{"id":2652,"date":"2020-01-17T17:23:04","date_gmt":"2020-01-17T17:23:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.arca.art\/en\/?p=2652"},"modified":"2020-02-21T16:01:05","modified_gmt":"2020-02-21T16:01:05","slug":"the-levers-of-discoverability","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.arca.art\/en\/resources\/the-levers-of-discoverability\/","title":{"rendered":"The Levers of Discoverability"},"content":{"rendered":"\"\"<\/a>\n

January 23, 2020<\/p>\n

Did our<\/span> clickbait<\/span><\/a> work? The use of attention-grabbing, intriguing, or even shocking headlines to lure readers to click on links is a clever trick used by marketers to increase advertising revenue by driving large numbers of Internet users to their sites. Our intention is quite different: we wanted to draw your attention to this purely digital and rather reprehensible phenomenon as a way to introduce the second chapter of our new online resource, <\/span>Digital Literacy in Six Easy Chapters <\/span><\/i>on the topic of discoverability. We suggest the following four excellent tricks\u2014never mind the clickbait\u2014to give your online content greater visibility.<\/span><\/p>\n

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Defining the Concept of Discoverability<\/strong><\/p>\n

Concerns around the discoverability of cultural content on the Web have been the subject of several debates in recent months. As a concept,<\/span> discoverability<\/span><\/a> is \u201cthe degree to which something, especially a piece of content or information, can be found in a search of a file, database, or other information system.\u201d The idea is particularly important when it comes to the visibility of diverse cultural expressions when pitted against content that\u2019s promoted or supported by the usual Internet giants. During the international symposium<\/span> Acc\u00e8s et d\u00e9couvrabilit\u00e9 des contenus culturels francophones \u00e0 l\u2019\u00e8re num\u00e9rique<\/span><\/i>\u00a0 <\/span><\/a>(Access and Dicoverability of Francophone Cultural Content in the Digital Era) held <\/u>in Montreal in the fall of 2019, a large number of participants spoke of recent upheavals in the music and audiovisual industries. As outlined in<\/span> this article<\/span><\/a> written for the RAIQ, we can conclude that within contemporary art and artist-run centre scenes, the digital upheaval has actually provided new opportunities for creativity, dissemination, and the cultural life of our communities. We are open to experimenting with new tools and new ways of doing things based on our objectives, interests, skills, and willingness to learn.<\/span><\/p>\n

But the concept of discoverability itself isn\u2019t set in stone. In their<\/span> theoretical and practical guide on the subject<\/span><\/a> (available in French only), database librarian Jos\u00e9e Plamondon and the Fondation Jean-Pierre Perreault use the term \u201cdiscovery\u201d rather than \u201cdiscoverability.\u201d This choice reflects a desire to reduce terminological ambiguity and encourage broader adaptation of the concept by more people.<\/span><\/p>\n

To illustrate the kinds of actions we can take to improve discoverability, Andr\u00e9e Harvey and V\u00e9ronique Marino of LaCogency, together with Jos\u00e9e Plamondon, have illustrated the concept by dividing it into four main \u201cpillars, or levers\u201d.\u00a0 These levers include strategies that target either humans or machines, and apply to either short or long-term uses. The four levers are further outlined here:
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Promotion<\/strong><\/p>\n

human + short term<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

Promotional activities are not exclusive to the digital realm, but may be expressed in new forms on the Web. <\/span>In fact, discoverability can be implemented in real life work in the real world to make new people aware of the activities and missions of our organizations through events such as exhibitions, panel discussions or networking cocktail hours with peers and like-minded groups. Some may also organize contests on social media networks, for example, by holding a draw (for show tickets, books, etc.) and inviting people to participate by tagging their friends in comments or reposting the event. Such practices can broaden our reach by accessing the personal and professional networks of our members, friends and subscribers.<\/p>\n

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Digital Marketing<\/strong><\/p>\n

human + long term<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

Digital marketing activities also take traditional marketing processes and apply them to digital environments. These include the purchase and placement of ads and promotional campaigns on social media. Web infrastructure has also enabled the development of programmatic ads, which benefit from advances in recommendation systems and data collection of Internet users\u2019 behaviour and interests.<\/span><\/p>\n

Interested organizations can learn about ad platforms from Google,<\/span> Facebook<\/span><\/a>, and<\/span> Instagram<\/span><\/a>. Canadian non-profits can register with<\/span> Techsoup<\/span><\/a> and the<\/span> Google Ad Grants<\/span><\/a> service to access USD $10,000 of in-kind advertising per month for text ads.<\/span><\/p>\n

It\u2019s also advisable to take time to develop and periodically evaluate your social media communication strategy by remembering the key concepts of relevance, authenticity, and consistency.<\/span><\/p>\n

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Search Engine Optimization
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machine + short term<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

Search engine optimisation (SEO) is a set of practices designed to improve the ranking of a page or website in a search engine\u2019s list of results. These practices must constantly adapt to<\/span> search engine modifications<\/span><\/a>. This might include, for example, paying particular attention to the coherence of key words that are used throughout a website, page layout that follows html markup conventions (structuring content by using the title tags <H1> et <H2>), and the strategic use of hyperlinks to other pages on your site or to other websites.<\/span><\/p>\n

Several free or low-cost resources are available to help you with your optimization activities. Many cultural organizations have a WordPress website, and the platform offers several SEO extensions. You may want to familiarize yourself with the<\/span> most frequently used extensions<\/span><\/a> and their specificities, and then compare each option to choose the one that best suits your needs.<\/span><\/p>\n

YoastSEO<\/span><\/a> is a popular, user-friendly extension with a free basic version that offers a range of tools to evaluate and optimize WordPress content. It also allows the addition of Schema structured data, which we will cover in the next section.<\/span><\/p>\n

Google Search Console<\/span><\/a> is a tool that measures a website\u2019s performance in terms of how it ranks in Google\u2019s search results.<\/span><\/p>\n

Online Broken Link Checker<\/a> is a tool that analyzes hyperlinks and locates broken links so that they may be quickly replaced with existing URLs.<\/p>\n

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Metadata, Structured Data, Linked Data<\/strong><\/p>\n

machine + long term<\/span><\/i>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

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Metadata<\/strong><\/p>\n

Metadata is data that describes or contextualizes other data or files.<\/span><\/p>\n

For example:<\/span><\/p>\n