

If you haven't done so already, check out these new features on your site and let us know what you think.

What else?

How Old is Your Audience? We've updated tracking on all sites so that you can now view the demographics and interests of your site visitors in Google Analytics (including whether or not your fans have been lying about their age). Find it under the "Audience" tab in your GA profile.
Search Bar in New ECPs: New ECPs now have the same search functionality as your DoXXX site, nestled in the sticky navigation bar at the top:

***Note: the search bar replaced the "Featured Venues" dropdown in ECPs, since this was the most logical area to embed the search bar for users. Featured Venue widgets will remain in the new ECP design.

Tastemaker Sorting Improved: new Tastemakers added to your site will appear at the bottom of your list of all Tastemakers (they used to appear at the top), and will move up to the top of the list based on most recent activity on the site.
Start Poking Your Friends: we've changed how Facebook pulls in the data from your site when you're posting a link to your homepage. It used to pull your mobile logo; now it pulls your shiny full-sized logo.

Tools to Help You Win

New Weekly KPI Report: Goodbye old weekly audience update form (and all that work), hello Weekly KPI Reports. Here’s a link to the How To doc so you can brush up before the first email goes out on Monday.
New DSD Queue: The New DSD queue in Asana features colored tags and headers to help you figure out where your request stands. There is also now a Reference DSD queue to archive ideas that were passed up this time around. You can read more about how it works here.
New Twitter Analytics: Twitter just launched a new Tweet Activity Dashboard that shows impressions and engagements for all of your Tweets. To get this data, you'll need to have a current account with Twitter ads, BUT this allows you to see metrics on both promoted and organic tweets. No need to pay to play. Just go to your Twitter Ads dashboard and look for the Analytics tab at the top.

Big Network Wins

Do312's 'Pizzafy' a Punk Album Contest

With nearly two weeks still to go until a winner is selected, Do312 has received over 140 entries to its Pizzafy a Punk Album Contest. Instead of just a normal ticket give-away for their upcoming Riot Fest, the team in Chicago came up with this fantastic way to engage their community.

People are noticing, too. This week the contest was Tweeted out to Riot Fest's 10,000 Twitter followers and was mentioned in a blog post by Brooklyn Vegan. Be sure to show Do312 some love and share this out, and let us know if you're running any similar contests in your metro!

What else?

Do416 + NXNE Lense: Do416 doubled its June traffic with their North by Northeast (NXNE) festival lense sponsored by Pemberton Music Festival. They also had their Events Recommended by Tastemakers promoted on the official NXNE site, providing a great example of cross-promotion with a festival partner.
Do206 KEXP ECP: Seattle’s landmark public radio station just launched its new events page powered by Do206! The page is built on the old ECP platform, but is still a huge win and continues the trend of adding top public radio stations as ECPs. Since launching, KEXP has accounted for a third of Do206's traffic, with 5,000 visits in less than a month. Reach out to your market's public radio station to start laying the groundwork for a traffic shot in the arm!
Do312 Riot Fest Page: Stuart whipped up an awesome custom layout (complete with animated Ferris wheel) for Do312’s Riot Fest page. Wanting to try your hand at some sweet page customization? Check out our custom CSS documentation and give it a crack!
Do512 and Do312 Killer Facebook Posts: Do512 scored 2,500 Likes and 150 Shares on this World Cup post, all adding up to a record-breaking organic reach of over 4 million! Do312 captured the doom and gloom of their market with this weather post, racking up 2,200 Likes, 2,600 Comments, and 920 Shares. The success of both of these mean you should always be looking for what is top of mind in your market, and surfacing it in creative ways on your social channels.
DoLA Hits 100K: Be sure to congratulate our friends at DoLA for hitting the 100,000 registered users mark last week! But as Josh Feingold pointed out, with 3.9 million residents in the city of Los Angeles they have their sights set much higher.
Do414 Page Redesign: Give our friends in Brew City a high five for at last transitioning to the redesigned site this month.
Do312 Anniversary: Do312 celebrated their 4th birthday!

NBD & Programs

Welcome Do502!

