January is a month of pulling themselves together after the long-lasting holiday season. Along with some familiar faces doing it, we are also bringing Sergey and Artur onto the product team. Doubling down on whatever needs to be doubled down.

Here is a list of recent changes since the start of the new year:

• The order changes:

  • You can now use Markdown in chat messages. Also, standard links are not recognized as clickable links in the chat.

• The client dashboard has been updated with the next things:

  • Added SSO to connect our feedback portal, so there is no longer a need to log in separately to provide feedback or vote on our roadmap

  • Links to placements if available already are now directly accessible from the campaign board. Simply hover over an order to check

  • After creating a new campaign or a project, we redirect straight into it so work can begin immediately.

• The fixes to the marketplace:

  • Some gaps between elements in the filters menu were inconsistent, but they have now been corrected

  • The ranges for some SEO metrics were reviewed on the format page and corrected when their health was shown wrongly

  • Traffic breakdown now has a proper empty state when data is not available, preventing confusion about whether it is a bug.

• The authorization flow updates:

  • Due to recent updates, the location selection on the onboarding questionnaire was not displayed. This issue has been fixed.

  • When Medialister was closed for a while, using a link to a specific order or a bookmarks folder would redirect to the dashboard instead of the intended link. This issue has now been fixed, and it works as expected.

We are also going to great lengths to finally open the media manager dashboard to the public in the next month. Publishers, stay tuned!

Inside Medialister

Here is a flow. A first one released a bunch of fixes. A second one made it possible to filter by more criteria. The third one pushed a few interface updates. Meanwhile, the marketers do their best to sell it. A product manager aligns everyone around market, client, and other product-related specifics. Month by month, it becomes more of a habit. In about a year, it starts to become the status quo.

In January, we decided to restart our collaboration with internal hackathons, bringing everyone into one room to work together. The first shot was an experiment for us. We wondered what would happen if a client wanted to view a placement with their content before making a booking. It turns out we can make it live using a browser extension. As a more practical use case, we also demonstrate the extension's ability to secure a placement on a particular website using Medialister. Although we are not yet ready to provide it publicly, you can get an impression from our landing page.

🎅 Christmas is coming, and we are reaching a point where we can confidently say that the product is in a quite decent shape after the initial release. After a few months of thorough testing and refinement, we have fixed over one hundred bugs (117 to be precise), made dozens of small improvements, and added a few significant new features.

The last updates for this year:

• The marketplace releases:

  • Sharing saved views and bookmark folders is less intimidating for recipients as the link is now a shortlink instead of a long, complex URL.

  • Half of our applied filters were not displayed as such in the marketplace header, but now they are. This includes cases for metrics and pricing when only one side of the range is indicated ("Up to..." or "From..."). We have also added icons for each filter to improve recognizability.

  • In the marketplace table, some format names did not fit on one line, visually breaking the rows. This issue has now been fixed.

  • Fixed the issue where adding 999+ media items to a bookmark folder caused the layout to break visually in the bookmarks menu.

  • We strive to create an app-like experience in our tool. Previously, when you set filters and columns in the marketplace, they remained in place as you navigated between pages. For example, you could check on an order in the campaign and then return to the marketplace to find your filters intact, without being reset. From now on, the marketplace will also keep your selected media intact.

• The checkout fixes:

  • We fixed the bug on the checkout page where the tooltip about insufficient funds appeared over the "Book" button, even though it was not accurate.

• The order updates:

  • We've added explanation tooltips for the editing tool in the content editor

  • In the chat, you can now send messages by pressing Enter

Newly added features:

• Daniil has enabled media recommendations based on the geolocations a user has selected during the registration

• The recommendation algorithm also considers the currently selected campaign goal:

  • For the goal "Link Building for SEO," the marketplace prioritizes placements formats with dofollow links and permanent placements.

