Case memo on “The New York Times Pay wall”

Submitted by Mr. Anil Kumar, Roll No – MP13009, BME 2013-16

Problem Definition:- March 28, 2011 The New York Times site became a restricted site where most of the content is protected behind a “pay wall.” Users who have exceeded the limit of 20 free articles per month were required to pay a subscription or digital printing. This was an initiative from New York times to become digital, the problems rose after digitisation is as below:-

(i) The newspaper industry had suffered from declining revenues, and the transition to digital media was difficult to navigate

(ii) Revenues from online advertising are not enough to offset the loss of print revenue (iii) Whether the transition to the pay wall could become a model for success in future and

will be a sustainable business model. (iv) The industry was buzzing with a series of questions and speculations like

(a) Was the Pay wall working? (b) Would the paid subscriber growth continue? (c) Would subscribers enticed by the introductory offer pay full price?

By observing above facts, the problem statement is “What strategy to be adopted to make a profitable newspaper business with Pay wall”.

Analysis of alternatives: - The alternative ways to address above problem are as given below:-

(i) The newspaper agency should have different revenue model by making joint venture with social media, professional sites, job sites , search engines e.t.c. Journalism can be linked to these websites & sharing of revenue model can be implemented. And also collaboration with device manufacturer i.e on purchase of ipad , one month online subscription is free.

(ii) The present strategy of Pay wall of metered system is not working may be due to reason like consumer might have used only free 20 articles & remaining they might depend on print media or other source .

(iii) There is one alternative like “All or nothing” may be utilised to increase revenue by blocking all content & available only for subscribed users.

(iv) Aggressive promotion of Pay wall to target customer with punch line that online browsing of news paper is less costly than print news paper, it may be more detrimental for print news paper, but will work for digital media.

(v) The news paper industry might have collaboration with electronic media like television news channel to get validation of their news by referring newspaper website like Wiki leaks – Everyone believes that the news on this website is correct .But cons is that television news agency have their own brand image & they may remain stick to that.

(vi) The newspaper industry may segment their product; different for different target customer .There should be clarified target customer like content specific for youngster, students, working people etc.

Recommendations:- To promote Pay wall, newspaper industry should have to use social media & charge subscribers for in-depth internet access & have to take lessons from internet companies to adopt their revenue model & expand customer base to other developing countries & should have collaborations with social media, search engine company , job seeker sites , matrimonial to leverage lost customer base.