Case Study: Growing a Digital Media Business with Content Management Strategies

APRIL 2012

PRACTICAL INNOVATION AT CHAINES TELE ASTRAL
GROWING A DIGITAL MEDIA BUSINESS WITH CONTENT
MANAGEMENT STRATEGIES AND TECHNOLOGIES

By Mary Laplante and Bill Trippe

Case Study

Table of Contents
Innovation in the Midst of Change .......................................................................... 1

In Their Own Words ................................................................................................ 2

About Astral ..................................................................................................................................... 2

Need and Solution: New WCMS Technology for CTA’s Digital Business ..................3

WCMS Search and Selection ............................................................................................................ 4

Project Planning and Implementation ............................................................................................. 5

Technology in Action .............................................................................................. 7

CTA’s WCMS Environment ............................................................................................................... 7

New Workflows and Processes ...................................................................................................... 10

Benefits of a Cloud Model ............................................................................................................. 11

Current State and Results to Date ......................................................................... 12

Conclusion: Applying CTA’s Lessons in Practical Innovation ................................. 13

A Partner’s Voice .................................................................................................. 15

 2012 Outsell, Inc.
http://outsellinc.com ii

Innovation in the Midst of Change
The broadcast television industry has been completely reshaped in little more than a decade and a half.
Today’s TV consumers are free of time, space, channel, and hardware constraints, thanks to digital
video recording technology, mobile devices with high-performance video capabilities, service provider
convergence, and social networks that serve as a virtual couch for program fans throughout the world.
While passive, “lean back“ viewers still comprise the large majority of audiences, “lean forward” viewers
seeking a more interactive relationship with content are becoming a powerful force. They are vocal and
willing to abandon if their needs are not met. And they largely overlap with the 18- to 34-year-old
demographic so coveted by advertisers, who are racing to be everywhere their buyers are—any
channel, any time, any location, any device. Increasingly, they are paying only for campaigns and
communications that target many or even all media—print, online, radio, TV, mobile, and social.

Faced with evolving audience and advertiser expectations, media organizations have been forced to
reconsider their business models, processes, and technology. For many, this change has been highly
disruptive, sometimes painful, and often expensive. Media companies must be ready to respond wisely
and efficiently, and make all of this disruption work for them, not against them. Embracing disruption
and transformation is even more challenging for successful brands with solid financial performance.
These organizations have vital businesses, with active customers, programs, products, and services.
How do they balance meeting the needs of today’s media consumers and advertisers and the essential
requirement to build infrastructures and practices that will drive towards the future? How do they
effect strategic change for both near-term benefits and long-term gains?

In this case study, we draw on one company’s experience to suggest that a solid approach lies in the
notion of practical innovation. In our view, new value creation is the hallmark of true innovation. We
define innovation as the deployment of new capabilities—people, process, and technology—that deliver
new value. In simplest terms, innovation enables an organization to do something that could not be
done before. In this way, innovation is not simply a matter of scale. It is not “bigger, faster, better” on a
linear path. Rather, innovation is a matter of fundamental, qualitative differences that result in new
value for employees, partners, customers, and shareholders.

Too often, however, innovation is more theory, less reality. More strategy, less execution. More
concept, less action. Practical innovation centers on the notion of an attainable, methodical approach
to introducing new capabilities and deriving new value. Practical innovation is a realistic path to doing
something truly new and different, while delivering benefits to the current business and forging a path
into a future that is increasingly unknowable, given the pace of technology change.

This paper presents a case study in practical innovation at the Chaines Tele Astral (CTA), Astral French
Specialty TV division serving audiences in eastern Canada. CTA is leveraging new content management
practices and technology from Atex to grow a traditional broadcast business into a contemporary

digital presence serving diverse, active, and expanding audiences and the advertisers who want to
reach them. The case study describes the business need and the technology solution, acquisition and
implementation processes, content and system architecture, and results to date. It offers Outsell’s
perspectives on best practices that are leading to winning performance for CTA, its audiences, and its
advertiser partners. Our goal is to provide insight into the experience and success factors within a single
company, and offer guidance on applying those insights and lessons learned to other businesses and
industries where digital transformation is essential for survival. We hope that readers will take away
deeper understanding of how practical innovation can be applied within their own organizations.

