1215 Hightower Trail Building A, Suite 100
www.mathereconomics.com
DIGITAL REVENUE
MANAGEMENT CASE STUDIES
1215 Hightower Trail Building A, Suite 100
Atlanta, GA 30350
www.mathereconomics.com
2
• Strategy
• Tactics: o Acquisition o Churn o Pricing
• Newsroom
3
1 2 3 4 5 6 TACTICS &
EXECUTION STRATEGIC DIRECTION
DATA & ANALYTICS
PRODUCT & USER
EXPERIENCE
TECH STACK NEWSROOM
Rate your maturity and effectiveness level in each of these pillars
Best In Class Industry Leader
Industry Standard Needs Improvement Needs Development
4
ENTHUSIASTS STABLE USERS
FLYBYS AVG. PER USER PER MONTH
ALL USERS 75.6% 15.4% 6.2% 2.8% PAGEVIEWS 1.4 7.0 14.4 100.7
ARTICLE PAGEVIEWS 0.9 2.6 4.4 27.2
VISITS 1.1 2.6 5.0 26.2 TIME PER VISIT 02:17 06:57 07:40 06:41 SCROLL DEPTH 28% 50% 52% 62% AD REVENUE $0.01 $0.05 $0.12 $1.08 UNIQUE DAYS 1.1 2.1 3.6 9.5
% KNOWN USERS 0% 2% 5% 38% CONVERSION
RATE 0.00% 0.22% 0.28% 0.73%
FANATICS
5
$232 $378
-$146
-$600
-$400
-$200
$0
$200
$400
$600
$800
$1.000
2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25
12-M
onth
Rev
enue
s M
illar
es
Static Meter Setting (free articles per 30 days per user)
Net Revenue Consumer Revenue Ad Revenue at Risk
6
FIRST TIME USER
On-site Welcome
Messaging
On-site Soft Calls to Action
Newsletters
REPEAT MEDIUM
PROPENSITY
Soft Calls to Action
Newsletters
Registration for + Page Views
Subscription Offer
ENGAGED HIGH
PROPENSITY
On-site Aggressive Calls
to Action
Limit Access to Content
Subscription Offer
Off-site Email Offers
(known users)
NEW SUBSCRIBER
Welcome / Onboarding
Emails
Brand / Product Promotion
Education Prior to First Renewal
RETAINED SUBSCRIBER
Timing-Based Brand / Value
Promotion
Behavior-Based Brand / Value
Promotion
Preference-Based Brand / Value
Promotion
Lapsed Subscriber Messaging
7
Mon
thly
Page Views at Risk 12,195,158Paywall Hits 1,050,689
Conversion Rate 0.19%
12 M
onth
s
Total Subscribers 69,716Total Sub Revenue $1,407,768Ad Revenue at Risk -$359,512
Net Revenue $1,048,256Dollar Tradeoff $3.92
Baseline Meter = 5
8
Mon
thly
Page Views at Risk 12,195,15812,664,898Paywall Hits 1,050,689 1,159,349
Conversion Rate 0.19% 0.19%
12 M
onth
s
Total Subscribers 69,716 71,740Total Sub Revenue $1,407,768$1,448,812Ad Revenue at Risk -$359,512 -$373,360
Net Revenue $1,048,256$1,075,452Dollar Tradeoff $3.92 $3.88
Baseline Meter = 5
Balanced Growth
9
Mon
thly
Page Views at Risk 12,195,15812,664,898 17,158,678Paywall Hits 1,050,689 1,159,349 2,075,540
Conversion Rate 0.19% 0.19% 0.14%
12 M
onth
s
Total Subscribers 69,716 71,740 80,133Total Sub Revenue $1,407,768$1,448,812 $1,618,299Ad Revenue at Risk -$359,512 -$373,360 -$505,836
Net Revenue $1,048,256$1,075,452 $1,112,463Dollar Tradeoff $3.92 $3.88 $3.20
Baseline Meter = 5
Balanced Growth
Aggressive Growth
10
Mon
thly
Page Views at Risk 12,195,15812,664,898 17,158,678 26,083,987Paywall Hits 1,050,689 1,159,349 2,075,540 4,389,079
Conversion Rate 0.19% 0.19% 0.14% 0.11%
12 M
onth
s
Total Subscribers 69,716 71,740 80,133 99,865Total Sub Revenue $1,407,768$1,448,812 $1,618,299 $2,016,768Ad Revenue at Risk -$359,512 -$373,360 -$505,836 -$768,953
Net Revenue $1,048,256$1,075,452 $1,112,463 $1,247,815Dollar Tradeoff $3.92 $3.88 $3.20 $2.62
Static Meter =2
Baseline Meter = 5
Balanced Growth
Aggressive Growth
11
Mon
thly
Page Views at Risk 12,195,15812,664,898 17,158,678 26,083,987 10,979,034Paywall Hits 1,050,689 1,159,349 2,075,540 4,389,079 940,591
