The Washington Post's The Most is a superb combination of well-designed sponsored content pieces and aggregated stories from other select publishers, in the same vein as the FT's Antenna. The UX, in particular, is genius: By organizing photos and numbered headlines in demarcated boxes under major name brand publishers, a lot of information is easily browsed. The contextually designed and written sponsorship box feels right at home on the page. The Most is an intriguing portal that invites further investigation into the larger site.
Overall: 6.83
Revenue Potential: 6
The Washington Post has opted to monetize The Most mainly through native ads, and the results are positive. Instead of being confronted by banners when logging on, users are instead met with the occasional ad in place of story, barely discernible from the rest of the content.
Value to Brand: 7
While others chase page views and click rates, The Most would rather get readers the stories they'll find compelling, even at the expense of their own website's ranking. The Post's willingness to get their readers coverage of the top stories, even if it comes from another outlet, should do quite a bit in gaining the newspaper giant a lot of goodwill.
User Experience: 9
As stated above, this product's strength is in UX. Easy to navigate and a perfect feeder for the general website, The Most gives both users and the publisher a lot of value. Strong design makes short work of organizing headlines, sponsorship and navigation into an inviting platform. When a user clicks on a story, the page opens a new tab instead of redirecting. This promotes the graze-style, and also keeps users on the website, despite linking to news stories from outside sources.
Published by The Washington Post
The Most