In Their Own Words
“One challenge was convincing television people that they are also web people. We needed to become
digital experts.” – Sophie Dufort, Vice President Interactive Media

“We had to reinforce across our organization that we are not building sites. We are managing content.”
– Sophie Théberge, Production Director Interactive Media

“We were desperate for more flexibility in web publishing. We would build pages, and then redo them
over and over again. We wanted to build new capabilities, not do the same work. And we wanted to do
it without development if possible.” – Claudine Bessette, Project Manager, WCMS Implementation

“Analysis of CTA’s requirements reveals that the primary purpose for the Web Publishing CMS is to
allow content managers, editors and website strategists to continuously add and improve the content
of websites with ease, so that web production efforts can be optimized to benefit from commercial
project opportunities.” – Sophie Théberge, Production Director Interactive Media

About Astral

Astral is one of Canada's largest media companies. It operates several of the country's most popular pay
and specialty television, radio, out-of-home advertising and digital media properties. Astral plays a
central role in community life across the country by offering diverse, rich and vibrant programming that
meets the tastes and needs of consumers and advertisers. To learn more about Astral, visit astral.com.

http://outsellinc.com 2

Need and Solution: New WCMS Technology for CTA’s Digital
Business
Astral CTA formed its interactive group 12 years ago, with the goal of creating websites supporting its
eight specialty French-language TV stations. Core philosophies (then as now) are that web presence is
complementary to TV broadcasting and that audience experience can be enhanced with content that
goes beyond programming itself while supporting the vision of the brand. These concepts shaped the
evolution of CTA websites from first-generation static programming guides and promotional/content
activities.

• Leveraging a very strong television presence in its French market, CanalVie.com rapidly
became a popular portal by mid-2000. The site publishes a huge variety of content for
women in the 30-45 age group and features very active forums.
• On Ztele.com, topic-oriented blogs and a car section draw men in the 20-35 age group.
• Vrak.tv, for children 9-14 years of age, operates as a strong community with a gaming
structure.
• MusiquePlus.com, another strong site, delivers a branded online experience with an active
community using social media and a news-based content strategy.

In 2009, CTA set itself on a course to leverage its existing success and grow into true digital media
presence in its markets. This would require a digital content strategy that was both deeper, ensuring
richer audience engagement, and broader, extending into mobile channels eventually.

To guide strategy execution, CTA formed a steering committee comprising stakeholders representing
executive, business, production, content development, and IT groups. The committee is responsible for
driving and overseeing all technology decisions (including acquisition) and for ensuring alignment with
Astral-wide efforts and vision. One of its first tasks was due diligence on the existing content
management infrastructure supporting the websites. CTA had in place a custom content management
system (CMS) that was functional but aging. A gap analysis compared requirements for true digital
presence with the current capabilities and the workflows and processes that had grown up around it. It
became obvious that the existing technologies and processes for content and web publishing could not
be evolved to support CTA’s business direction. Without new technology, the content and production
teams would not be able to support the volume and breadth of content that would be required, nor
would they be able to publish it in a timely manner. In addition, concurrent projects involving other
technologies were underway (such as the system supporting web video management and delivery).
Time was right for reconsidering all of the processes and workflows driving web presence. Thus began
the search for a new web content management system (WCMS).

On the bottom line, the business case was driven by the need for efficient, state-of-the-art web
publishing. The steering committee’s investigation was shaped by a clear understanding that content is


the company’s business—not website design and development. This squarely grounded the target
solution as a CMS optimized for web publishing and media asset organization, rather than a web
production system. All decisions were driven by a vision of “content anywhere,” as determined by
consumer preferences. The right solution would put control in the hands of the content owners, ensure
that the content could be managed independently of platform or device constraints, and enable high
degrees of automation and streamlined workflows.

