Vox buys datascience start-up OpBandit to track readers better

Vox Media, the US digital publisher, has bought a data science start-up as it looks to track more closely how readers view, share and interact with content across the internet.

OpBandit tracks information about readers and their behaviour and uses it to determine the best content to show them on a publisher's site. Readers who come to a Vox story about US President Barack Obama through the site's homepage, for example, may see a different headline and picture than those who click through a link from Facebook or Twitter.

The acquisition comes as social media platforms such as Facebook and Pinterest are playing a significant but controversial role in getting stories in front of readers.

Facebook is in discussions with a number of publishers about hosting their content directly on its platform. The move has set off a debate in the industry over how much control of advertising revenue and data media outlets may hand over to the social network.

Vox did not disclose the purchase price of OpBandit, but the deal was made in cash and stock, a person familiar with the matter said.

"It allows us to be a much smarter publisher and to really understand our audience and how they are interacting with our content, not only on our own platform but also on other platforms," said Trei Brundrett, Vox's chief product officer.

Editors at Vox and the group's other sites, which include the food site Eater and tech-focused The Verge, will be able to see which elements make a story more likely to be engaged with in a variety of ways, from clicks to social shares to comments.

The ability to see and analyse data about readers across platforms has grown in importance as companies such as Vox and BuzzFeed move towards a model of distributing their content - and the advertising messages they create for big brands - more widely across the internet instead of relying exclusively on their own sites.

"If we are going to deliver our content elsewhere, we want to know who our audience is there [to] better serve them our own editorial content and the advertising as well," Mr Brundrett said.

OpBandit was founded in 2012 by Brian Muller, who previously led data science at LivingSocial, the online deals company, and Blaine Sheldon, who previously worked at Graham Holdings' Slate Group.

Vox's most recent funding round, which closed in December, raised $46.5m from General Atlantic, a New York investment firm, and valued the company at $380m.

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