With customers across the globe in the media and publishing sector, Brightspot brings decades of experience across thousands of projects and an even bigger number of breaking news events.
Whether it鈥檚 a sudden natural disaster, geopolitical conflict or a planned event with massive audience interest 鈥� the upcoming U.S. presidential election being the notable occasion on the horizon 鈥� news sites need to be ready to cover the story immediately and reliably. This means digital experiences that are primed to absorb huge and often unexpected upticks in viewership.
As we鈥檝e reported previously when covering the infrastructure needs of global sporting events like the soccer World Cup, no news is good news when it comes to servers and web pages being optimized to scale during times of peak audience interest.
But as we know 鈥� and have seen on multiple occasions during 2024 鈥� the news arrives fast and in unexpected ways.
Across Brightspot customers covering the news, including The Los Angeles Times, POLITICO and the Chicago Sun-Times, recent breaking news events have included the Trump/Biden debate, the attempted assassination of Donald Trump and Joe Biden鈥檚 unexpected withdrawal from the presidential race.
All this happened in the span of less than four weeks, and Brightspot dev-ops teams were tracking server loads that peaked at more than 400,000 requests per minute at an individual site level (and more than 700 million asset requests over a 24-hour period on the occasion of the Trump assassination attempt in June for one news customer).
Each implementation and instance of a news site will vary, and so do the challenges and remedies that need to be considered in order to be ready for that moment when the news goes from breaking to big.
With our years of experience supporting some of the biggest names in the business, here are eight general rules of operational excellence we follow in order to be ready for the unexpected. Along with breaking news, these same steps apply to events with high audience interest such as the Olympics, live golf events like the PGA Championship or this November鈥檚 U.S. presidential election.
1. Anticipate high-traffic surges with load testing
News sites should conduct load testing to simulate massive surges in traffic. The example of the news site recording surges of up to 413,000 requests per minute following the Trump assassination attempt shows the importance of tuning infrastructure to manage such spikes. Stress testing under a variety of conditions can reveal weaknesses that might only show up under real-world load.
2. Leverage caching for faster page loads
Caching is critical for reducing the load on servers during high-traffic events. News sites operating on Brightspot achieve cache hit rates upwards of 99%, significantly reducing server strain. Configuring longer Time-To-Live (TTL) for cached assets and pages allows more content to be served directly from cache, speeding up load times during critical moments. However, caching abilities must be balanced by a newsroom鈥檚 ability to see its latest content appear immediately. In the case of live blog updates, say, being able to 鈥渂reak the cache鈥� is a tool that is also core to serving the news.
3. Scale infrastructure resources in real time
Flexibility in resource scaling is essential for handling unpredictable spikes. News sites should ensure they have systems in place to dynamically allocate server resources. A strategic focus on infrastructure tuning can help news sites achieve 100% uptime during high-traffic events, mitigating the chances of an outage when these sites need to be fully operational.
4. Optimize for faster page load times
Slow load times can frustrate users and drive them away. One news site in the Brightspot stable saw page load times as low as 380 milliseconds during President Biden鈥檚 address announcing he was no longer seeking re-election, showing how vital speed is when all eyes are on the moment. Web optimization strategies such as compressing images, lazy-loading content and minimizing JavaScript can make a big difference in ensuring smooth user experiences during both high-traffic occasions as well as general day-to-day operations.
5. Enhance security to mitigate DDoS and malicious traffic
High-traffic events often attract malicious actors. Robust security strategies, including firewalls, DDoS protection and proactive monitoring, are essential. Applying firewall protection rules to manage traffic and enhance security is a good practice for mitigating potential threats.
6. Prepare for third-party service optimization
News sites often rely on third-party services for elements like ads or subscription handling. It鈥檚 crucial to ensure these services can handle the increased traffic load as well. Handling third-party traffic through a CDN (content delivery network) is an example of how offloading such services can improve performance.
7. Implement robust monitoring and real-time adjustments
Continuous monitoring of performance metrics allows for real-time adjustments. Tools like Pingdom provide insights into page load times, cache hit rates and overall server health. Setting up alerts and dashboards helps teams respond to performance issues as they arise.
8. Create a fail-safe plan for critical events
A fail-safe or contingency plan is necessary in case of outages. Outages can unfortunately occur. If that happens during a major news event, there鈥檚 a critical need for redundancy and fallback plans, such as rolling out reduced functionality or static content in the event of a server failure.
Media & Publishing: Brightspot CMS customer case studies
These strategies provide a solid framework for news sites preparing for high-traffic events, ensuring they can handle surges effectively without compromising user experience. Contact us today if you鈥檇 like to learn more about our approach and the ways Brightspot is built to support world-class news and media experiences.