The DoStuff Network continues to grow and is now expanding into the Bluegrass State! DoStuff has teamed up with Jeffrey Smith from Crash Avenue and Lizi Hagan from Production Simple to bring Do502 to life.

Thanks to them, "bands" will now be added to "bourbon" and "bats" on the list of things synonymous with Louisville.

Do210 Graduates from Bootcamp!

The San Antonio crew joined us in Austin for training, and is now on the fast track to launching their site. They've already made strong headway on locking in venues, securing giveaways, and planning events for their community.

Keep an eye out for their site to go live in the upcoming days, as they're on their way to breaking the speed record for getting a DoSite up and running.

What else?

Future Folk: Halfway through the Future Folk Part of Earth Tour 2014, we’re seeing excellent turnout at all of the screenings. Plus, the FF BitTorrent Bundle has brought in over 1M pageviews, 620,000 downloads, and captured over 11,000 emails so far!

Check out pictures from all the events so far: DoLA, Do312, Do317, Do314, Do206, and Do415.

Ballantine Ale Deal: New York signed a deal with Ballantine Ale, Pabst’s newest resurrected beer label that will be promoted within the metro. This deal was a renewal buy based on the success of the Lone Star program in Texas.

If you have comments or feedback, or just want to give a shout out, let us know!

Surprise! New Front-end Update Includes Artist Cards On Event Pages, Tags, and Upgrades to “Latest” Page

No comments: Posted by Anonymous at 8:37 AM Labels: FrontEnd, Product Updates, Redesign

Surprise! We just rolled out a big update to the front-end packed with powerful new features.

Included in today’s update are improvements to artist info displayed on event pages, new tag functionality, and phase one of our overhaul to the Latest page. We’ll soon add more detailed information and best practices to LearnStuff, but for now here are the most important highlights and changes we want to show you:

Artist Info

One bit of feedback we’ve been hearing quite often since the redesign is that artist info became much less prominent on event pages. Starting today, we’ve added new collapsible Artist Cards to event pages to help promote artists and improve the overall user experience.

These Artist Cards are displayed just above the event description, and make it easier to find artists’ social links, their Artist Page, and view their YouTube videos. Now, if only we could find a way to get this Trace Adkins/Prince/Bon Iver triple bill booked.

Latest Page

Possibly the most significant change in today’s update is phase one of the upgrades we’re making to the Latest page. Since the redesign, the Latest page has lagged behind Event listings in terms of both layout and functionality. Not anymore.

Starting today you now have the ability to add both pictures and tags to links you highlight on the Latest page. Instead of a bland list of events and headlines, your Latest page will now resemble something closer to the layout on your homepage. This means a more customizable design and a more engaging experience for your users.

By default your new Latest page will just carry over your site design, but custom CSS options will allow you to customize the design over time to distinguish it from event listings and other areas of your site.

We felt these changes were especially important because the Latest page is where you have the greatest editorial control on your site. This is where you can decide to showcase featured events, sponsored lists, editorial content, cultural topics, and other top pages. But in order to really capture the value that the Latest page offers, it needed to look the part.

Another important change that will increase the visibility of your Latest posts is the new widget displayed in the sidebar of all pages (anything with /p/ in the URL). Appearing just below Featured Events, this Latest widget is identical to the one displayed in the footer of your site. By adding it to the sidebar, it will drive even more page views to the content you decide to feature each day.

Future updates will show you more ways to optimize your Latest page and tags, but for now get in there and start testing out the new features!

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Friday, August 8, 2014

What DoStuff’s Doing: E6 Wrap-up and E7 KICKOFF

With Episode 6 finishing up the first week of July, it’s time we updated you on DoStuff’s progress over the course of E6 and what we plan to do in E7.

Episode 6 Wrap-up

Radmin! - The biggest focus of the Product team in E6 was getting Radmin ready for real-world use, and they delivered. Events, Pending queues, Scrapers, Artists, Venues, People, and Advertising were all finished and tested over the course of E6 so that we could begin the transition away from Admin.
Front-end - Tags were added to Event pages along with new Artist cards, and the Latest Page got a big update of its own to improve editorial content on your site.

What didn't?

