Chirdeep Shetty, CEO of Quintype Technologies, shares his views on how publishers can increase their revenue in 2019 through various subscription models. This was presented to select group of publishers at the WAN-IFRA Digital Media Event 2019.
Reuters surveyed 200 leaders across 29 countries around the key challenges and opportunities for this year. The survey cited over half (52%) of the publishers are doubling down on subscriptions this year, pushing native advertising to the backseat.
Publishers are shifting their focus on additional revenue sources to supplement advertising. Here are some payment models that are working out for publishers.
- Popular subscription options that Magazines use are the weekly, monthly or annual plans. National geographic issues an annual plan, where enthusiasts can subscribe to get access to their exclusive digital content as well.
- Bloomberg put its Businessweek content behind a metered paywall. Readers without subscriptions can read four free stories each month. With this model, you can set the number of articles and duration, matching your business KPIs. The disadvantage though, of this plan, is that readers can exploit it by going incognito on their browsers.
- Micropayments reduce the hassle for readers to sign up and access content. The model allows a user to pay for individual articles without any sign-ups, subscriptions or commitments. You can integrate multiple wallets and pay later options to make the process smoother. Publishers can price each article differently based on its perceived value.
- The Guardian uses a membership model and has over 570,000 members (until April 2018) who give regular financial support to the organisation. The members get privileged access to content, live events and journalists from the Guardian as well.
- The Wire has been employing donations since 2016 and has received funds over 5 Crores ($714K). It is largely dependent on donations from readers and philanthropically-minded individuals for the bulk of its revenue.
- The Ad-free subscription model aims to give your readers an enhanced browsing experience. Investing.com, Scroll and The New York Times provide their readers with significant increase in page speeds and no pop-up ads in exchange for a subscription.
- Fundraising can help mobilise communities in times of need. It was instrumental when severe floods hit Kerala in late 2018. People across the globe were able to support with funds. Chief Ministers fund raised almost 3,367.51 Crores.
- AMP Paywall and subscription models for publishers was introduced in Nov 2017 to empower quality journalism and support the efforts of publishers to monetize their content even on the AMP platform.
- Facebook closely followed, by allowing publishers to put their content behind a paywall on Instant Articles.
Interested to experiment with any of the above subscription plans? Contact us to learn more.