INSIGHT REPORT

PAYWALLS
FOR PUBLISHERS

Written by: Sponsored by:

Faisal Kalim

PAYWALLS FOR PUBLISHERS I

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PAYWALLS FOR PUBLISHERS

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Introduction
Can paywalls boost your revenue?
Yes. Here's how.
This guide aims to help publishers with their paywall strategies.
It shares examples and insights from innovative publishers and
experts across the world. We hope it will provide inspiration and
contribute to you strengthening your overall reader revenue
strategy.

PAYWALLS FOR PUBLISHERS

1 Why paywalls?

4 The different types of paywalls

10 Dynamic paywalls: Beyond the one-size-fits-all approach

15 Leveraging first-party data

17 Shifting the organizational mindset

20 What's next?

Faisal Kalim

A longstanding business journalist, Faisal rose to become

Editorial Manager of The CEO Magazine before turning his
attention to developments in media and digital publishing.
His specialised focus is on the latest revenue generation
strategies available to publishers.

@faisalkalim

PAYWALLS FOR PUBLISHERS III

WHY PAYWALLS?
PAYWALLS FOR PUBLISHERS 1
WHY PAYWALLS?

The future of publishing depends upon a diversified revenue "If the Covid
portfolio with direct reader revenue playing an increasingly vital
pandemic
role.
has taught us
The last eighteen months have also clearly shown that people anything it’s
are willing to pay for credible, useful and unique content that
that you need
they can’t find elsewhere. The pandemic drove up traffic and
subscriptions hugely2 despite many publishers removing paywalls more than one string to
from their coronavirus coverage3. your bow to survive as
Overall, the subscription economy has grown nearly 6x (more
a publisher."
than 435%) in the last 9 years4. Subscription-based publishing
Peter Houston, Author,
companies grew revenue by 16% in 2020 (globally).
6 Publishing Technologies That
Will Make A Difference To Your
Business1

PAYWALLS FOR PUBLISHERS 2

WHY PAYWALLS?

While the bump has since flattened, retention levels of

new subscribers are encouraging. More publishers are now
considering paywalling their content, but the promises of
paywalls are tempered by the fear of shutting out readers and ad
revenues.
Smaller publishers also worry about competing for readers’
wallets with global brands like the Times. However, research
shows that readers are willing to pay for local news and niche
content5 — areas which most publishers can improve upon.
Publishers also have deep questions about the different kinds of
paywalls being used across the industry. This guide sheds light on
what the options are, and how best to use them.
We delve into the different types of paywalls being used
successfully by various publishers all over the world, how they
work, and the next stage in their evolution.

The Subscription Economy Index (SEI), Zuora

PAYWALLS FOR PUBLISHERS 3

CONTENT ANALYTICS

TYPES OF PAYWALLS
PAYWALLS FOR PUBLISHERS 4
TYPES OF PAYWALLS

While there are a variety of paywalls in use they can be broadly "Subscription
classified into hard and soft paywalls.
is an act
Hard paywalls do not allow visitors to access content without of loyalty
subscribing. They can be a risky strategy and so are used by and readers
very few publishers. “Success with a hard paywall may be an
need some
uphill climb,” says Nalini Edwin, VP, Chartbeat, “as the majority
of prospective subscribers tend to bounce offsite when way of developing that
encountering an inflexible gate — and you’ll have to plan to loyalty and affinity for
cushion against possible financial repercussions, e.g. decreased a publication before
ad revenue.”6 they’re likely to pay."
“Softer solutions that allow some access to content are easier to
contemplate than the firm doorslam of the ‘pay-up or push-off’ Joshua Schwartz, CTO,
approach,” adds Houston. “But hard paywalls can work, and not Chartbeat7
just for giants like The Wall Street Journal or The Financial Times.”
Hard paywalls have worked for publishers who serve a niche and
dominate their market in that area or have a highly differentiated
product. The Economist, The Wall Street Journal, and Financial
Times are some publishers that have used hard paywalls
successfully.
While these are some of the world’s most reputed organizations,
The Information, a niche tech and business news site founded
in 2013, achieved profitability in three years8 with a hard paywall
despite a high subscription cost ($399). Its success serves to
underline how a mix of niche and unique, high-quality content
are the foundations of a successful hard paywall strategy.
“The upside to this approach is it requires every user to be logged "You become
in,” says tech and media journalist Simon Owens10, “so readers
can’t use various browser tricks to get around a meter. And when
a successful
done well, the hard paywall can squeeze out more revenue per subscription
reader, which means you don’t need to reach massive audience business not
scale before you start generating real revenue.” when you
put a paywall up; you
Key takeaway: become a successful
Hard paywalls can work if you have valuable content not subscription business
available elsewhere. These include niche topics, local news, when you have content
and deep investigative and opinion pieces. that’s worth paying for."

