New agency Daylight has launched in the Australian market as local publishers turn to investing in brands.
The agency, evolved out of a newsroom and co-founded by Duncan Greive, has become a key partner to national publications such as Man of Many and The Squiz. Daylight’s presence in Australia comes at a time when a combination of increased AI and downranking links on social drop in website traffic through referrals.
CEO Lee Lowndes said for independent media outlets, it’s made loyal direct traffic and the need to build brand awareness of a brand to attract and retain an audience on owned platforms paramount.
“In an environment where audiences were being led directly to websites by Google and Facebook, publishers could get away without focusing on brand too heavily,” Lowndes said.
“But this year, the influence of social platforms is going to play such a drastic role with audiences, the ability for them to be switched off overnight is a looming reality, along with them becoming an increasing cesspit of misinformation, we may start to see audiences retreat back to trusted sources, so the role brand plays here in rebuilding trust is key,” she added.
New work for Man of Many features a vast upgrade of the website’s user experience and the development of a membership benefits scheme to increase revenue for the business without introducing a paywall.
Scott Purcell, Man of Many
Scott Purcell, Man of Many co-founder, said working with Daylight allowed his publisher to succeed in a highly competitive digital environment, including a more than 50% increase in views per session since installing the new website.
“As an independent publisher, we only really have our own data to make big decisions about our business. The beauty of Daylight is that they have knowledge and experience from dozens of different publishers that they use to help level up your infrastructure. It allows us to operate like a bigger business,” Purcell said.
“Having an agency partner that improves brand and UX is crucial for a business to thrive in an environment focused on keeping a user on the website for longer – and ultimately converting them into a paying customer – not just for racking up cheap SEO clicks, he said.
“Daylight has enabled us to meet the expectations of the modern news consumer. They have helped upgrade our website, our brand and most importantly the way we interact with our audience. Their fierce attention to audience engagement above all else has been crucial in a time where the digital landscape is changing fast,” Purcell added.
For The Squiz, Daylight’s work involved upgrading the site’s brand and digital touch points to increase audience, as well as relaunching the website to drive growth in spend with advertisers.
Daylight’s work with publishers sees them modernise brand identities, UX and strengthen digital touch-points to wrest control of audience pipelines away from tech giants and into the hands of publishers.
Lowndes said the current environment in Australia meant a business like Daylight was primed to make an impact. “Owning your own infrastructure is key to success for publishers in the current environment. Newsletters, podcasts, and a strong editorial strategy were a path to an audience engaging directly with a media publisher without the intermediary of social media or SEO.
“It is currently a real paradigm shift in Australian media with big tech referrals drying up. Rather than a negative, this is actually a massive opportunity for local media to take control of their own digital infrastructure, to grow their own audience, and to take the power of their content in their own hands,” Daylight’s Lowndes said.
The Squiz said Daylight being formed in a newsroom allowed the agency to understand the needs of a media business on a deeper level. Squiz Media founder Claire Kimball said Daylight’s newsroom roots gave the agency an advantage in working with digital publishers.
“Daylight’s insights made the process of our rebrand a true partnership with the Squiz team. We’ve created a site that’s easier for the team to work with and easy for our newsletter and podcast audiences to navigate.
“Importantly, prospective audience members and commercial partners can get a clear impression of who we are and what we do, and that is paying off for us,” she added.
The push into Australia for Daylight follows successful partnerships in the Pacific and New Zealand. Daylight has worked with a raft of publishers, including Stuff NZ, Pacific Media Network, The Spinoff and Fiji Sun, across branding projects, commercial integrations, UX strategy, design, development and full re-platforming projects.
Top image: Daylight CEO Lee Lowndes