  • If the goal is "To Attract Traffic to Drive Sales", it shows higher formats with both dofollow and nofollow links, targeting an audience of over 10,000 visits per month

  • If the goal is "To Build Brand Awareness", the marketplace considers formats with a total monthly audience of over 10,000 and native placements to be more relevant.

Delivered fixes and small improvements:

• In the client dashboard:

  • New projects are now called "My Project" by default instead of "FirstDefault Project," which had a missing space also

  • Pavel has corrected the incorrect copy in the activities for the project creation. It now accurately states that someone has created a specific project in an organization.

  • Now, when a user is removed from a project, they are correctly redirected to either another available project within the organization or to a newly created organization where they can start fresh with new projects and campaigns.

  • Members will receive an email notification when they are removed from a project

• The order changes:

  • Rodion has added a button to remove links in the content editor

  • In the requesting changes popup, the "Do Nothing" button did nothing (pun intended). Now, it closes the popup without any other actions.

  • Yerkebulan has removed the text regarding the review process from all order statuses, except for those in the TO PUBLISH or TO MAKE CHANGES columns.

  • He has also made the changes requesting more seamless. Now, if the placement link is obtained from media and a user sends a message to the chat, a popup will appear asking if there were any changes requested in the messages, prompting a change in the order status. Users can still click "Request Changes" as usual of course.

  • Members with the viewer role can no longer cancel orders from the changed conditions state.

• The authentication flow fixes:

  • Rodion has fixed the LinkedIn authorization that had not been working for some time

• The marketplace changes:

  • Yerkebulan has redesigned the UX for applied filters. Now, if there isn't enough space to display them all, the dropdown is shown for easy access to them without sacrificing working space by stacking applied filters in multiple lines as it was before.

  • The search icon is now clickable. Previously, the only way to start searching was through the invisible input on the right side.

  • Recommendations in the cart are no longer placeholders; they are fully functional and reflect the marketplace recommendations.

  • Some media had the suffixes "_1," "_2," etc., in their names. This has now been fixed.

  • The new metric, Organic Traffic by Ahrefs, was added for displaying, sorting, and filtering.

  • The saved views now show the correct number of media items beneath them.

  • The applied filters for Local Coverage are now displayed as proper country and region names instead of IDs.

  • Fixed an issue with the "Without..." filters, which were displaying the opposite results and functioning as "With...".

  • The number displaying the total results in the marketplace may get stuck at zero after the page refresh, but this issue has been fixed.

• The checkout flow fixes:

  • The top-ups were indefinitely marked as "In Progress," even though they successfully went through. This issue has been fixed

Freshly squeezed:

• Rodion has revamped the invitation modal window for better usability by removing unnecessary steps and adding explanations for the roles.

The pile of fixes:

• The client dashboard changes:

  • New members are now correctly redirected to the organization they were invited to

  • Now it's harder to miss when the conditions of a placement change in one of the orders, as we now mark such orders with a red attention state

  • We continue to face several issues with the revamped roles and access to various features. Pavel, Daniil, and Rodion are gradually addressing these problems.

  • The notifications counter is now displayed in the projects and campaigns menu, making it clear where you should focus your attention

  • If the price for a placement changes, we will prevent any surprises by showing you the new price with all fees included

  • If there is not enough money in the balance to accept the new price for the changed placement conditions, we will direct you to the top-up flow with the funds already set up for addition. All you need to do is click a button.

  • You cannot continue with a placement until you either accept the new conditions or decline them and choose another media. The choice is yours.

• The marketplace improvements:

  • The media in bookmarks can now be filtered

  • Yerkebulan has enabled sharing of bookmark folders and saved views through a link. Simply click the three-dot button and select "Share."

• The emails updates from Pavel:

  • The emails now come from "Medialister" instead of "no-reply", making them more distinguishable in inboxes

  • Fixed the bug when the order card in emails displayed the media name twice instead of the placement format

• Other miscellaneous changes:

  • The format date was changed everywhere from "12.11.2024" to "12. Nov 2024"

Inside Medialister

Medialister has emerged as a logical evolution of PRNEWS.IO. We have redesigned and rebuilt everything from scratch to ensure that the experience we provide matches the quality of the products we admire and were inspired by. This journey has not been short, and we have encountered many changes along the way. As a result, some parts of the product do not feel integrated; they seem like isolated features rather than cohesive elements. So, the so-called journey is far from over.