Jessica E. Lessin, Founder

Soft paywalls allow users to access some digital content based
& Editor-in-Chief, The
on conditions set by the publisher. Most of the commonly used Information9
paywalls fall under this category.
Metered paywalls are the most popular form of soft paywalls.
They let readers access a set number of articles for free before
requiring them to pay. Wired allows readers to consume four
articles a month for free before asking them to subscribe for
unlimited access.

PAYWALLS FOR PUBLISHERS 5

TYPES OF PAYWALLS

Using this strategy allows readers to experience the quality of "The metered
your content and may over time inspire them to sign up for a paid
model is less
subscription. Research done by American Press Institute’s Media
Insights Project found that 47% of new subscribers signup after disruptive
running out of free articles on a site they like and respect11. to casual
visitors and
Getting your readers to register and log in with their emails
to access free content is also important. It enables you to can convert 5-10%
understand them better by monitoring their onsite behavior and of the most engaged
you can make personalized content recommendations (on-site readers into paying
and via emails) based on their behavior. It will drive engagement digital subscribers."
and over time, increase their chances of subscribing.
GateHouse Media, which merged with Gannett, uses a “two-five Michael Yeon, VP Marketing,
meter” in its publications. Readers can consume two articles for Admiral15
free before being asked to register themselves to unlock three
more articles. The publisher has found that a registered user is
4x more likely to become a digital subscriber compared to an
anonymous one12.
“Too often, publishers view digital subscription through the lens
of free visitors versus paid subscribers, but this neglects the value
of free registered users,” writes Mary-Katharine Phillips13, former
Media Innovation Analyst, Twipe. “There is no greater indicator of
a reader’s interest to pay than volunteering their email address.”
A metered paywall works best for well-known brands that
produce a high volume of content, like The New York Times.
“When done well,” writes Owens14, “a metered paywall allows
publishers to generate reader revenue without forcing the outlet
to take a negative hit to its web traffic. That way it can continue
to monetize with ads.”
Many set the meter too high and as a result, lose out on potential
subscribers. The exact number of free stories depends on the
reading behavior of each publisher’s audience. “Publishers can
test the number of articles offered to optimize subscription
conversions for their audience,” adds Yeon. They need to “monitor
the behavior of their most engaged users and set a meter limit
which does not discourage casual visitors, but catches monthly
regular readers.”
Currently, publishers offer an average of 5 free articles per
month, down from 13 in 2012.

Key takeaway:
You can consider opting for a metered paywall if you
produce a high volume of content and are a well-known
brand in your target market. In short, it allows readers
to sample your content without hurting its value or ad
revenues.

PAYWALLS FOR PUBLISHERS 6

TYPES OF PAYWALLS

The other commonly used variations of soft paywalls include:

