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In any communications plan, there’s room for both print and digital channels. But that doesn’t mean it’s always easy to tell which one is right for every project. Wondering what to choose for your content? Take a look at our quick breakdown of the main advantages and weaknesses for print vs digital formats.
Sometimes, you need things done fast. Whether you’re whipping up a quick flyer or racing the clock on a complex publication, time is a key factor. However, printing your content requires hours at best and even up to several weeks. And that’s without counting how long it can take to distribute printed materials by post or by hand! Compare those hours and weeks with under a minute to upload your file to a digital publishing platform like Calaméo. The result is a clear advantage for digital.
WINNER: DIGITAL
Like speed, the cost of different formats varies depending on which materials are needed. For print content, the cost of paper and ink adds up quickly. On the other hand, many digital channels are free or low cost. For example, you can create and share unlimited digital publications on Calaméo for absolutely no charge.
WINNER: DIGITAL
When it comes to signaling that your content is important, choosing print vs digital has a big impact. Because of the higher costs and time required, printed materials represent a greater investment than digital communciations. Plus, elements like high-quality paper, embossing and binding reflect the value of your message in a way that is hard to translate to online channels. Today, print takes the edge in prestige.
WINNER: PRINT
The toughest match-up on this list. Print and digital content provide very distinct experiences. Online formats are dynamic, interactive and shareable; printed formats are tactile, immersive and collectible. Given the amazing range of digital experiences and print innovations, we have to say that both channels are champions here.
WINNER: TIE
Before the Internet age, it was difficult to measure how many people saw or engaged with communications. Newspapers and magazines described their reach in terms of circulation, while businesses kept track of how many messages they sent. Thanks to online media formats, detailed statistics help you understand how audiences view and interact with your content. A major digital benefit!
WINNER: DIGITAL
Let’s go to the numbers on this one:
In general, print communications have a much longer lifetime than digital content. Of course, some printed material only lasts a day, while some tweets have been archived to live forever. But the ability to update and delete digital publications makes them less durable than print.
WINNER: PRINT
Finally, consider the sustainability of print vs digital content. Although you might think that online is obviously the greener choice, remember that even sending a single email has an environmental impact. So to get serious about eco-friendly communciations, it’s useful to review the entire process from creation to distribution. In most cases, digital will offer more sustainability overall.
WINNER: DIGITAL
Digital!
As our head-to-head shows, digital options have a lot of advantages for your content strategy. However, the real takeaway is that print and digital can complement each other perfectly in a balanced communications plan.
Do you know the term “dark social”? Although a lot has changed about social media since the idea was first described in 2012, dark social sharing is as important as ever. In fact, this type of sharing might be even more key to understanding your content’s success today. Read on to learn why dark social matters in 2021 and how to track it for your digital publications on Calaméo.
All the way back in 2012, people were beginning to wonder how much content was being shared to social media networks. Or how much content was being shared in other ways. Because networks like Facebook and Twitter were growing fast, share buttons popped up all around the web to make reposting to your own feed easy—and trackable.
But while the number of shares ticked up, this new behavior couldn’t be the only way users were passing along videos, publications and posts. Despite the buzz around social feeds, research showed that plenty of people were sharing in a simple way: copying and pasting the content’s URL into email and messages. Unlike regular social shares, this kind of social activity wasn’t tracked.
As a result, it was easy to miss dark social sharing’s value. However, over the past several years sharing to social media platforms has declined. There are several reasons to explain this trend, including algorithm changes, rising interest in digital privacy and concerns about how information spreads online. Since more than a third of businesses say that “social shares” are a goal for their content, these harder-to-see forms of social sharing must be taken into account.
💡 TIP: Not sure whether social shares are a priority for your publications? Our quick checklist will help you brush up on your digital publishing strategy in no time.
So, how should you track the “dark social” sharing of your content? When it comes to your digital publications, Calaméo’s advanced statistics are a great place to start. That’s because our publication viewer’s own share button was designed with lots of different uses in mind. Take a closer look and you’ll see some options beyond the usual social networks.
Even better, the Shares section of your Calaméo statistics will show you just how many times your publication was emailed, embedded or its URL copied. And the results might surprise you. For example, we were checking the stats for our most recent issue of CALAMEO Magazine and noticed this breakdown:
To access your publications’ Shares data, go to the Statistics section of your Calaméo account. Click on the “Shares” tab and scroll down to find the full statistics.
Also, be sure to note that these numbers only reflect “dark social” shares coming from inside the publication viewer. You can almost certainly be sure that other readers have, for instance, copied and pasted the publication URL directly from their browsers to share with their networks. Or to put it another way, public social shares may only be telling you a small part of the story.
💡 TIP: To keep digging deeper into the impact of dark social sharing for your content, consider using tracked links and Google Analytics to reveal more data.
In short, social media metrics don’t give you the whole picture when you want to measure how your content is shared online. If you’d like to start looking at complete Shares statistics for your publications on Calaméo, request your free, two-week PLATINUM demo today.
