The trends and evolution of monetization strategies in the world of news publication and digital media. We looked at several early adopters in this space and how they adapted to the market situation. Most importantly we have tried to look at some of the evolving needs and trends in this space that will help you understand what lies ahead.

1. Trends in Digital Media Industry

2. Newspaper Industry Gradually moving to Paywalls
450 of the 1,380 daily papers
have or are in the process of
adopting pay plans – Pew
Research Center*
• Source : http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2013/04/09/pay-walls-could-be-prints-salvation-online
• Image Source: WSJ Website

3. Are paywalls are a recent trend?
THINK Again…
WSJ DID IT in 1997!
Paywall & Pricing Experiments
• Image Source: WSJ Website

4. Early Adopters of Paywall
Current Status (March
2013)
“Metered digital subscription
model,” First 20 articles or
multimedia features on the site are
free. Anyone who wants to read
more will have to
subscribe, although access to the
home page of the site, or to links
discovered through social
media, will remain free*
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323
415304578368682003629320.html
$50/year
for access
to WSJ.com
January
1997
> 200,000
online
subscribers
April
1998
Celebrates
its millionth
online
subscriber
May
2007
2001
•Started charging for
content
2007
•Adopted a "metered
model" with 10 free
articles without registering
2010
•Dropped Free access. Free
access available after registering
on a metered monthly basis
Wall Street Journal
Financial Times
http://theweek.com/article/index/205465/the-medias-risky-paywall-experiment-a-timeline/

5. The curious case of Financial Times
Superior content quality offered at a much
higher subscription package!
"We would see the sort of articles
they were reading & the frequency
they were reading those articles
and began to map those”
-John Ridding, CEO, Financial Times
• Avg daily readership, only a
little less than WSJ2.1 m
• More expensive than WSJ’s
subscription model25%
• Registrants enter their e-
mail, zip code, industry, job
responsibility & position level
5m

6. Popularity of Soft Paywall - Metered Model
FREE
10 articles/month
$15
4 week website
subscription March 2011
136%
Digital
Circulations
Q1-Q2 2012 –
NYT BLOG
* Image Source: New York Times site

7. Group Subscription
Applicable for organizations with more than 50 employees
“All access” digital subscriptions across tablets and smartphones
Rates determined by the number of individuals an organization adds
* Image Source: New York Times site
*

8. Economist Decoy Pricing Experiment
Decoy package
Print subscription price = Print &
web subscription = $125
Led to people reading print content
and accessing web content for the
interactive media
Helped get ad revenues from both
print and web channels
Source: http://conversionxl.com/pricing-experiments-you-might-not-know-but-can-learn-from/

9. Popularity of Soft Paywall - Metered Model
*Source: http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/b5897574-95eb-11e0-ba20-00144feab49a.html#ixzz2PrqvHvjF
Logos used from the Website of the newspapers
Monthly Unique Visitors

10. Combining HARD & SOFT paywall
Have two versions of the same
article – one free and one paid
This change should be seen as "two
different sites for two different kinds of
reader – some understand [that]
journalism needs to be funded and paid
for. Other people just won't pay. We
have a site for them.“ - Boston Globe
editor Martin Baron
* Audit Bureau of Circulations http://www.bostonglobe.com/business/2012/10/30/the-boston-globe-circulation-rises-nearly-percent-herald-falls-nearly-percent/OSqacPxh1L0kQycUnBP1oM/story.html
Boston
Globe 2011
Boston Globe
Premium in depth
content
Boston.com
Breaking news, Briefs
In Daily Circulation 1st time
since 2004 during 6-month period
ending Sep 2012*

11. Implication for Niche players
Source: www.davidlafontaine.com/case-studies/final-pdf-paid-content.pdf
Niche Sites With Paywall
• Narrowly Defined, High –Value, Exclusive Content
• Intensely Interested Target Audience
Willing Paying Customers

12. Who do you think did well in Subscription Arena -
Smaller Niche Players or the Larger General Interest Magazines?
-2.10%
2.20%
1.10%
3%
0.60%
-3.50%
The
Atlantic
The Week The New
Yorker
The
Economist
Time Newsweek
Percentage Change of Subscriptions Circulations 2010-11
Smaller Niche Players
Larger General Interest Magazines
• The smaller publications did better
than the traditional market leaders in
selling base subscriptions
• The Economist enjoyed the highest
annual gain, at 3%
Source: Audit Bureau of Circulations, FAS-FAX report for consumer Magazines
PEW Research Center’s Project for Excellence in Journalism 2012 State of News Media

13. But Paywalls are not a Universal Success
$19.95
*annual
subscription fee
1996
1.4l
*number of
monthly readers
1998
Sluggish
Growth
Drops
paywall
1999
1998
• $25 annual subscription
fee
2001
• $30 annual fee for
‘Salon premium’
with no ads
2002
• Non-paying readers
can access articles
after a commercial
2009
• Abandons its
subscription model
Salon
Microsoft’s Slate

14. $4.95
*online
subscription/ month
2003
97%
- Drop in
readership
- Paywall
dropped
2005
The Los Angeles Times
$260
*annual
subscription fee
2009
35
*subscriber base
2010
Offers
package
based
subscription
model
2013
Long Island-based newspaper Newsday
Source: http://theweek.com/article/index/205465/the-medias-risky-paywall-experiment-a-timeline/
http://observer.com/2010/01/after-three-months-only-35-subscriptions-for-inewsdayis-web-site/
http://data.newsday.com/services/onlineaccess/

15. New York Times ends Times Select
subscription service in Sep 2007
40% jump in site traffic after the pay wall
came down – Nielsen
Solution: Free access to some articles +
access to the first few paragraphs of paid
articles
30% of traffic to newspaper Web sites comes from search engines -NAA
Google ‘s "first click free" (running since 2008)
allows users to find and read articles behind a paywall
The reader's first click to the content is free, and the
number after that would be set by the content
provider
All content
behind paywall
Exclusion from
search results
Reduces Traffic
to website

16. Disrupters to watch out for…
News Aggregators & News blogs:
One-stop Content channels
Google
news
Social Magazines
Zite
Pulse
Livestand
Flipboard
N
E
W
S
A
G
G
R
E
G
A
T
O
S
The
Huffington
Post
28m
*page views/ day
11m
*avg unique
visitors/month
30m*avg
installations/month
N
E
W
S
B
L
O
G
S
46m
*avg unique
visitors/month
Mashable20m
*avg unique
visitors/month
Reddit

17. Articles on
entrepreneurship, biology, finance, ant
hropology, political science & literature
The best things from traditional
publishing combined with the best
parts from Internet
Publish Articles by Experts
Quality material on blogging, web
development, design & technology
Authors can make money & gain
popularity by writing/reviewing
articles
Crowd sourcing-Pay per article published

18. http://www.chargebee.com
Subscription Billing. Simplified.
Reserve your free sandbox today!