Freemium: Freemium models offer readers a mix of free and
premium content, in which editorial teams often curate the
articles that will appear behind a paywall. Some publishers find
it better than metered paywalls which treat all content equally
- a 500-word breaking news story is counted against the article
limit, as well as an in-depth investigative piece.
Gating the more valuable pieces, which happens in the freemium
model, makes better business sense. Most people subscribe to
get access to distinctive journalism16 they can’t get anywhere
else. The free content meanwhile, can help expose the brand to a
larger audience and generate ad revenue as well.
Business Insider uses this approach17 with its editorial leadership
team assessing whether a story goes behind the paywall or
is made freely available. “Where I struggle the most with the
metered approach,” Claudius Senst, former Head of Consumer
Subscriptions at Business Insider, tells Owens18, “is that if I read
three amazing, in-depth journalistic pieces and then hit a fourth
story that’s just a short snippet of an article, and on that story I
hit the paywall, I always feel betrayed as a user. I feel like ‘why is it
asking me to pay now?’”
A freemium paywall works best for brands with unique content,
helping to highlight the valuable content you produce. However,
“this model can also go wrong if the content chosen to be put
behind the paywall is decided by gut feeling and not backed up by
data,” suggests Phillips19.
“It’s important to analyze which stories actually trigger
subscription acquisitions and put those behind the paywall.”
Hybrid: Publishers using this
approach combine different
aspects of metered and
freemium models. They may
change users’ article limits
based on their behavior, or
offer exclusive content/
products to subscribers (like
newsletters, events, etc.)
Gannett, which publishes USA
Today, uses a hybrid model
across its publications. The
USA Today
publisher offers subscriber-
only content to readers along with free articles. The newsroom
decides what goes behind the paywall.
“You don’t want to put things that are commodity content behind
a paywall,” says20 Amalie Nash, SVP of Local News and Audience

PAYWALLS FOR PUBLISHERS 7

TYPES OF PAYWALLS

Development, USA Today Network, “because people aren’t going

to subscribe and they’re not going to see the value in something
like that.”
Around 10-20% of Gannett’s content is placed behind its “for
subscribers” paywall. Sports commentary, local dining, and
investigative projects perform well, with people subscribing
directly off that content, Nash tells Local News Initiative. While
all growth couldn’t be attributed to this model, it was one of the
most successful ways the publisher’s subscriber base has grown
in years, she adds.

WAN-IFRA

French local newspaper Le Parisien doubled its digital subscribers

last year using this model21. A key element of its strategy included
focusing on a hybrid of metered and paywalled content on its site.
The newspaper used a standard metered paywall earlier. Over
time it started adding premium articles for subscribers only.
The number of premium articles was steadily increased from 10
a day at the beginning of 2020, to 50 a day by the end of the year,
Sophie Gourmelen, MD and Publisher, Le Parisien told WAN-
IFRA. The strategy worked, as 90% of all new subscribers came
via premium articles. The paper not only doubled its subscribers,
but subscription revenues as well by raising digital subscription
prices from 5 to 8, and then 10 euros a month.
Le Parisien analyzes reader data to identify the kinds of stories
that convert casual readers into subscribers. Top converters
include long reads, human interest stories, real estate, and local
mobility topics, such as bicycling.

PAYWALLS FOR PUBLISHERS 8

TYPES OF PAYWALLS

Some publishers also use leaky or porous paywalls, which allow "Serving
users to access content beyond the set limits. For example, when
relevant
they access content via social media and search engines or even
by using the incognito mode in their browser. content to
the reader
Publishers may also occasionally lift paywalls from certain
leads to
types of stories, like breaking news or stories related to public
calamities. This was seen in the case of the Covid-19 crisis when better conversion
many outlets made their pandemic-related coverage free. rates. At its core,
By allowing conditional access to content beyond set limits
future success in the
you can let readers experience more of your content without subscription business is
reducing its value. It can also help you reach more (and possibly unquestionably driven
new) readers coming through search and social media. by the AI capabilities to
Timewalls are yet another variation of soft paywall in which process huge volumes
content is free for a certain amount of time, say an hour after of data to segment and
publication, after which it is placed behind a paywall. The model target prospects to
helped Idaho-based local news publisher Boise Dev generate convert."
“tens of thousands in reader revenue,” according to its Founder
and Editor, Don Day22. Swedish publisher Mittmedia was able to
David Gosen, CRO, Piano
increase subscriber conversions by 20% using this strategy23.
“Using time can be a valuable part,” David Gosen, CRO, Piano,
told Digiday24, “but the overriding subscription strategy has to be
reader-led.”

