Problem summary

The user needs to pay to get access to a restricted area on a website.

Example

When you want to read an article at The Times, you are presented with a paywall that prompts for your login. You can bypass it by paying your way through.

Usage

• Use when you need a way of directly making money on the content you produce
• Use when your users are willing to pay for the content you produce
• Use when the perceived value of your content is greater than the amount of money you are requesting for it
• Do not use when your website is solely dependent on making money on banner impressions, as the highest possible number of pageviews is then the most important.

Solution

Paywall strategies vary. Some close off all content, some lures you in with bait and asks for money after x amount of articles, other websites cherry pick content that’s not free for all. Below is an overview of the main variations among which combinations occur.

Strategies

• Paywall: All content is behind one big paywall that surrounds the entire site. Examples are The Times

• Freemium: In the freemium model, some content is free for all and some are behind a pay wall. Examples are The Wallstreet Journal, Berlingske, Aftonbladet

• Taxometer: The first few articles are free to view whereafter the paywall kicks in. Examples are The New York Times, Financial Times

• Time limits: You buy a day, week, month or year pass or access to the archive for a number of days. Examples are The Observer, The Guardian

• Bulk sales: Upsale and sale to companies. Examples are Financial Times and Mediawatch

• Sale by the piece: Purchase of single stories and services. Examples are Tænk, PeepCode

Payment doesn’t have to be monetary

Most paywalls include a monetary exchange, however there are several ways a user can pay to get behind a paywall:

• Monetary exchange: The traditional paywall includes some kind of monetary exchange – it can payment for a single piece of information or by subscription

• Subscription to print media: Instead of buying a subscription to use the website only, require users to own a subscription of the print edition of the media in order to enforce both revenue streams: online and offline.

• Permission: Let your users give you permission to call them up, send them emails, to get your information from facebook, to contact your friends, etc.. Getting permission to build a long term relationship can sometimes be more worth than a simple monetary exchange.

• Lead: You could also let users give their permission for an advertiser or other third party to contact them.

• Time: Let your users take a questionaire – do you want to know about the profile of your users and their behavior – or could an advertiser or other third party be interested in knowing about your users? You could also let your users watch a video commercial from an advertiser or otherwise grow from their valuable time.

Rationale

Paywalls is used as an alternative income source for online media websites, where banner advertising has been the tradition. As users move their habits from print to online, media companies find it harder to base their business on advertising revenue only. Paywalls has been widely introduced to make up for the lost revenue.

More example images of the 'Paywall' pattern

• 

  You can read part of the article before a paywall sets in a berlingske.dk

• 

• 

  At The Wallstreet Journal, the user can read the first part of the article - to read the rest a subscription is needed.

• 

  At the Swedish national newspaper, Aftonbladet.se, the benefits of subscribing to their "plus" edition is explained in the bottom of the article.

View more example screenshots

4 Comments

• 1
  

  Kollene McGinley

  29 Jan, 2013

  It is widely known that print publications are suffering from the new digital age. The Internet has made news, current events, pop culture, political affairs, global affairs, and local affairs accessible with the ease of clicking a mouse. Many print publications have had to downsize due to financial hard times. This has lead to a fierce competition in the print publication and newspaper journalism industry. On one hand, this goes to show that the positions held are held by the best and brightest of journalists, which shows the intellect, academia, and experience behind journalism today. But on the other hand, it has been evidenced that because executives at newspapers are so fearful to lose their jobs, they are fearful of taking risks, even when the risks may reap rewards. I currently work at a digital subscription company called Media Pass. My role is to speak with news publications and other content driven properties to help them monetize their digital content through a subscription pay wall model. As the world of journalism is moving out of print and towards a new age of digital journalism, the subscription pay wall will drastically change the economics of online publications.
  The most popular example of a newspaper publication that decided to take the risk of charging for content on their digital property is the The New York Times. The New York Times receives over 30 million unique visitors per month according to their compete.com score. Sites like this are reluctant to implement a pay wall as they fear they will loose traffic which will in turn hurt revenue from advertisers. Almost every website online is monetized by ad revenue. Sites are reluctant to block their users with a subscription pay wall because they fear it will hurt ad revenue, site traffic, and user loyalty as users may be reluctant to pay for access to content. The success of the New York Times proves that digital subscription pay walls do not affect revenue in a negative way, in fact, quite the opposite. Most pay walls generate 8-10 times more revenue than traditional advertising. Since The New York Times implemented the pay wall, many other publications are moving towards a paid content model. As time progresses and the digital age advances, sites will need to begin charging for access to premium content.
  A great example of a publication I admire is Newsweek. I could go to a more esoteric news source like the economist, but I am choosing Newsweek because it appears to a larger number of people, is more simply written, and is more accessible to the average person. Newsweek gets the message across seamlessly without using labyrinthine verbiage. In a short period of time the reader can have a clear understanding of what is going on in the world. The good news is that you can educate yourself about global affairs. The downside is that is the limit of the magazine; it doesn’t take you as deep into the article as the New York Times does. I get a lot out of the social presence that Newsweek maintains. I can login to facebook and twitter to see the top posts from Newsweek. On October 18th 2012 after 80 years of traditional print and distribution, Newsweek announced that they are going to switch to an exclusively digital format and charge for subscriptions online. Although the subscription model is not a new concept, implementing an exclusively digital edition of a publication and doing away with the paper edition has never been done. Newsweek did not reinvent the wheel but they stand out as leaders in the new digital age. An integral component to sustaining readers is providing them with exclusive and valuable material. Many papers’ sites build a brand or higher a blogger which serves as a brand to engage readership and promote audience loyalty. I am interested in participating in a career in journalism and watching the new digital age grow.
  Kollene@mediapass.com www.mediapass.com

• 2
  

  Cash Payday

  12 Mar, 2013

  ^ Wow that is a long comment.

  Thank you for sharing!

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