Conversion Rate 0.19% 0.19% 0.14% 0.11% 0.21%
12 M
onth
s
Total Subscribers 69,716 71,740 80,133 99,865 68,497Total Sub Revenue $1,407,768$1,448,812 $1,618,299 $2,016,768 $1,383,357Ad Revenue at Risk -$359,512 -$373,360 -$505,836 -$768,953 -$323,661
Net Revenue $1,048,256$1,075,452 $1,112,463 $1,247,815 $1,059,696Dollar Tradeoff $3.92 $3.88 $3.20 $2.62 $4.27
Static Meter =2
Baseline Meter = 5
Balanced Growth
Advertising Recovery
Aggressive Growth
ACQUISITION, CHURN, PRICING
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Digital-Only
7Day+ Digital
Sunday+
Digital
Digital-Only
7Day+Digital [VALUE]
Sunday+
Digital
46% 54%
0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%
Paywall Non-Paywall
The “subscribe button“ and email
channels are equally important
to the paywall
The print product should be
promoted proudly alongside digital
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Content categories and authors
(last 28 days)
Visits
(per week)
Days since last visit Page views and time onsite
(per day/page)
0,00% 0,01% 0,02% 0,03% 0,04% 0,05% 0,06% 0,07% 0,08% 0,09% 0,10%
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25
Paywall Hits
Probability to Subscribe
15
Probability to subscribe grows as users engage with the paywall…
… but begins to decline after too many paywall hits
Personalized call to action with reference to popular sportswriter
shows a 0.12% lift in conversion rate from initial testing
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A.
B.
0.26% CONVERSION
RATE
0.38% CONVERSION
RATE
Meter 2
Meter 10
17
Unique Modals 10,942 6,267
Conversions 54 32
Conversion Rate 0.49% 0.52%
HIGH-PROPENSITY
Unique Modals 35,795 7,956
Conversions 93 35
Conversion Rate 0.26% 0.44%
MID-PROPENSITY
Meter 2
Meter 10
Aggressive meter shows almost no change in conversion rate
Does conversion volume supersede the decline in conversion rate?
18
4,39% 4,09%
1,42%
0,00%
0,50%
1,00%
1,50%
2,00%
2,50%
3,00%
3,50%
4,00%
4,50%
5,00%
Low Medium High
Retention by Engagement
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0,11 0,11
0,05
0,00
0,02
0,04
0,06
0,08
0,10
0,12
Low Medium High
Price Elasticity by Engagement
Digital-only subscribers showed lower overall price elasticity than 7-day subscribers
The Impact of engagement is not linear and is also impacted by tenure and original price
NEWSROOM
21
60%
40%
Unique Articles on Path to Conversion
72%
28%
Unique Bylines on Path to Conversion
One of the biggest surprises for publishers is the amount of content not relevant for subscription or advertising revenue
22
General College NFL High School Sports
Arts
Business
News
Opinion Special Projects
-
0,5
1,0
1,5
2,0
2,5
- 0,5 1,0 1,5 2,0 2,5 3,0
General College
NFL
Hockey
High School Sports
Other Sports
Local College
MLS
Baseball
Arts
Business
Life
News
Obituaries
Opinion
Special Projects
Bubble size indicates conversion volume
+CONVERSION
+R
ETE
NTI
ON
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Category Page Views PV with Path to Conversion Paywall Hits Conversions
Unique URLs PTC / PV PTC / URL
Crime 3,398,462 11,784 288,725 205 12,272 0.35% 1.0
News 846,627 2,129 61,205 120 3,757 0.25% 0.6
Politics 1,121,271 6,020 71,777 111 5,328 0.54% 1.1
Columnists 886,525 3,787 50,746 111 3,502 0.43% 1.1
Baseball 1,060,046 3,614 83,589 74 2,061 0.34% 1.8
Entertainment 1,051,370 2,987 47,259 71 6,183 0.28% 0.5