PAYWALLS FOR PUBLISHERS 9

DYNAMIC PAYWALLS:
BEYOND THE ONE-SIZE-
FITS-ALL APPROACH
PAYWALLS FOR PUBLISHERS 10
DYNAMIC PAYWALLS

Dynamic or intelligent paywalls have great potential and are "While

being used by many publishers successfully. John Wilpers, author
meters
of FIPP’s annual Innovation in Media report25 called dynamic
paywalls the “hottest new tool” that are helping publishers assume that
secure, “significant sustainable reader revenue.” each story’s
contribution
“It’s amazing, (mind-boggling, actually) to think that in an era of
increasing personalization we ever thought a one-size-fits-all toward a user’s even-
paywall would work,” he wrote in the report. tual subscription is in
Dynamic paywalls use machine learning and artificial intelligence
some sense the same,
to adapt to users’ behavior and restrict access to content freemium and dynamic
accordingly. They can automatically alter article limits and even models let us think
deliver personalized subscription pitches based on readers’ about how each story
consumption habits. can best contribute to
For example, a reader who avidly consumes sports content from the business.28"
a publisher using a dynamic paywall may see the paywall go
up after consuming a lesser number of sports-related articles Josh Schwartz, CTO, Chartbeat
compared to other topics. Around one-quarter of respondents
subscribe because they want access to specific topics they can
only get after paying, according to26 research from American
Press Institute's Media Insight Project27.
Intelligent paywalls can also help optimize your stop rates i.e.,
increase the percentage of users who are stopped from accessing
content and asked to subscribe. This is important as research by
the Lenfest Institute of Journalism29 found that the majority of the
publishers lag behind thriving news organizations in their stop
rate.

PAYWALLS FOR PUBLISHERS 11

DYNAMIC PAYWALLS

"A news organization’s stop rate often distinguishes high- "A dynamic
performing publishers."
paywall seeks
Digital Pay-Meter Playbook
to identify
The fiftieth percentile of publishers from 500 news organizations particular
in the Lenfest study stopped only 1.8% of their readership with
behaviors or
a paywall or meter. In contrast, publishers with “sustainable”
digital businesses (between the 80th and 90th percentiles of all audience segments and
publishers studied) reported stop rates at, or above 4.2% of all maps a more relevant
readers. digital subscription
Further, publishers reporting more than 6% of unique visitors offer."
reaching their stop threshold had “thriving” digital subscription
businesses. Michael Yeon, VP, Admiral

A critical limitation of simple paywalls, whether metered,

freemium, or hybrid, is that they behave in the same way
regardless of individual users’ predilections. “They put the
content first, rather than the user,” says Gosen30, “placing the
burden of generating subscriptions on the content alone, which
in turn ignores the huge boosts in subscription growth that data-
driven, real-time personalization can offer.
“In sharp contrast, a dynamic paywall will be constantly asking
questions such as: which readers are most likely to convert
to subscribers? Which readers should receive which kind of
subscription offer? And when should readers receive an offer?
This type of paywall will use the answers to these questions
to constantly evolve and bend at will to suit the needs of a
publishers’ readership, with no single consumer treated the
same.”
This ability to use real-time insights and adapt to user interests
"We use a
and needs makes dynamic paywalls more effective in building
engagement and driving subscriptions. dynamic
paywall to
Many publishers use paywalls that can assess a user’s propensity
to subscribe. This information is used to pitch them the right
better target
offer at the right time. “If you recognize someone’s behavior, then people with
it’s easier to figure out at what point you put that wall in front of the right offers. Maybe
them,” says Nash31. someone needs just
The Wall Street Journal, one of the earliest publishers to use a one more extra article.
paywall, has evolved its earlier freemium model into a highly We use the dynamic
sophisticated dynamic paywall that measures reader activity paywall to find the
across 65 variables. right moment in time32."
They include frequency, recency, depth of read, preferred content
types, and favored devices among others. The algorithm takes all Lindsay Horrigan, GM
of these into account to calculate readers’ “propensity score” or Consumer Subscriptions,
Bloomberg Media
their probability to subscribe. The paywall is adapted according
to each reader’s behavior, placing limits on the number of free
stories, especially in the areas of their interests.