One example is projects, which is somewhat buried and difficult to access. However, this is where you invite your team. We see that some users struggle to find the invitation button or even realize that collaboration with their team is possible in Medialister.

We do not yet know how we will address this issue exactly, but we are determined not to leave it unresolved. Because we are building a product, not just a collection of features in isolation. The marketplace recommendations should align with your current campaign goals and should not simply be another page on app.medisliater.com. Perhaps you need links in already SEO-optimized articles published by others. You might even find that you don't need a marketplace right now and just want to make a bid to free yourself of the choices. Or you'd prefer to choose a bundle crafted for you. We can create five pages to accommodate all of that and put a sales person to tel you all about it. Or we can provide a seamless experience.

New stuff to check out:

• A small delivery from Yerkebulan now allows you to quickly copy your order ID by simply clicking on it. It can be useful when you communicate with our support to resolve any issues.

• Rodion made a significant effort to visually indicate that certain actions are not available for your role

• When you sign up with a password, we provide you with a helpful shortcut link to open Gmail and find our confirmation email more quickly

• The hyperlinks in your order content are now automatically set to the type specified in the conditions (dofollow, nofollow, sponsored). However, you can always change this in the hyperlink adding menu for a particular link if neded. Baked by Rodion.

• If conditions change after booking, Daniil and Yerkebulan has done so you will be notified and offered the choice to accept the new conditions or cancel the order entirely.

What was fixed and imroved:

• The client dashboard updates:

  • Rodion has disabled role changes for your current account, so only others can modify it according to this guide

  • The notifications counter for the campaigns is now updated correctly

• The order drawer changes:

  • Previously, you could cancel an order even if it was already in progress on the media side. Now, you can only cancel orders that are currently in progress on your side of work.

  • The chat in orders is more responsive and takes up all the remaining height of the order drawer

  • The chat is now scrollable, making the message input easier to access since it is no longer hidden beneath the messages

  • There was also an issue where long messages appeared formatted without proper syllable transfer

  • New messages are now indicated by a red dot

  • Some text appeared unformatted when copy and pasting it into the order editor

• Changes in the marketplace:

  • A change you couldn't prepare for: Yerkebulan has changed USD to $ everywhere

  • The filter "Audience by Countries" is now working properly and shows only the media where traffic from the selected countries exceeds 30% of the total

  • Sometimes, previous selections remained in the marketplace table, but this is no longer an issue.

  • In the emails about updates for saved views, the number of new media under your saved views is now calculated correctly, thanks to Pavel

• Meta tags, tracking pixels, and backdating were previously listed under "Accepted Topics" but have now been moved to the conditions block

• Some users may experience a 502 error, but they shouldn't anymore.

Inside Medialister

No better place than a changelog to confess our struggle to find the best metrics for PR activities done on Medialister by our clients. One of things we are exploring is measuring the attention. As a Product Lead, I oppose this metric as too vague to be a decisive factor and which even could be backlashed as baloney. Alexander, the founder, fights me pushing the points of its scientific grounding and no proper alternatives. It might be biased from any side, so as a good litmus test, we've agreed to check what the community thinks before adding it to the product.

For now, no harm in learning: https://medialister.com/blog/attention-is-a-critical-component-of-advertising-for-long-term-impact

Big issues are easy to notice, making them easy to get your hands on. Small and itty-bitty ones are another story. At a glance, some aspects may not seem important enough to take any efforts yet. Minor copy changes, pixel-to-pixel nuances, different states when you interact with elements, incosistent capitalizations, not matching border radii... Yet, when you do care about such seems-to-be trifles, someone else notices it. Then, another person. And a few others for it to have a compound effect. Eventually, everyone sees these elements woven into the core of the product and, subsequently, into the business.

