"Audience development" has morphed from a fairly straightforward function - managing the circ file - into a complex, multichannel marketing discipline. From search optimization to brand building, audience development now spans a broad spectrum of activities. How do you make sense of it all? The following resources should help.

New roles, new challenges
The role of the audience development manager has expanded dramatically thanks to new distribution channels and new methods for syndicating content. But success really comes down to applying some good, old-fashioned consumer marketing principles. Find out how Hearst, PennWell and others are tackling the audience development challenge.

Using rewards and incentives to grow your audience
Some people buy their friends; the author submits that online publishers should buy their audience, or at least offer rewards and incentives to draw traffic to their websites—and build their databases while they're at it.

The five pillars of subscription management ROI
One of the key challenges to implementing a subscription management system is answering executive questions regarding the system’s costs and its payback. These systems can be expensive, but their benefits are usually worth it. Here are the different ways that you can build an ROI model that will satisfy your CFO, CEO and you company’s board of directors.

Three ways to easily capture audience data
Sometimes, you don't have time to implement complex user registration technology. Here are three ways to quickly get your user registration operations up and running using third-party services. 

SEARCH OPTIMIZATION

Four great, practical ideas for increasing search traffic
Here are four proven SEO tactics the author has collected from various trusted sources.

Can’t afford a consultant? How to teach yourself SEO
If you put in the time, you can learn a ton about SEO without paying a dime. Here’s a three-step plan.

5 reasons to become a search expert
How do you get editors to think more positively about search? Try speaking their language.

METRICS

Latest comScore controversy underscores a broken Web measurement model
comScore’s pricing model for its new hybrid-measurement service kicked up quite a tempest in the Web metrics space. But the bigger issue is that publishers are foolish to rely on the fuzzy math of Web measurement services to direct their online business strategies.

Want better CPMs? Improve your audience metrics
Better engagement metrics will help publishers improve the audience experience and enhance their ROI pitch to advertisers.

Emerging Web metrics focus on engagement, audience quality
The ability to create richer visitor profiles is the key to building (and monetizing) site traffic.　

SOCIAL MEDIA

4 key audience-development tools for Twitter
Variety's Director of Online Marketing offers his favorite tools for using Twitter for audience development.

How to use social media to source articles and engage readers
Social media services have given journalists new tools to discover hard-to-find sources and identify hot topics. Here’s a look at some strategies and tactics for understanding the people and topics within a given industry or beat.

CASE STUDIES

Interweave uses live events to unearth its brands’ ‘passionistas’
Enthusiasts love your brand, but passionistas go a step further – they’re willing to spend money on unique experiences related to your brand. How trade publisher Interweave is attracting this passionate customer base through events.

Health.com finds a healthy following on Twitter
Aggressive tweeting and cross-linking increased followers of Time Inc.'s health enthusiast site by 2,500% in three months. Will the bump in buzz translate to site growth?

Go niche or die?
If you were a leading destination site on the Web for your category, with more than 100 million page views a month and more than 1.5 million registered users, what would make you want to cannibalize your own business?

How Brooklyn Based built a 10,000-strong email readership
What started as a "bleemail" (half blog, half email) shared with friends has blossomed into a successful hyperlocal business. The Brooklyn Based newsletter's co-founder discusses the benefits of using relevant, targeted content to attract and retain an extremely engaged community.

ADDITIONAL WEB RESOURCES

Retention strategies for a tough economy
Renewals are more important than ever in the current economy, with publishers more focused on retaining profitable subscribers and minimizing acquisition costs. However, consumers’ cutbacks in discretionary spending and hyper-focus on getting the best deal have also made retention more challenging, even for magazines with long histories of strong renewal rates.

Building online communities by the numbers
Here's a set of guidelines to help your company build an active and effective online community.

How your CMS helps your SEO
A good Web CMS should automatically take care of much of your basic SEO responsibilities. However, many publishers are still saddled with legacy systems that necessitate manual SEO optimization as content is entered into the system. Here’s a quick primer on what your CMS does for you, and what you can be doing to make sure your content is optimized for search.