Peter Kirwan Paywall Strategies 2011

Paywalls: an update

Peter Kirwan

Six paid content models

• Total lockdown• Metered• Freemium• Time-limited• Site licensing• Pay-per-view

News International

• The most aggressive paywall experiment:– Times/Sunday Times: July 2010– NoTW: October 2010– Marketing costs?– Traffic reduction?– Social interaction?– Unique ad sales challenge• The “newsletter” challenge: deep & focused

– Eight months on, there is (still) no Plan B.

News International: Metrics

• News statement: November 2010– After four months. . .– 100,000 print subs activate web access– 105,000 “paid-for customer sales”• c.50,000 “monthly subscribers”

– Web subs, iPad & Kindle

• “Many of the rest”– “Single digital copy” or PAYG web subscribers

Times/Sunday Times: “Unofficial” Metrics

• Online: 54% w/ household income over £50K• iPad: 60% with household income over £100K• Multichannel sub reach: up by 40% (July-Nov)• App frequency: 74% of subs daily or more• Web frequency (per user): x6– Times Online: One visit per fortnight– New sites: 3 visits per week

News International: Metrics

• GNM’s leaked analysis (for September 2010)– 54,000 users/month behind the wall– 28,000 = print subscribers– 26,000 = “specifically paying for digital content”– Many digital-only subscribers ex-UK (13,000)– UK audience demo bias: Male, 45+, south-east– News junkies (more likely to visit other news sites

than non-subscribers)

Data from Experian Hitwise

The end of Times Online: reactions

Non-Times readers

Times readers

1%

14%

58%

51%

41%

35%

Subscribed in some form Stopped using Used other free sites

Source: O&O, November 2012 (2,737 respondents)

News International: Metrics

• Times/Sunday Times: Home page traffic– UK uniques, December 2010: 1.22m– UK uniques, January 2011: 1.61m– For comparison: Telegraph = 4.3m (Jan 2011)

• Conversion rate (January data):– At 0.6% = 9,660 new web subscribers per month

Source: UKOM/Nielsen, January 2011

Social marketing

Social marketing

Caitlin Moran on Twitter: 66,000 followersTimes/Sunday Times: 250,000* digital subscribers (all platforms)

* = estimate (mine)

Ad agencies: “My overall experience of dealing with this publisher is good”

Spring 09 Autumn 09 Spring 10 Autumn 100

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

News IntlGuardianTelegraphBest in class

Source: IPA Digital Media Owners Image Survey, 2009-2010

News International: Known unknowns

• Those “disappointing” sign-up figures– Opaque: over-interpreted?– What’s your yardstick? Millions? Thousands?

• Home page traffic: strong & rising– @0.6% conversion rate = 116K web subs/year– If all purely digital = £12m/year– Minus churn, plus renewals– Sky-News bundling to come?– Ad revenue: the great unknown

News from elsewhere

• Telegraph.co.uk– Paid content site launch, September 2011– Metered, with “very generous” allowances– Big print subscription base = 325K (52% of circ)• Huge store of demographic information

– Well-regarded online sales team– Competition double-edged for News:• Reinforce idea of paying for content• Competition for similar eyeballs

Free-to-air: Mail Online

• Mail Online: 54m uniques per month (ABCe)– Two-thirds ex-UK– Clear editorial strategy• Los Angeles bureau• World’s 2nd largest English-speaking “news” site• India? BRICS?

– Reliance on ad networks in US

Free-to-air: Mail Online

• DMGT: B2B = growth• Executive enthusiasm but. . .• Board-level commitment?• Question: how will DMGT handle investment?– Risk of spreading resources too thinly– Shareholder response to new capital allocation

Free-to-air: The Guardian

• GNM: £40m digital revenues budgeted 2011– ?£5m = non-advertising– Strong online display recovery

• Paid content at Kings Place?– Mr Marx’s cash cushion: vs. cyclical online display mkt– International ambitions (US, Latin America. . .)– Online display: 5-10 years of 10%+ YOY growth– So: take the paywall money?– Or intensify free-to-air investment?

Not your dad’s idea of paid content

Models Platforms Frequency

Lockdown (News) Google One Pass/FCF Single copy & sub

Freemium (FT, Telegraph) Press + (Journalism Online) Per day/week/month/year

Free (Guardian, Mail, Indy) Skiff (News Corp)? Per article: micropayments

App-based paid content App Stores Metering (Google: FCF)

In the wake of dot.com crash, UK nationals experimented with online paid content.

Crosswords, archives, bingo. . . but rarely the core product.

This is different.

+ contextual differences

• 48% of 82 European national papers offering paid online content (2007)

• B2B: fall of classified & rise of data/workflow approaches

• In consumer, some investment in value-added (Telegraph+?)

• Online display can underwrite digital future for some, but not all. . .

Peter Kirwan

@[email protected]