New stuff was released during the last two weeks:

• New traffic sources on the format page: Email and Display Ads

• Examples of articles in the format pages will show you how your content will look.

All the recently fixed issues and small improvements to notice:

• Yerkebulan revamped the states for order cards. Now, it's clear which order is currently selected. The hover effect is more visually distinguishable, and there is a new red attention state.

• Changes in the marketplace filters:

  • Now you can choose different types of hyperlinks in Filters together

  • Filters Meta Tags, Tracking Pixel, Backdated were moved to Other Conditions

  • Some filters were renamed for clarity

  • The filters Unique Text and No Hyperlinks were removed as they were not relevant

  • Filters now expand more smoothly in the marketplace

• Changes on the format page:

  • Some media formats were previously impossible to open, but now they are fixed

  • The SEO metrics now include information on the last update

  • Sometimes, the format page displays a content limit of 99,999 symbols, which essentially means no limits. We now refer to this instead of that ridiculous number.

  • Some SEO metrics and conditions were underlined, suggesting that they have explanations in a tooltip. In reality, they do not. Now, only those with explanations are underlined.

  • Bounce rate is expressed as a percentage (e.g., 0.65 becomes 65%).

• The fixes to the authentication flows:

  • The login page now redirects users to the dashboard without refreshing the page

  • The authentication flow copy was revised to sound more natural

• The orders:

  • The order cancellation now includes a confirmation popup to prevent accidental actions

  • Now, requesting changes for a published article is a much smoother experience. Click "Request Changes," fill in the input with the specific changes you want, and send it back for review.

• Rodion and Pavel fixed the first article onboarding to respond properly to the events at each step

• Fixed the error that prevented editing a campaign

• The cart was resetting when refreshing the checkout page in the browser, but now it isn't

Don't stop to keep attention.

In Estonia, it's this season when it's rainy, +2°C at mornings, and so gray outside that all the photos looks b&w. This weather will continue until April, with a few rare exceptions. In some opinons, the best time to work.

Meanwhile, we have prepared some new updates:

• Daniil covers your needs with the new similar media block on the format page

• Bookmarks are now fully functionable

• Yerkebulan and Daniil introduce a new feature that allows you to cancel your orders. Simply click the three-dot button on an order to access this option.

• We have added a lot of new filters to the marketplace:

  • Accepted sensitive topics

  • Number of hyperlinks and their types

  • Extra features available by conditions, such as the ability to publish with images or provide a homepage announcement.

The batch of updates also has fixes and improvements as usual:

• Preventing the marketplace selection popup from staying on the page when nothing is actually selected in the table

• Switching between organizations is now smoother. Previously, some information from the previously opened organization remained in certain parts of the interface.

• Yerkebulan has ensured that the "Show Older Activities" button does not appear if there are, well, no older activities to display.

• Pavel has fixed the copy for some activities (oops, no one anticipated the situation where an activity states, "an order was moved from to another campaign")

• Now, every format provides more information on sensitive topics, indicating which ones are accepted by the media and which are not.

• Rodion did a lot of work behind the scenes. I’ll quote him since this is more in his area of expertise:

  Proper state management is here. This crucial change will enhance user-friendly navigation. For example, it will allow access to specific orders beyond current campaigns and organizations, and it should resolve quite a lot of state management bugs.

As usual, stay tuned! Be sure to not forget to take your vitamin D if necessary.

New additions out of the oven:

• Every order now features its own activity log

• Orders now also contain the conditions of the format

• Along with the visits chart, we now display the percentages of traffic channels and the geography of the total traffic

Fixes and improvements:

• Pavel has resolved an annoying issue where users received two consecutive emails about unsuccessful and successful bookings after making a reservation

• The campaign columns are now sorted with the most recently updated orders at the top

• The order card titles are now updated when you modify the order content, eliminating any confusion about whether they were saved

• The issue where a project that an already registered user was invited to was not visible has been fixed

• Daniil has completely revamped the top-up and booking processes to ensure they run smoothly for users

• Some media were mistakenly filtered out when users played out with filters such as visits and Semrush data.