Lense creation and management - we had planned for lense creation and management to be included in the list of Radmin features completed in E6. Instead, it’s been added as a top priority for Episode 7 (see below).
Ad reporting - Radmin ad management was completed during E6, but linking ad reporting to Google Docs was pushed to E7.
Front-end - While Tags and Artist cards were added to Event pages in E6 (see above), we decided to abandon plans to add related lists/posts/events/venues until we can figure out a better way to display them.

Delivery

What got done?

Do210 - We officially launched Do210.com to add San Antonio to our growing list of metros!
Bootcamp reboot - We changed how new metros prep for Bootcamp and what we cover down here in Austin.
New email templates - We built an all-new newsletter template for MailChimp, and we’ll be working on streamlining the process for adding new templates in the future.
ECP/Lense Documentation - We sent out documentation for how to request ECPs and hire a designer, plus a template email to send to ECP developers.
CSS customization documentation - We added a new tutorial in LearnStuff for customizing Promo User and List pages, and a lot of you have already been putting it to use. We’ll be adding more CSS tips to LearnStuff in the future.
Overhaul KPI Reporting - Our new “How You (and the network) Did Last Week” emails are meant to give you more insights into what’s moving the needle and what isn’t.

What didn't?

Content & editorial guidelines - This is going to be such an important focus in the future that we decided to pull way back and start from the beginning. In E7 we’ll be studying the current editorial mix on the Network and measuring engagement so we can figure out what our goals should be.
Standardize network communications - We started on this in E6, but with the loss of Katie and the addition of Ted this has been pushed into E7.
LearnStuff updates - We’re still working on how to improve LearnStuff so that it stays the most up-to-date resource for support info.

NBD

What got done?

New metro! - Louisville was added as added as the newest metro in the Network. Keep an eye out for Do502 to launch this fall.
New hire! - We hired Mollie Brown to help with sales and marketing efforts. Mollie comes to us from The Orchard in NYC.
New deals! - Ballantine Ale signed a big deal with DoNYC, and we’ve been in meetings with American Express, Converse, Deep Eddy, Goose Island, Pabst, and MillerCoors.
Future Folk - Our first creative tour promo collab wrapped up this week in Austin, and we couldn’t be more excited with how well it went Network-wide. The success of Future Folk signals good things for similar programs in the future.

What didn't?

New sales templates - The metro/brand sales deck templates we’re working on to help improve the deals process carried over to E7 (see below).

Episode 7: The Next Episode

Episode 7 kicked off the second week of July, and while we tried a shorter episode term for E6, we’re going back to a three month term for E7.

Here’s the list of the projects that got “funded” for Episode 7:

Product

Now that a large portion of the daily workflow has been transitioned over to Radmin, Product’s primary focus in Episode 7 is on expanding the functionality of Radmin and continuing to sunset Admin.

We’re also working on improving SEO across the Network and improving integrations with MailChimp and Google Analytics.

Ad reports to Google Docs - Being able to export Radmin ad reports to Google Docs will give you flexibility in displaying and manipulating data.
Radmin Dashboard - A brand new dashboard in Radmin complete with user counts, ad impression numbers, and upcoming RSVPs and Giveaways.
SEO improvements - It’s time to get serious about improving search rankings for the entire Network. Do206’s Scott Porad is already working with DoStuff on some SEO tricks.
Putting Metros in control of all transactional emails - We’re moving all transactional emails (RSVP/Giveaway reminders, followed Artist activity, etc.) to Mandrill so metros can customize email layout and get better analytics.
Automating ECP request and setup - This one’s for Stuart. We’re moving ECP creation over to Radmin so anyone can create one easily.
GA reporting cleanup - We’re cleaning up how Google Analytics reports new users, so you can see how many you gained over a certain time period and where they came from (ECP, RSVP, Giveaway, Facebook, etc.).
Syncing MailChimp and DoStuff databases - All email subscribe/unsubscribe data (including 21+ info) will automatically update in MailChimp.
Moving ~~site design~~ and assets to Radmin - Site design functionality is already up and asset management is being transitioned now.
Improved WISYWG functionality - In addition to improved image and video support on the front-end WISYWG editor, you will have the ability to embed Event, Artist, and Venue cards.
Overhaul send RSVP list - You will have the ability to send RSVP lists from Radmin, and customize the email template that goes with it.
Enhanced ECP functionality in Radmin - We’re building more ECP controls into Radmin, including the ability to pick what Featured Events run on each property
Show reviews - This is one we’re really excited about. We’re building a Rotten Tomatoes-style concert review system that will tell users what others thought of the previous shows on that tour.