PAYWALLS FOR PUBLISHERS 12

DYNAMIC PAYWALLS

“[We have] an intelligence layer, which became a propensity "If I get a

model,” Karl Wells, GM of Membership, Subscription Sales and
person’s
Marketing, WSJ explained in a Digiday interview33. “It was the
driver of determining where you are in the purchase funnel. score, I
You come to [the website] we’ll give you a score. That score will pretty much
determine what your experience will be. know how
“The first-party data is the most powerful. Your visitation count likely they will be to
plays a big role, the device type you’re on — desktop, Android, subscribe."
iPhone — play a role and the type of content you consume can
play a role. The third-party data like where you live has a huge Karl Wells, GM of Membership,
bearing on whether you will subscribe or not.” Subscription Sales and
Marketing, Wall Street Journal
“[An adaptive paywall] allows you to pick the threshold based on
past patterns of engagement. If there is a certain type of reader
who will most likely convert on their fourth visit and another
type who most likely converts on the seventh, the model will
reflect that.”
John Wiley, Director, Data Science & Insights, The Wall Street
Journal34
Swiss newspaper, Neue Zürcher Zeitung (NZZ) has been very
successful with dynamic paywalls. Like the Journal, NZZ uses
many variables to personalize its paywalls for readers, and
calculate their propensity scores.
It uses 100 to 150 of them, including reading history, time spent
on articles, frequency, device, newsletters they receive, and
the times they visit. The publisher uses this data to tailor its
messaging, text, placement, timing and even the color of the pay
prompt readers see.
“We play around with the threshold,” Steven Neubauer35, former
MD, NZZ told Digiday. He explained that people can see payment
messages after they have read five, eight, 11 or 13 articles.
“Ultimately, the goal is to not disrupt the product experience; we
only want to disrupt when someone is willing to pay.
“You will never hit 100 percent success. Sometimes there is the
need to indicate this is a pay product — ideally only when the lead
is warm enough, willing to pay, and it’s an offer that fits the needs
they are looking for.”
Machine learning and AI take the guesswork away from many
critical decisions like how many, or which stories you can allow
users to access freely. Insights gained from the data will give
you a reasonably good idea about which readers are likely to
subscribe after hitting a paywall and the ones unlikely to do so.
You can use this information to target each type differently.
“If you think about paywalls broadly, there have been metered,
freemium, and hard paywalls. Metered considers people who
will want to read more than, say, five stories. Freemium assumes

PAYWALLS FOR PUBLISHERS 13

DYNAMIC PAYWALLS

this and not that is the type of content people will pay for,” Wells
told NiemanLab36. “This is what we’ve tried to move on from. Our
model now is to flip that and start with the reader. The content
you see is the output of the paywall, rather than an input.”

Key takeaway:
A sharp focus on readers is essential for an effective
subscription strategy. Dynamic or intelligent paywalls
maximize chances of conversions as they are triggered by
reader behavior.

