The Washington Post News Group
Challenge: Today’s consumers need instant and constant information. The Washington Post and its sister companies – Newsweek, Slate, and Express, needed a channel to push out news and to find new ways to keep their readers engaged.
Solution: As part of a comprehensive mobile strategy, we built The Washington Post a suite of Alerting applications that enables them to deliver timely content to their subscribers. From National and Local Breaking News Alerts, to Political Updates, late breaking Sports News and even Premium Alerts, the Rip Road’s interactive Brand platform allows The Washington Post to stay connected to their readers – whenever new news becomes available.
Rip Road’s client friendly messaging web interface allows the Washington Post editors to write and send Alerts, while a custom developed RSS Digestor application and XML handlers allows the technology team at Newsweek to automatically generate and schedule SMS messages to their readers.
We also developed an interactive SMS search application exclusively for washingtonpost.com, that taps into the City Guide database and enables users to find local destinations and events of interest – local restaurants, museums, stores, movies and much more. When combined with washingtonpost.com’s insightful reviews and recommendations, the Search application has become a powerful digital revenue generator for washingtonpost.com.
And, we created a SMS Coupon platform that enables washingtonpost.com to provide local D.C. area coupons to be delivered right to a reader’s mobile phone. This platform is constantly updated via XML to ensure that the latest coupons are served up to readers.
Rip Road has managed this mobile solution from start to finish, providing technical support and customer care, while ensuring prompt message delivery and a seamless consumer experience.