Delivery

Network-wide Fantasy Football bracket - Yeah you read that right. We’re starting a new DoStuff Fantasy Football league. Every metro manages one team. Big prizes and bragging rights will be on the line.
Improve metro support communication - Our abilities to manage all support requests via email and the Google forum are becoming stretched. We’re working on ways to improve support across the board.
Finish local sales ingredients list - We’re wrapping up new templates you can use to kickstart your local sales game.
~~Launch New DSD Queue~~ - The New DSD Queue launched last month and will help improve organization and transparency of the DSD process.
Editorial mix audit - The Delivery team is going to review what content performs best, so we can set goals and guidelines for how to improve editorial and social across the Network.
Program delivery reporting audit - We need to figure out where our Program reporting needs improving, so we can keep pitching to bigger and bigger national advertisers.
Test metro email lists - We want to use MailChimp to target inactive subscribers and see if we can re-engage them.
Festival debt audit - We need to assess where our Festival platform rests right now, and what it will take to bring it back up to speed.
Standardize Network communications - As the number and importance of our Network emails grow, we need to standardize when and how we communicate different information to everyone in the network.
Update LearnStuff for Radmin - The launch of Radmin means a lot of the documentation on LearnStuff is already out-of-date.
Summit 2014 - November will come up sooner than we all think, so we’re starting on planning and logistics now.
Implement/test ClientPulse - ClientPulse is a cool tool that will help foster more communication between DoStuff and the metros. We use a similar tool here internally.

NBD

After growing the team and wrapping up the first Network-wide tour, NBD is doubling down on going after big name “whales” in E7.

Brand/Metro Sales Template Decks - Carried over from E6, we’re redesigning our sales templates to score bigger advertisers and bigger dollar amounts.
Finalize two brand case studies - For such a unique media company, we need more case studies to show advertisers that what we do works.
Bi-weekly sales call - We’re working on ways to make this call more interactive so that it can be more valuable for everyone. Step one is to improve call quality.
DoStuff messaging - We’re updating our own messaging in E7 so we can improve how we all describe what DoStuff is to advertisers and partners.
DoStuff marketing - As 2014 comes to a close, we’re finalizing a comprehensive (and awesome) marketing plan to close out the year with a bang.
Network-wide video series - Brands are emphasizing how important video is to them right now. We need to build a “content trail” as a proof of concept for big dollar advertisers.

As always, comment below if you have any questions!

Monday, July 28, 2014

rADmin: Making Your Ads Rad

Video Highlights

Overall Advertising Interface

When you first click into the "Advertising" section of Radmin, you'll see a grid with a similar layout as the other sections of Radmin.

For clarity, you'll see only your current active ads, sorted alphabetically by ad location.
Clicking into the filters section at the top of your ads will allow you to filter by Advertiser name and ad unit, or check "Include Inactive" to display ads not currently running.
The columns displayed on the Advertising homepage include:

Advertiser: The advertiser attached to the respective ad. This controls how ads are grouped together when pulling ad reports. For best results, you should have one and only one advertiser in your system for each respective client/partner that advertises on your site.
Campaign: The campaign attached to the respective ad. This field is purely for organizational purposes, and should be used to group together ads with a common theme/ad buy.
Ad Name: The unique name attached to the respective ad. This is most commonly used to combine the advertiser, campaign, and location to make the ad easily identifiable when scanning the list of ads. Review the below recommended hierarchy of the Advertiser/Campaign/Ad Name relationship-

