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Millennials at Elite Daily: “At age 24 I was nicknamed grandpa”

Digiday called them “the most formidable millennial whisperer of the bunch” For Greg Dybec, Managing Editor, Elite Daily, this would not be possible if the company itself was not run by millennials. He joined us at DME15 in London.

by WAN-IFRA Staff executivenews@wan-ifra.org | April 21, 2015

To qualify as a millennial you need to be between 18 and 34 years of age. And according to the statistics, Elite Daily is reaching this group better than any other media player – with an impressive 71.3% millennial reader composition, just ahead of Vice and then Buzzfeed.

In a fascinating development for a site founded by six men, the audience is now 70% female.

In just three years from 2012 they’ve grown from zero to 74 million monthly uniques. DMG Media liked it so much they bought the company.

For Dybec, their ability to empathise with their audience is a core advantage “Everyone at Elite is a millennial – but despite the regular happy hours, I promise you we still get work done”. That means 80 employees, all under 35. In fact there is not even anyone over 30.

Growing up with their readers

When it started they had “zero experience” but they knew wanted digestable and easy to consume news. And they have grown along with their audience.

It might seem obvious, but Dybec says many forget that “millennials don’t fit under one umbrella.” They follow the diversity and look for approaches to content dev and distirbution that with click better with millennial viewing habits.

The secret sauce: Conversational content that can be consumed rapidly and on the go, and allows readers to form their own opinions (own and share)

“This authentic approach has enabled us to grow rapidly and retain our readers”

Go Narrow to Go Wide

What does diversity mean in practice? At Elite Daily, first they separate informational from identity-based content. Then that identity-based content takes a hyper focus on, for example, ‘night-owls’ or people who wear glasses. In other words, groups that users can identify with.

What happens  in 10 years? Will you fire yourself?

Dybec asks himself the question everyday. For sure he is seeing longer form articles are becoming more popular. And the topics are changing – you know what, “millennials are maybe even getting married”.

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