World Editors Forum 11: Session Paywalls, Bill Mitchell, Dirk Nolde, Matúš Kostolný, Jim Roberts

18th WORLD EDITORS FORUM Session: Paywalls, from the newsroom perspective Speakers: Bill Mitchell, Dirk Nolde, Matúš Kostolný, Jim Roberts Mark your calendar64th WORLD NEWSPAPER CONGRESS19th WORLD EDITORS FORUM Vienna, Reed Messe Wien www.wan-ifra.org/kiev2012

Paywalls from the newsroom perspective WAN-IFRA-WEF 2011 Vienna, Austria | October 15, 2011Bill Mitchell, The Poynter Institute, @bmitch Dirk Nolde, Berliner Morgenpost, @BMOnline Matúš Kostolný, SME.sk, @denniksmeJim Roberts, The New York Times, @nytjim

What we’ll do this morning• Terms of the deals• Glimpses of how they work• Results so far• Lessons learned• Questions, comments, suggestions from the audience

But ﬁrst, some history from WAN ‘94

Current writing on the (pay) wall1. Old debate: reach vs. revenue -- New era: reach and revenue2. Crucial to engage the social web as well as the paid web3. Paid content having more positive impact on newsroom attitudes than expected4. Flexibility is key

Focus on best customersTwo different approaches: Reward them by providing freedigital access to all printsubscribers Rely on them by charging a smallextra fee for digital access  80 Percent of 130 Press+ Publishers charge print subscribers an extra fee for digital  Interestingly, those publishers get better results in selling digital-only

Dirk Nolde, managing editor for digital,

Terms & circumstances of Paid: Paywall erected December 2009 Free for print subscribers(80,000) €4.90 @ month for non-subscribers Behind the wall: local & sportsnews Morgenpost.de the only paid site

Some results so far: 11,000 digital subscribers (includesprint subscribers who register forfree digital) December 2009: 2,4 million visits September 2010: 3,3 million visits September 2011: 5,1 million visits Increased incentive for qualitycontent

Matúš Kostolný, editor-in-chief SME.sk | @denniksme

 Paywall erected on 9 Slovak sites May2011 €2.90 @ month/€29 @ year Free for print subscribers Behind the wall: opinion, politicalnews, etc. Wall removed for big stories (like thisweek)

Outside the wall this week

Some results so far: Revenue shared proportionately (€40,000 in ﬁrst month for all 9sites) Improves quality of onlinecomments Overall traffic increase (5%) but20% drop for locked sections likeopinion

Jim Roberts, assistant managing editor

Terms & circumstances of paid: Metered (leaky) wall erected March 2011 Still free: links from search, social web;ﬁrst 20 articles each month Free for print subscribers; others pay$35 @ mo Digital is $5 cheaper ($30) forsubscribers who agree to take Sundayprint edition

Outside the wall

Some results so far: 1 million digital users, including281,000 digital-only Uptick in print subscriptions Slight dip in page views; modestincrease in unique visitorsAttitude shift in the newsroom

Lessons LearnedQuestions, comments, suggestions

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World Editors Forum 11: Session Paywalls, Bill Mitchell, Dirk Nolde, Matúš Kostolný, Jim Roberts

by WAN-IFRA on Oct 15, 2011

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World Editors Forum 11: Session Paywalls, Bill Mitchell, Dirk Nolde, Matúš Kostolný, Jim Roberts — Presentation Transcript