Start Date: The date the respective ad will go live.
End Date: The last date the ad will run. For Featured Events, the ad will end at the start time of the event. For brand ads, the ad will run through the entirety of the end date, then automatically pause afterwards.
Location: The ad's respective ad unit (Featured Event, Top Right, Listings Middle, User/Venue Widget, Leaderboard)
Weight: The percentage (out of 100 page loads) that a brand ad will be served. Adjusting a brand ad's weight will proportionately adjust the weights of all other brand ads concurrently running in the same ad unit. For example, adding a new Top Right ad with a weight of 50 will cut the weights of every other Top Right brand ad in half. Adding a new Top Right ad with a weight of 100 will set all other Top Right ads to a weight of 0.
Impressions: The number of impressions that the respective ad has accumulated over its lifetime, compared to its Impression Goal (the target number of impressions set during ad creation).

***Note: the daily update of how many impressions a given ad has received will not be immediately live when launching, but should be introduced in the week following when you first have Radmin ads access.

Required Advertiser/Campaign Fields: It is now impossible to create an ad without associating it with an advertiser. This should prevent any problems with ads not showing up when ad reports are pulled. For brand ads, you must associate it with a campaign before creating the ad.
Duplicate Advertiser Prevention: It is also impossible to create two advertisers that have the same name. You'll get this error message instead:

(Note: you could still create one advertiser called "Live Nation" and another called "LiveNation" so always try to add an existing advertiser before creating a new one)
Venue/User Widget Mutually Exclusive: When creating a venue/user widget, once you associate it with a user OR venue, the other option will no longer be available. In other words, you can't associate a widget with both a venue and user. Once associated with a particular venue/user, that will automatically become the Advertiser for the widget.
Impression Goal: How many impressions a brand ad needs to deliver to the advertiser for the respective ad. Used for comparison against how many impressions the ad has actually received to date, which will display for each ad on the Advertising home page.

Ad Management

Magnifying glass: View the details page for a previously created ad.
Pencil: Edit a previously created ad (adjust an ad's weight from this page).
Play/Pause: If the ad is active, click the Pause icon to make the ad inactive. If you wish to make a currently inactive ad live on your site, apply the "Include Inactive" filter, and then hit the Play icon. This tool is especially handy for monitoring impressions and controlling which ads show without having to constantly adjust ad weights.
Graph: Pull an ad report for the respective ad and all other ads attached to the same advertiser.

You're a rADmin grAD

Radmin Introduction: Your Faster, Prettier, More Intuitive CMS

Radmin Highlights

Magnifying Glass: Always takes you to that item’s detail page
Pencil: Always takes you to that item's edit page
Cog: Always drops down additional options (takes place of that massive sidebar in Admin)

Better Sorting

New Media Search Function

For a full run-down of the new Media Search features, check out Justin’s tutorial here.

Advertise: Set-up a new ad for that Event in the Advertising tab
Giveaway: Open a pop-up to create a Giveaway for that Event
RSVP: Open a pop-up to set up an RSVP
Slideshow: Enter Flickr information to add photos to the Event
Voting: Quickly vote on event using the email of promo accounts (ex: Top Picks, Free, etc.)
Merge: Merge with another Event (note: this action will take you back to Admin for now)
Copy: Create a new Event using the same information
View: Check out the Event on your metro site
Delete: Be careful! Once you delete an event, it’s gone

Advertising and more

Friday, July 18, 2014

What DoStuff's Doing: Welcome Do502, Do312's Pizzafied Punk Albums, and Front-end Updates

It's been a few weeks since out last Network Update and there's a lot to cover, so let's get right to it!

Product Updates

If you haven't done so already, check out these new features on your site and let us know what you think.

What else?

How Old is Your Audience? We've updated tracking on all sites so that you can now view the demographics and interests of your site visitors in Google Analytics (including whether or not your fans have been lying about their age). Find it under the "Audience" tab in your GA profile.
Search Bar in New ECPs: New ECPs now have the same search functionality as your DoXXX site, nestled in the sticky navigation bar at the top:

Tastemaker Sorting Improved: new Tastemakers added to your site will appear at the bottom of your list of all Tastemakers (they used to appear at the top), and will move up to the top of the list based on most recent activity on the site.
Start Poking Your Friends: we've changed how Facebook pulls in the data from your site when you're posting a link to your homepage. It used to pull your mobile logo; now it pulls your shiny full-sized logo.