On the top line, the business case addressed two primary opportunities. First, by aiming for more
profitable web production through optimized content management, CTA would have time, tools, and
expertise to devote to new commercial and added-value projects. Second, one business argument for
investment was driven by profound and fundamental changes in media advertising. Today advertisers
demand consistent messaging across all channels (web, mobile, broadcast, and print). They want
advertising messaging tied to relevant editorial content, and they want data, data, and more data. The
right WCMS would be critical to CTA’s ability to continue to attract and serve high-quality sponsors and
advertisers across the breadth of its digital business.

WCMS Search and Selection
The steering committee established a funnel process for identifying, evaluating, and selecting a best-fit
solution. Stages included preliminary screening, a private RFP process, on-site demonstrations, and
hands-on user evaluations by CTA staff. To narrow the field after the screening, the committee
developed a set of key criteria that would qualify a small number of WCM vendors to receive the RFP, as
summarized in Table 1.

Criteria Goal

Multi-site/multi-channel management Manage multiple sites with a single installation of the
software to enable content sharing and reuse, and lay
foundation for mobile channels

Open architecture Ease integration of platform components through well-
documented interfaces (APIs, SDKs, or published source
code)

Advanced but intuitive publishing features Provide a web user interface with tools that facilitate
publishing activities like creating landing pages, featuring
content, managing taxonomies, and in-context editing

Prior success delivering WCMS solutions to publishers, Bring a track record of positive performance for businesses
particularly in digital media and broadcasting industries like Astral

Table 1: CTA Key Vendor Criteria


If a vendor met these key criteria, the committee then considered other factors including timing
(deployment, training, and adoption), pricing (licensing, maintenance, and support), and technology fit
with the existing CTA environment.

This evaluation process distilled a list of six WCMS vendors who would receive the RFP. The candidates
represented a variety of solution approaches: open source WCM deployed by a systems integrator,
licensed software configured and installed by an integrator, and vendors deploying with their own
professional services.

One of the key steps in the CTA selection process is worth calling out as a best practice. Too many
times, new technology fails to realize its full potential due to compromised user adoption. This is often
because the needs of the people using the system to do everyday work are not considered during
requirements gathering. Or if they are considered, users are not given the opportunity to experience
the technology first-hand in a real work scenario. To its great credit, CTA mitigated adoption risk with a
hands-on evaluation by CTA end-users, who test drove the systems and completed a “solution
appreciation questionnaire” that rated their experiences with each. This process gave users a sense of
ownership in the new solution; it also teased out problems and issues that may not otherwise have
surfaced during evaluation.

After this well-planned and managed technology acquisition process, CTA chose Polopoly from Atex, a
UK-based software company providing solutions for media-rich industries. The following factors were
keys to the final decision:

• Most closely aligned with CTA’s key requirements and highest rated by CTA users.
• Offers features that specifically address challenges in the media industry, including
integrations with tools that enable brand websites to improve and monetize web presence.
• Addresses page creation and content organization efforts with dynamic page generation
and text mining technologies.
• Offers content management features supporting publishing workflows and asset reuse.
• In-context analytics.
• Tablet publishing capabilities.
• Flexible and extensible software architecture, plus met the CTA profile for scalability and
performance.
• Software-as-a-Service delivery model.

Project Planning and Implementation
CTA’s web content and development team assumed responsibility for the WCMS implementation, with
an internal project manager collaborating with an Atex lead architect on project coordination and
planning. CTA initiated work on site design and information architecture, including the definition of
CTA’s taxonomy comprising a category and tag dictionary. Planning included analyzing and defining


strategies for content migration, integration with current assets and repositories, and re-
implementations of custom applications within the new WCMS.

The introduction of new technology created an opportunity for CTA to rethink the web content
strategy for each site, including the information architecture and design. A key design decision was
reuse—elements developed in Polopoly would be appropriate to the experience on a particular site, but
would also suit broader needs to the extent possible. For specific element needs, the approach was to
ensure that behavior was consistent across sites. To CTA’s audiences, the Polopoly-driven sites would
be similar in look, style, and behavior. This strategy offered two benefits. First, it would enable CTA to
get to deployment faster, reducing the effort to design individual websites. Second, it would ensure
consistent experience for consumers, reducing the negative impact that sometimes occurs with
noticeable differences in site design.

