The publishers are hoping to quadruple their online traffic as a result of sharing over 200,000 new web pages of searchable content, which replicate their printed archives.
Netcopy has developed the archive site on behalf of the Catholic Herald. Every page has been scanned and digitised, each article tagged and extracted, so that readers can search the whole archive online by content, keyword, topic, location, and date
Andy Leisinger, MD at the Catholic Herald, said: “We anticipate this archive launch will bring a significant increase in new readers now it is all indexed and optimised for Google. It’s going to be really easy for those who don’t usually read the newspaper to access a vast Catholic resource just by Google-searching. We have already attracted a number of historians, academics, genealogists and general public inquiries just by word of mouth while the site was in development stage. There is every indication that we will be swamped by US interest, too. We aim to quadruple web traffic within a year of today’s launch.”
John Hazell, one of the founders of Netcopy, said: “This is a great way to make specialist media such as the Catholic Herald instantly available to a wider audience and to the next generation of readers and significantly improve their SEO in the process. We are confident that the Catholic Herald will achieve their web traffic target as a result of this new digital content.”
The newly digitised archive includes seventy-seven years of content and is accessed on the Catholic Herald’s navigation bar. For launch the archive can be accessed at no cost, and there will always be some content available free. However, following the launch period, full access will be restricted to subscribers of either the magazine, or the website.
About Netcopy
Netcopy says: “Netcopy was founded by John Hazell and Jason Nicklin. By delivering digitised archives, Netcopy can help publishing companies to increase visitor numbers to their website, generate new revenue sources and preserve valuable archives in a useable way. Digitising archives also has an enormous impact on Search Engine visibility and ranking.”