PAYWALLS FOR PUBLISHERS 14

LEVERAGING FIRST-
PARTY DATA
PAYWALLS FOR PUBLISHERS 15
FIRST-PARTY DATA

Dynamic paywalls will also make better sense in a cookie-less "Advanced

future. They are repositories of first-party data—the source of
analytics is
rich and nuanced audience insights that can help optimize your
audience and traffic, and maximize revenue potential. now key to
acquisition,
Canadian publisher The Globe and Mail uses a suite of AI tools
activation
called Sophi which, among other functions, also manages its
paywall. The publisher’s audience data reveals38 that readers and retention, the
who mostly consume general news and recipes are less likely to future of paywalls will
subscribe compared to those who read a lot of business-related be automated based on
content. data-driven insights.37"
Sophi might present such general news readers with a paywall.
However, if they don’t subscribe, it will not hit them with the Grzegorz Piechota,
same message again and again. Instead, it might ask such readers Researcher-In-Residence at
INMA
to register with an email.
“Publishers are testing their paywalls to gather first-party
data to determine which cohorts of readers are more likely to
subscribe and which are better off left to access free content to
drive traffic and ad revenue39.”
Tim Peterson, Senior Reporter, Digiday
The strategy has helped the Globe increase subscription
conversion, registration, as well as loyalty and engagement. It’s
because “we’re not alienating readers who would never pay by
asking them to pay,” says Senior Project Manager, Sonali Verma.
Such readers, for example, those who mostly read car reviews
and are unlikely to subscribe, are a strong source of ad revenue
for the publisher.

Key takeaway:
Data is key to growing subscribers. It can be used to identify
your most loyal customers. They can then be targeted with
personalized offers increasing their chances of conversion.
Data is also useful for working with readers who are never
going to pay. They can be monetized differently, i.e. through
ads or eCommerce.

PAYWALLS FOR PUBLISHERS 16

SHIFTING THE
ORGANIZATIONAL
MINDSET
PAYWALLS FOR PUBLISHERS 17
SHIFTING MINDSETS

Paywalls are just one element of the subscription strategy. It’s "At the heart
not going to work if not backed by high-quality content and an
of every per-
effective user acquisition and retention plan. “It isn’t just about
putting a paywall up,” says Lindsay Horrigan, GM, Consumer fectly execut-
Subscriptions, Bloomberg Media40. ed paywall
plan lies the
“It’s about building a consumer operation and speaking to your
audience and your readers. How do you reach consumers? Where most intimate of au-
do you reach them? How do you make a high-quality value dience relationships, a
proposition? Those are all great fundamentals of a consumer relationship that re-
operation.” quires your readers to
There is a direct correlation between reader-focus and hand over their credit
subscription growth, according to FT Strategies’ Towards card details. Treat it
your North Star report41. It is based on findings from the GNI right and that intimacy
Subscriptions Lab, a collaborative program by Google, INMA and
FT Strategies in 2020. It had eight publishers participating from can be the foundation
different European countries. for years of recurring
revenues."
The report recommends publishers set a ‘North Star’
goal—a single, shared objective across an organization—that
Peter Houston, Author,
demonstrates a clear priority of subscription over other revenue 6 Publishing Technologies That
lines. “Engaging readers in a long-term relationship is a very Will Make A Difference To Your
different task compared to generating traffic, and requires full Business
commitment,” the authors note. “Rarely have organizations
succeeded without shifting their mindset and focus to creating
value for readers.”
As mentioned earlier, publishers who were able to stop 6%
of their most engaged users with a paywall reported having
“thriving” digital subscription businesses42.
Matt Skibinski, Reader
Revenue Advisor at the Lenfest
Institute for Journalism
recommends publishers to
focus on converting readers
who visit the site regularly,
frequently open newsletters,
and access content on multiple
platforms. These behaviors
indicate engagement which
is more important than the
size of the audience itself,
according to Skibinski.
“There are cases where Lenfest Institute
smaller, niche publishers
have a really high conversion rate and have enough of a digital
subscription business to be meaningful,” he explains43. “Even
though their overall audience pales in comparison to larger
brands the people who access their content use it in their
everyday lives, consider it valuable, and feel a strong affinity to it.”

PAYWALLS FOR PUBLISHERS 18

SHIFTING MINDSETS

Whether a user subscribes after hitting a paywall or exits your

site depends upon his/her perception of the content’s value
and loyalty to your brand. Growing a subscription business
successfully requires understanding that you’re never going to be
able to convert every user.
“Instead, look at what you do best,” suggests Paul Jowdy, Chief
Business Officer and Publisher, Women's Wear Daily. “See what
content you deliver that’s valuable and unique and that no
one else is doing and cut that piece out of the pie and make a
subscription out of it.”
"Give the customer many reasons to come back on a daily and
weekly basis,” says Martha Williams, Author, Paywalls: How to
start your subscription strategy (FIPP)44.
“Delight them with surprises and help make their lives frictionless
and fun. Anticipate and solve life’s niggling problems for them.
Feed their passions. Transport them to content, advertising,
shopping and entertaining places created just for them,
made possible by data and artificial intelligence that enables
personalization."