The actual transitioning of the websites from the existing to the new platform would initially be staged
one site at a time. This deployment strategy ensured business continuity for the majority of the
websites and minimized the risk of disruption due to new technology introduction. CTA’s thoughtful
approach included an assessment of the scope of content migration issues. The roll-out started with
Musimax.com, a small site in terms of number of content assets, and moved on to Ztele.com, a
medium-sized site. CanalVie.com is the third to move to the new platform. This will be the largest
effort due to the amount of content that will be migrated.

Sep 2010 to Mar 2011

Apr and May 2011
Requirements
definition, Jun 2011
vendor Contracting
investigation, with Atex Feb 2012
and technology Implementation
selection start Mar 2012
Two sites
running on new
WCMS Two sites in
development

Figure 1: WCMS Timeline


Technology in Action
Under the hood, the ways that the sites and pages worked would be completely different from the
existing approaches. These new capabilities are fundamental to innovation at CTA—the introduction of
new capabilities that deliver new value. CTA would be able to engage audiences, serve advertisers, and
position for growth in ways that it could not without an updated content technology infrastructure.

CTA’s WCMS Environment
In the course of its analysis, CTA identified a number of key technical requirements, but perhaps the
most important was having a content management platform that would separate content from format
in ways that would:

• Enable pages to be assembled on the fly, including landing pages for articles, index pages for
sections, and index pages for the sites themselves.
• Drive this dynamic assembly from a rich array of metadata.
• Marry the assembled content with relevant advertising.

Taken together, these features would enable CTA to create, in effect, an unlimited inventory of pages
and accompanying advertising, and to readily build out custom content sets, micro-sites, and other
content packages that could be blended with advertising.

CTA’s solution of choice, Atex Polopoly, is optimized for this kind of delivery, which is why it is widely
used in news and media companies. Content is stored in a neutral XML structure. Each content element
can be tagged with a variety of metadata. Pages are then dynamically assembled based on the
metadata. For example, articles tagged as being about a particular television show or movie can be
assembled on the fly into a landing page about that show, and married with advertising about that
show, movie, or other related products. In addition:

• The format-neutral XML content will allow CTA to dynamically make content available for
publication on any digital device.
• Polopoly’s integrated text mining tools simplify content tagging. CTA’s content creators can
efficiently tag content sets, thereby driving the dynamic assembly of content products and
landing pages displaying related content and advertising.
• The content categorization has the added benefit of helping to keep visitors on the site
longer by directing them to related and interesting content, thereby generating additional
advertising revenue.

The underlying content model is simple but powerful. In essence, all content is stored as “Articles” (the
content or information carrying unit) and in “Departments,” which are content containers that can be
used to build hierarchies or lists of articles. Both the Articles and Departments are linked to one or more


input templates and one or more output templates. The input templates provide a graphical user
interface to the content, enabling editors to create and manage content objects. The output templates
are then used to render the content. With this model, an article on a movie could be married with one or
more output templates—one for the primary landing page, one for an alternate landing page design,
one for a mobile version of the website, and so on.

In addition, content managed in the platform is:

• Cached and distributed, enabling dynamic delivery of the content to various distribution
points and formats.
• Versioned, enabling continuous and flexible updating of the content, as well as functions
such as “rollback” when necessary.
• Indexed, enabling search and ongoing text mining and refinement.
• Importable and exportable, enabling API-level access and flexible models of syndication.

CTA’s architecture for its “Publish Anywhere Web CMS” is illustrated in Figure 2.

Figure 2: WCMS Architecture at CTA


Within the Polopoly platform, the core content management services (storage, indexing, versioning,
access by users, etc.) are separate from the run-time versions of product that are used for delivery,
which are shown at the top of the diagram (Website A, B, and so on). This separation enables scaling to
accommodate very high traffic, which will be essential as traffic grows and websites become replete
with video, audio, animation, and other resource-intensive content. Multiple logical layers dedicated to
specific services make it possible to isolate capabilities for performance optimization and management
of infrastructure costs.