Football 971,367 4,815 103,240 70 1,922 0.50% 2.5
Opinion 281,260 2,209 24,797 62 2,500 0.79% 0.9
Community 430,391 2,127 33,426 61 454 0.49% 4.7
Sports 756,506 1,769 47,787 60 3,864 0.23% 0.5
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2,100 fewer articles (33%) in some content, risking 1.6M page views 800 more articles (20%) in core content grows page views by 2.8M
1,361 fewer articles and at least 1.2M more page views ($30K revenue from advertising, acquisition, and retention)
0
500
1.000
1.500
2.000
2.500
3.000
3.500
4.000
International Economy Politics Local News National News
Opinion Business Culture
Uni
que
Publ
ished
Art
icle
s
Published Recommended
ABOUT US
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May 2018 | New York City
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29
GANNETT McLean, VA
GATEHOUSE MEDIA Fairport, NY
NBA New York, NY
ADVANCE LOCAL New York, NY
SCIENTIFIC GAMES Las Vegas, NV
NY POST New York, NY
TRIBUNE MEDIA Chicago, IL
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL New York, NY
MCCLATCHY Sacramento, CA
NEWSDAY Melville, NY
THE HOME DEPOT Atlanta, GA
HEARST CORPORATION New York, NY
DALLAS MORNING NEWS Dallas, TX
SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION Washington, D.C.
PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER Philadelphia, PA
GOOGLE Mountain View, CA
*Select clients
COX ENTERPRISES Atlanta, GA
THE NEW YORK TIMES New York City, NY
INTERCONTINENTAL EXCHANGE
Atlanta, GA
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SINGAPORE PRESS HOLDINGS (SPH)
Singapore
CINEPLANET Lima, Peru
FAIRFAX MEDIA NEWS CORP
Sydney, Australia THE AGE
Melbourne, Australia
BORSEN Copenhagen, Denmark
NINE NETWORK Willoughby, Australia
MEDIAHUIS Antwerp, Belgium
SCHIBSTED Oslo, Norway
eJOBS Bucharest, Romania
JOONGANG ILBO Seoul, South Korea
NRC Amsterdam, Netherlands
NZME Auckland, New Zealand
TORSTAR THE GLOBE & MAIL
Toronto, Canada
*Select clients
PROJECT SYNDICATE Prague, Czechia
NZZ Zürich, Switzerland
BONNIER Stockholm, Sweden
POST MEDIA Vancouver, Canada
ATLANTIC LOTTERY CORPORATION
Moncton, NB Canada
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL THE NEW YORK TIMES
New York, NY THE HOME DEPOT
INTERCONTINENTAL EXCHANGE Atlanta, GA
GOOGLE Mountain View, CA
SCIENTIFIC GAMES Las Vegas, NV
SMITHSONIAN Washington, DC
LE MONDE Paris, France
NDTV India
GRUPO NACIÓN San Jose, Costa Rica
CLARIN Buenos Aires, Argentina
EL ESPECTADOR Bogota, Colombia
ESTADÃO São Paulo, Brazil
ESTADO DE MINAS Belo Horizonte, Brazil
FOLHA DE S. PAULO São Paulo, Brazil
NEXO JORNAL São Paulo, Brazil
GRUPO OPSA Honduras
LA NACIÓN Buenos Aires, Argentina
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• Strategic Pricing Analysis
• Audience Analytics
• Content Economics
• Market Based Pricing (MBP)
• Customer Lifetime Value (CLV)
• Churn Modeling
• Customer Acquisition
• Revenue Forecasting
• Listener™ Data Platform
• Advertising Rate Analytics
Yield mgt. and lifecycle tactics
applied to 30M+ subscribers
weekly
32
600
600+ news media partners
globally
$4B 30M 10 to 1
Most clients see a 10-to-1 return on investment from
our services
Over $4B+ in consumer
revenue managed annually
1215 Hightower Trail Building A, Suite 100
www.mathereconomics.com
[email protected] Mather Economics
1215 Hightower Trail Building A, Suite 100
Atlanta, GA 30350
770-993-4111 www.mathereconomics.com