PAYWALLS FOR PUBLISHERS 19

WHAT NEXT?
PAYWALLS FOR PUBLISHERS 20
WHAT NEXT?

Remind and educate your readers

While paywalls put a price on your content you must also
continue to remind and educate your readers about its value via
on-site messages or email newsletters.
“Our most valuable asset is the content that we produce,” says
Jason Sylva, Head of Consumer Revenue at New York Magazine45.
“We see our role in consumer revenue as helping people
understand that this is valuable and worth paying for.”
The Guardian has messages at
the end of articles underlining
the value of their journalism
and asking readers’ support.
The strategy has worked
spectacularly46 for the
publisher, bringing it back
from the brink of bankruptcy.
“We have to be absolute about it,” says Howard Saltz, Knight
Foundation Innovator-in-Residence, Florida International
University47. “You can’t pussyfoot around, you’ve got to say, ‘We
are a product. And you just can’t expect something for free.’”

Conclusion
In this report, we’ve covered paywalls that are commonly used
across the industry and explained why dynamic paywalls - based
around AI and reader behavior - are the future.
We’ve also outlined the other factors that are critical for paywalls
to work, not least nurturing an organizational mindset focused on
serving readers and making decisions based on first-party data.
That said, please keep in mind that you will most likely
not get your paywall strategy right the first time. Ongoing
experimentation and iteration in conjunction with the other
elements of the subscription strategy are important. Fostering a
culture of collaboration and experimentation in your organization
is, therefore, critical for success.

PAYWALLS FOR PUBLISHERS 21

LEADING VENDORS
PAYWALLS FOR PUBLISHERS 22
LEADING VENDORS

Piano
Dynamic paywall technology
Cloud-based platform that measures each visitor’s likelihood of
subscribing and determines the publisher products they’ll need to
improve their propensity to subscribe.

Celeraone
Dynamic paywall technology
Combines paywalls with audience development. It offers paid
content solutions with smart paywalls, identity management &
real-time user segmentation and targeting. Also offers Single
Sign-on authentication solution that provides a unified view of
user identities across apps, websites and other services.

Evolok
Subscription platform
Offers a suite of engagement and monetization tools for online
content. Supports the full spectrum of paywall models, from
freemium all the way through to hard wall. Also offers secure,
single sign-on user access and can be used with social media
applications as well as websites.

Pico
Subscriptions
A solution for media companies who want to develop membership
and subscription-based systems. It’s a system that integrates
email signups, on-site analytics, and payments. Driven by two
conversion points – turning anonymous users into email signups
and getting readers to pay.

Admiral
Visitor relationship management
Single tag SaaS platform for digital subscriptions, adblock
recovery, privacy consent management, email acquisition and
revenue growth.

Payread
Publisher payment tech
Removes friction from the registration and payment process for
digital publishers by giving them access to the readers’ mobile
phone number. This can then be used for payments to publishers,
through charging purchases to the reader’s mobile phone bill.

Zuora
Subscription tech
Creates cloud-based software on a subscription basis that
enables publishers to launch, manage, and transform themselves
into a true subscription business. Offers complete order-to-
revenue capabilities and is a 360 degree solution.