Features of the “Publish Everywhere” architecture include:

• Dynamic content delivery for mobile and web browsers.
• A content administration and publishing layer managing content creation, workflows,
content tagging, and site structure.
• “Application templates” or plugins for integrating key third party services such as BrightCove
for video delivery, Google Analytics, and Adobe Omniture.

The platform supports standard release management best practices, deployed with a continuous
integration development approach using development, staging and production environments as
illustrated in Figure 3. Developers have a protected environment in which to create new features, while
QA teams have a separate space for ensuring that all new elements integrate well and function
properly. This greatly reduces risk that content or sites fail in production.


Figure 3: CTA Publishing Environment

New Workflows and Processes
A key CTA requirement was to make content creators much more productive by allowing them to focus
on content creation and not design or page layouts. In the old environment, new content development
often meant working with wireframes or mockups of new pages. Now content creators have a much


simpler workflow of creating the content, enriching it with tagging, and then submitting it to a
workflow, as illustrated in Figure 4.

Figure 4: CTA Web Publishing Workflow

• Content creators enter raw content into a simple user interface that separates key elements
such as the title and lead from the full text of the article. Users are trained in the interface and
have a guide instructing them on what elements are allowed in the content.
• Content is then tagged for subject and other key metadata. Users are presented with an
interface that includes the subject categories and metadata elements such as artists who are
mentioned in the content, geographical tags, and whether a video clip or other media are
included in the content.
• Users then submit the content to a workflow. Users can save drafts, preview the content, or
publish it directly to the website.

This same overall process drives the taxonomy and text mining for the published websites. The content
is tagged for subject and other metadata. Articles tagged for a specific artist, for example, can be used
to dynamically generate pages and “queues” of articles that can be embedded in other pages. These
articles can then be married with appropriate advertising or even tagged for specific campaigns. The
tagging also enriches the search experience for users, providing better results and more ways of
filtering the results.

Benefits of a Cloud Model
Given CTA’s demanding content creation, management, and delivery requirements, a hosting
partnership arrangement with Atex made the most financial and operational sense. The staging and
production environments are located in a private cloud, hosted by Atex. The development environment
is housed within CTA. This framework helps reduce the company’s operating expense by removing the
need to invest in new hardware or resources to monitor the system. The benefits of this approach are
multifold:

• Virtualized servers enable rapid scaling.
• Failover can be near-instantaneous for disaster recovery or in the event of a single point of
failure.


• Bursts of additional bandwidth can be accommodated when traffic spikes for special events
or periods of increased traffic.
• System and performance monitoring can be continuous and proactive.

Current State and Results to Date
Now 18 months into the project, CTA has transitioned Musimax.com and Ztele.com to the new WCMS,
and has started on Historiatv.com and CanalVie.com. CTA will complete implementations across the
remaining four properties over the next year. With total deployment in its early stages, the broad
picture of technology impact is only starting to emerge. But there are encouraging and compelling
signs of success.

Operational improvements enabled by CTA’s web publishing CMS are already being realized.

• Creating a new page structure or template is now up to 80% faster, depending upon the level
of element reuse within Polopoly and publishing queues. In addition, an editor can execute
this process without a technical resource (user interface designer or front- or back-end
developer). What required four resources in the past is now executed by one person. There is
also less risk involved than with the hardcoded sites, resulting from the ability to preview and
roll back quickly and easily.
• Publishing new content in an existing template is now up to 50% faster. Uploading a new
article no longer requires a designer and a front-end developer, although a designer still
performs a quality assurance check because image quality is critical on the CTA websites,
and correct formatting is essential.
• Automating front-end development processes has dramatically reduced the risk of error
introduction when manually hardcoding pages by approximately 90%, based on initial
results. CTA has also realized content reliability and performance stability through the new
workflow that streamlines publishing from the development to staging to production
environments.