• Automatic order approval sometimes occurred too early. Now, it always takes place 24 hours after receiving a link from the media.

• Rodion has resolved several issues with the order chat:

  • Now it updates in real-time, as it should.

  • The sender's name and avatar are now not too close to each other.

  • When switching between orders, the chat updates instead of showing the same messages as before.

• Yerkebulan made a quality-of-life improvement by removing unnecessary options from the turnaround time filter and adding a "Beyond 6 Days" option

• An error that occurred when deleting a saved view has also been fixed

• The marketplace table is not refreshing now after adding an item to the cart

• The navigation of the product is now much faster due to the removal of unnecessary requests behind the scenes.

Our marketing team has made the first big public move and launched Medialister on Product Hunt. Despite a good fight, due to an accident, we were not featured and did not receive any product-of-the-day badges (we'd definitely took it, believe me 😼). The same incident also led us to launch earlier, removing the gateway waitlist. So far, so good, and no regrets.

On the product side, there are a few new thing:

• The format page and the order now provides the conditions under which media accept and publish content

• The format page also now has the monthly visits chart

• We also added the turnaround time on this page, indicating the typical timeframes in which the media publishes content

• Email notifications for new messages in the order chats

• Your billing information is now securely stored for future top-ups and bookings, so you won't need to enter it repeatedly.

And a lot of quality-of-life fixes and improvements:

• The marketplace is loading much faster, thanks to Yerkebulan

• He also optimized the login and signup flows for the mobile devices

• Preventing the error "Unable to remove from the cart" when trying to rage-click the trash button

• When the balance is insufficient for a booking, we now clearly display the amount that will be deducted from the current balance and the additional amount required to top up, avoiding confusion

• Fixed the bug that caused the dashboard layout to break in rare cases after logging in

• Pavel fixed the messed up filter options and sorted them out in alphabetical order

• The fix is released for members with the viewer role when they could send orders for review

• The bug was fixed when a member's role was changed to a higher one, but their rights weren't updated properly. For example, when a user became a manager or an admin from a viewer role, they still couldn't perform any actions.

• The emails on order updates now show the article title and the media in which it is or will be published

• The columns for Semrush Rank and Semrush Traffic now actually display data (they were empty before)

• Rodion has added a touch of magic to the sliders, making them operate smoothly. Though, we are still debating internally the best way to make them as user-friendly as possible.

• The links in emails now aren't broken, kudos to Daniil

• He also did his best to fix the bug when bookings didn't come through when a balance top-up was required for it

• We released a hotfix to resolve the issue that prevented users from adding images to order content in the editor

• The publish date tooltip text was changed to emphasize that in some cases deadlines can be missed by media

That's it! Stay tuned and eat healthy!

Follow us on Product Hunt for future launches: https://www.producthunt.com/products/medialister

Tim is here 🤗

One year of development to finally start the Medialister journey. It kicked off with a team of one person juggling ideas, designs, and visions with Alexander, the founder. To date, it has grown into a pack of six committed and principled human beings behind the new vision. Committed to delivering. Principled to build best-in-class products for the actual people behind every business.

Having been in the industry for quite a lot, we've seen how marketers struggle to make communication with media straightforward, doing much more than they could in an ideal world while managing their activities. We've seen how media managers do all one can to survive. We've seen how horribly products for these people are made, bringing not relief but hurdles. We want to make a turning point today. We've built not just a new product. We have rebuilt the entire team and the processes within. All so we can make the world of paid media less miserable for both sides.

Our promise to our users is to continue juggling to keep the pace and discover the best ideas to enable people to work with paid media efficiently.

❤️ Thanks to Daniil, Rodion, Pavlo, Erkebulan, and Anastasiia for making it feasible!