PAYWALLS FOR PUBLISHERS 23

APPENDIX
1. 6 Publishing Technologies That Will Make A Difference To Your Business, Sovrn
2. 300% growth in subscriptions for digital news and media: Time for publishers to reassess their business
models? What's New in Publishing
3. Coronavirus leads to surge in traffic: How publishers are building reader loyalty by offering free content, What's
New in Publishing
4. The Subscription Economy has grown over 435% in 9 years (and the uptick is expected to continue), What's
New in Publishing
5. How and Why People are Paying for Online News, Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism
6. Paywall model breakdown: The current landscape and new frontier, Chartbeat
7. Publishers move beyond the metered paywall, Nieman Lab
8. Maybe Information Actually Doesn’t Want to Be Free, The New York Times
9. The Information’s Jessica Lessin on five years of subscription journalism, Digiday
10. Why The Information’s paywall strategy is so successful, What's New in Publishing
11. 3 insights for generating reader revenue, Twipe
12. How Newsrooms Are Building Better Paywalls, Local News Initiative
13. 6 insights for your subscription strategy, Twipe
14. Why The Information’s paywall strategy is so successful, What's New in Publishing
15. What Are the Different Kinds of Paywalls (and Do They Work?), AdMonsters
16. How and Why People are Paying for Online News, Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism
17. Business Insider’s fascinating approach to paywalls and free content, What's New in Publishing
18. Why Business Insider launched a hard paywall, Simon Owens
19. Are you developing your paywall strategy for acquisition or retention? Twipe
20. How Newsrooms Are Building Better Paywalls, Local News Initiative
21. Le Parisien doubles its digital subscribers, sets goal of 200,000, WAN-IFRA
22. Respect the non-paying audience, Nieman Lab
23. How publishers are playing with time in their paywall strategies, Twipe
24. Sweden’s MittMedia increases subscriber conversions by 20% with a ‘time wall’, Digiday
25. Innovation in Media 2019-2020 World Report, Innovation Media Consulting Group
26. 5 best practices for conversion, Twipe
27. Paths to Subscription: Why recent subscribers chose to pay for news, American Press Insitute
28. Publishers move beyond the metered paywall, Nieman Lab
29. How today's news publishers can use data, best practices, and test-and-learn tactics to build better pay-meters,
The Lenfest Institute
30. Opinion: Why more publishers should incorporate dynamic paywalls to improve personalisation and loyalty,
What's New in Publishing
31. How Newsrooms Are Building Better Paywalls, Local News Initiative
32. Bloomberg Media Takes A Bull Position On Subscriptions, AdExchanger
33. Inside The Wall Street Journal’s subscription strategy, Digiday
34. Behind the Wall Street Journal paywall that decides when readers are ready to subscribe, The Drum
35. How Swiss news publisher NZZ built a flexible paywall using machine learning, Digiday
36. After years of testing, The Wall Street Journal has built a paywall that bends to the individual reader, Nieman
Lab
37. Paywalls: How to start your subscription strategy, FIPP
38. The Globe and Mail has built a paywall that knows when to give up, Nieman Lab
39. Media Briefing: Publishers are switching up their paywalls, Digiday
40. Bloomberg Media Takes A Bull Position On Subscriptions, AdExchanger
41. Report on the Google News Initiative & FT Strategies Subscriptions Lab 2020, FT Strategies
42. Digital Pay-Meter Playbook, Shorestein Center
43. Publishers Sharpen Their Approach to Paywalls, Folio
44. Paywalls: How to start your subscription strategy, FIPP
45. Publishers Sharpen Their Approach to Paywalls, Folio
46. 3 years to a million paying supporters: Guardian’s alternative model of growth without paywalls, What's New
in Publishing
47. How Newsrooms Are Building Better Paywalls, Local News Initiative

PAYWALLS FOR PUBLISHERS 24

 Also from What's New in Publishing:

INSIGHT REPORT

THE PUBLISHER'S GUIDE TO

ECOMMERCE

Written by: Sponsored by:

Damian Radcliffe

THE PUBLISHER'S GUIDE TO ECOMMERCE I

PAYWALLS FOR PUBLISHERS 25

 Sponsored by

Credits
Author: Faisal Kalim
Design: Esther Kezia Thorpe

All images courtesy of Pixabay and Unsplash.

Copyright © 2021 What’s New in Publishing. All rights reserved. Every attempt has been made to ensure
that facts, figures and pricing are correct at the time of publishing.

PAYWALLS FOR PUBLISHERS 26