These improvements will enable CTA to meet its larger business goal of leveraging the same resources
to create new value, instead of consuming time and money with repetitive manual processes.

CTA is monitoring metrics designed to assess the impact of the new technology on audience
engagement, including increase in number of consumers accessing video or other content specific to
the site (such as blog entries on Ztele.com), and more page views of video content. Increases in traffic
and engagement plus new technical and process capabilities delivered by the web publishing CMS will
lead to the longer-term strategic benefits that are targeted for three years after full deployment.


Although top-line revenues related specifically to the new
Behavioral advertising is the delivery of adver-
technology are still in the future, CTA’s ability to deliver more tising content based on the collection of data
content on dynamic pages is currently having positive impact on online from a particular computer or device
partnerships with advertisers and sponsors. Premium ad capturing Web viewing behaviors over time and
placement programs are selling out more quickly. And as a across non-afﬁliate Web sites for the purpose of
using such data to predict user preferences or
marketing benefit, media agencies and clients can “see” the
interests to deliver advertising to that computer
difference in the sites supported by the new WCMS, resulting in
or device based on the preferences or interests
additional competitive advantage for CTA. Over the longer term, inferred from such Web viewing behaviors.
one of CTA’s goals for the new WCMS is the ability to deliver Behavioral advertising is distinguished from
behavioral advertising, which it was not able to do at all with the contextual advertising, where ads are based on

in-place technology. the content of a Web page, a search query, or a
user’s contemporaneous behavior on the site.

The overall rate of cost savings and pace of productivity -- Self-Regulatory Principles for Online
improvements is currently moderated by the need to run the new Behavioral Advertising, July 2009
web publishing CMS in parallel with the existing system on which
the other six systems run. To mitigate risk, any new features are designed to operate on both
platforms, and new integrations are developed once but tested in both environments.

Today CTA’s content is delivered in a web browser on its websites. When the transition to the new web
publishing CMS is completed, CTA intends to expand to content delivery to web-based mobile apps and
possibly to native app platforms, depending upon the state of the market and on audience preferences.
With a common pool of content that can be published and promoted in compelling, value-added ways
across channels, CTA’s vision of a true digital media business will be reality.

Conclusion: Applying CTA’s Lessons in Practical Innovation
The ability to distribute content in digital form over low-cost networks has touched every corner of
every industry in which economic value is derived from content distribution, including newspapers,
magazines, music, books, even professional information services. In a world turned chaotic by
technology, viable paths forward are not linear. The winners are transforming themselves from single-
media businesses like TV into true multi-channel digital businesses. To do this, leaders must step back,
rethink, and move ahead in ways that are likely to be fundamentally different from their historical
businesses. This is why the willingness to embrace true innovation is characteristic of market leaders.
They know that new capabilities that deliver new value are essential. But they are also practical,
recognizing that current business performance is critically important.

Within the context of the technology initiatives covered in this case study, CTA illustrates best practices
with its commitment to managing the balance between improving current results and pursuing its


vision for digital media presence. Its feet are firmly planted in both its current business and the business
it aspires to become. We can point to three specific examples:

• ROI in the new WCMS platform is focused on the bottom line for the first three years, with top-
line revenue expected thereafter. The steering committee set realistic expectations regarding
top-line timeframe. Although change is occurring rapidly, it is not happening so fast that
reliable, sustainable revenue can be promised in the near term.
• The initial one-site-at-a-time approach to implementing the new platform is designed to
minimize interruption of the current business, and at the same time orchestrate the
development of internal capabilities by starting with the smallest sites and moving onto the
larger projects.
• The decision to deploy with a cloud model and outsource much of the IT infrastructure is
essential to CTA’s ability to meet current and future project goals. Through a strategic
relationship with its technology partner Atex, CTA is addressing current management realities
as well as ensuring cost-effective scalability as content publishing demands grow over time.