Tools to Help You Win

New Weekly KPI Report: Goodbye old weekly audience update form (and all that work), hello Weekly KPI Reports. Here’s a link to the How To doc so you can brush up before the first email goes out on Monday.
New DSD Queue: The New DSD queue in Asana features colored tags and headers to help you figure out where your request stands. There is also now a Reference DSD queue to archive ideas that were passed up this time around. You can read more about how it works here.
New Twitter Analytics: Twitter just launched a new Tweet Activity Dashboard that shows impressions and engagements for all of your Tweets. To get this data, you'll need to have a current account with Twitter ads, BUT this allows you to see metrics on both promoted and organic tweets. No need to pay to play. Just go to your Twitter Ads dashboard and look for the Analytics tab at the top.

Big Network Wins

What else?

Do416 + NXNE Lense: Do416 doubled its June traffic with their North by Northeast (NXNE) festival lense sponsored by Pemberton Music Festival. They also had their Events Recommended by Tastemakers promoted on the official NXNE site, providing a great example of cross-promotion with a festival partner.
Do206 KEXP ECP: Seattle’s landmark public radio station just launched its new events page powered by Do206! The page is built on the old ECP platform, but is still a huge win and continues the trend of adding top public radio stations as ECPs. Since launching, KEXP has accounted for a third of Do206's traffic, with 5,000 visits in less than a month. Reach out to your market's public radio station to start laying the groundwork for a traffic shot in the arm!
Do312 Riot Fest Page: Stuart whipped up an awesome custom layout (complete with animated Ferris wheel) for Do312’s Riot Fest page. Wanting to try your hand at some sweet page customization? Check out our custom CSS documentation and give it a crack!
Do512 and Do312 Killer Facebook Posts: Do512 scored 2,500 Likes and 150 Shares on this World Cup post, all adding up to a record-breaking organic reach of over 4 million! Do312 captured the doom and gloom of their market with this weather post, racking up 2,200 Likes, 2,600 Comments, and 920 Shares. The success of both of these mean you should always be looking for what is top of mind in your market, and surfacing it in creative ways on your social channels.
DoLA Hits 100K: Be sure to congratulate our friends at DoLA for hitting the 100,000 registered users mark last week! But as Josh Feingold pointed out, with 3.9 million residents in the city of Los Angeles they have their sights set much higher.
Do414 Page Redesign: Give our friends in Brew City a high five for at last transitioning to the redesigned site this month.
Do312 Anniversary: Do312 celebrated their 4th birthday!

NBD & Programs

Welcome Do502!

What else?

Future Folk: Halfway through the Future Folk Part of Earth Tour 2014, we’re seeing excellent turnout at all of the screenings. Plus, the FF BitTorrent Bundle has brought in over 1M pageviews, 620,000 downloads, and captured over 11,000 emails so far!

Check out pictures from all the events so far: DoLA, Do312, Do317, Do314, Do206, and Do415.

Ballantine Ale Deal: New York signed a deal with Ballantine Ale, Pabst’s newest resurrected beer label that will be promoted within the metro. This deal was a renewal buy based on the success of the Lone Star program in Texas.

If you have comments or feedback, or just want to give a shout out, let us know!

Friday, August 8, 2014

Episode 6 Wrap-up

Episode 7: The Next Episode

Monday, July 28, 2014

Video Highlights

You're a rADmin grAD

Radmin Highlights

Advertising and more

Friday, July 18, 2014

Product Updates

Tools to Help You Win

Big Network Wins

NBD & Programs

Thursday, July 17, 2014

Artist Info

Tags

Latest Page

Friday, August 8, 2014

Episode 6 Wrap-up

Episode 7: The Next Episode

Monday, July 28, 2014

Video Highlights

You're a rADmin grAD

Radmin Highlights

Advertising and more

Friday, July 18, 2014

Product Updates

Tools to Help You Win

Big Network Wins

NBD & Programs

Thursday, July 17, 2014

Artist Info

Tags

Latest Page

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