News site re-launched for Holyrood Magazine

Article by Alistair Wood

Tue 12 Nov 2019

ESco have re-launched a news and events site for Holyrood Magazine, Scotland’s fortnightly political and current affairs brand, and already the site is seeing a significant uplift in traffic.

“We worked with ESco over the summer to build a media website suitable for news, long-read features and comment pieces, while also hosting information on the events side of our business. I am delighted with what they came up with – ESco helped create a modern, fresh site, which is quick and easy to use, while presenting content from our print magazine in a stylish and attractive way.”

“From the start of the process ESco’s project team quickly got to work in understanding what we need from a site, and since our launch in October continue to develop the platform as required”  – Liam Kirkaldy, Online Editor

The brief from Holyrood was to improve the look and feel of the site and, by improving the dwell time from readers, open up additional commercial opportunities. The site is structured with the following functionality:

• News – breaking news published on a daily basis, with topic-based related article links to similar content.
• Comment – longer deep-dive reads with comment and analysis from Holyrood’s award-winning writers.
• Events – Holyrood has been providing event management for nearly two decades and runs nearly 100 Policy Briefings, 20 Conferences and 4 Awards annually. This part of the site is used to promote and register people to these events.<
• Commercial Opportunities – we have integrated with various platforms to serve up personalised and relevant advertising, both from the in-house Dod’s team, but also from other video or ad platforms. These have been implemented to be as engaging as possible, without obstructing the reader from consuming the great content.
• Content Hubs – with so much content being produced by the Holyrood team, it was important to tie related content together into hubs either by topic or writer. This helps the reader to find the most relevant content, but also aids with the all-important SEO. 

We have received really positive feedback from our audience while our page views have increased significantly in the first month following the rollout.

Liam Kirkaldy, Online Editor at Holyrood Magazine

About Holyrood Magazine

Holyrood is Scotland’s fortnightly political and current affairs magazine that keeps people informed with its award-winning and thought-provoking editorial. The award-winning magazine of the year is read by the country’s key legislators, Scottish parliamentarians, civil servants, Scottish Government agencies, political parties, 32 local authority chief executives, as well as individual departments within councils, trade unions, health boards, educational organisations, voluntary organisations and non-governmental bodies.

Holyrood is frequently quoted within the Scottish Parliament as a source of reliable information and political debate and according to Ipsos MORI is the most widely read publication amongst MSPs, with the magazine cited as being influential in their decision-making.

About Dods

Dods is a market-leading business intelligence, events, media and training company. They have built a reputation for high quality, unbiased content across all of their products and services. Dods’ global reach enables customers across six continents and 50 countries to navigate the complex and changing UK and EU political and public sector management environments.