Establishing and maintaining the balance between improving the current business and realizing future
vision is always a difficult management challenge. Temptations to favor one over the other are
sometimes too great to ignore, particularly when the pressures of rapid and inexorable change create
urgency to “do something.” Readers of this case study would do well to consider CTA’s approach:

 Stay focused on the core business in the midst of change. CTA never loses sight of the fact that
its business is content. Strategies and tactics are constantly trained on developing capabilities
and competencies that establish the company as the premier content provider in its markets
across all media.
 Bring all of the stakeholders to the table. The composition of the steering committee ensured
that every organization impacted by the new WCMS was represented, and that all groups were
ready to act once the technology decisions had been made.
 Develop strategic partnerships with technology providers. CTA sought out a supplier with a
depth of experience working with media companies, establishing vertical market expertise as a
key criteria during the selection process. With its cloud deployment of WCMS, CTA and Atex
are working together on a daily basis and in collaboration to reduce CTA’s risk. This cannot
happen if the supplier simply installs the software and sends a bill.

Other best practices well illustrated by CTA’s WCMS success include:

 Take an organized, methodical process to technology acquisition that is consciously inclusive of
all stakeholders and users. CTA excelled in its approach to finding the best-fit WCMS. Putting
the systems in the hands of the users before buying may have taken a little more time during
the evaluation process, but will pay significant benefits in terms of adoption.


 Never underestimate the content migration issues. In hindsight, CTA’s production director
Sophie Théberge identifies this as an important lesson learned. In the end, content migration
will be the largest portion of project effort by far, and it is essential to manage the effort
consciously and rigorously. Migrating while deploying has presented some unexpected
developer challenges, and the process is resource intensive, as there is no way to automate the
migration.

CTA’s story is one of growth and evolution, not immediate and wholesale transformation. Innovation is
sometimes mistaken as important only in the latter case. As CTA’s success has shown, investment in
new content technology and practices can introduce new capabilities that make innovation practical,
manageable, and essential to impacting current as well as future business.

A Partner’s Voice
We thank Atex for contributing the following content to this case study.

The broadcast industry, like all media sectors, is facing increased competition for audience time and
attention. An abundance of choice allows consumers to be more selective. As a result, broadcasters
need unparalleled flexibility in delivering content and creating a more engaging user experience. The
Atex Polopoly Web Content Management System (Polopoly) is an integrated software platform
boasting a suite of tools designed to empower broadcast news departments, enrich websites, and
expand customer marketing efforts across all media channels.

Global broadcast companies like Astral Media are selecting Polopoly to expand and enrich their online
presence and to deliver on their metadata-driven publishing model. Polopoly is based on open
standards and a highly scalable architecture. The system is simple to use, yet powerful and flexible, and
which currently manages some of the largest traffic web sites in the world.

Having worked with some of the most advanced and demanding digital publishers, Polopoly addresses
the diverse and complex demands of global broadcasters. Polopoly supports the planning, creation,
enrichment, delivery and access of content across all media channels. In addition, the system enables
consolidated newsroom organizational and workflow models, with a focus on quality local content and
greater community participation.

With today’s media organizations being continuously challenged to sustain their positions as the
information centers of their local communities, Polopoly provides competency in this changing
business model, powering the flow of information and managing a broadcaster’s audience,
contributors, and communities.


In short, Polopoly provides the infrastructure to extend a broadcast company’s media reach, delivering
any content, anywhere, anytime, and in any format. We are very proud of our relationship with Astral
Media, and we look forward to continuing our partnership of collaboration and innovation.


Outsell, Inc., is a research and advisory firm that helps the world’s publishers, information providers,
and enterprise marketers grow revenue, deliver superior solutions, optimize their clients’ performance,
and thrive in a fast-changing global digital market.

Call +1 617.497.9443 Call +1 650.342.6060 Call +44 (0)20 8090 6590
Fax +1 617.497.5256 Fax +1 650.342.7135 Fax +44 (0)20 7031 8101
763 Massachusetts Avenue 330 Primrose Road, Suite 510 25 Floral Street
Cambridge, MA 02139 USA Burlingame, CA 94010 USA London WC2E 9DS


Case Study: Growing a Digital Media Business with Content Management Strategies

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