News organisations are now adopting practices predicted years ago — using Artificial Intelligence to produce low-demand stories, while reserving the best journalism for readers willing to pay for a subscription.

During the second day of the INMA World Congress of News Media, Greg Piechota, INMA’s researcher-in-residence, shared INMA research that found news organisations are moving toward adopting AI and placing greater emphasis on actively listening to their audiences. 

Piechota cited the study “INMA Financial Benchmarks 2024,” which compared subscription models and financial indicators across 60 major media companies worldwide. The study found consumers have become the primary customers of news organisations.

“If we look at the broader media landscape — including Web sites, television, radio, books, and film — the market is essentially divided between advertising and paid content,” he said. “So in reality, it’s consumers who are funding the entire ecosystem.”

The most striking finding for Piechota was a 1% decline in revenue across the media companies analysed. He noted that among the top-performing quarter of outlets in 2024, revenue grew by just 4%, while the bottom-performing quarter saw revenues fall by 6%.

“The business remains profitable, but margins are modest,” he mentioned. “The average operating profit margin is around 6%. The best performers reach 11%. Of course, there are outliers; for instance, one publisher in Australia posted a 28% margin.”

While advertising remains important, consumers are now the primary source of funding for news organisations, according to Piechota.

For this reason, he argued there is no ceiling on subscription revenue, noting the average household penetration rate for national news brands in the United States is just 1.1%. Even The New York Times, he said, has reached only 8%. That’s where media companies should continue to focus their efforts.

“The highest result we found was in Estonia, where one outlet, Delfi, reaches 25% of households with its subscription model,” he noted.

Strategies for growing subscriptions

The same INMA study identifies four key tactics to boost subscriptions, based on data analysis from the media companies examined:

• Long, discounted trials.
• Smart paywalls.
• Targeted renewal offers.
• Service bundling.

After analysing hundreds of publications, Piechota noted the most important tactic is making it easy for customers to subscribe, offering initial discounts to build a habit, and then retaining them with higher prices.

“They also use the latest technology to segment audiences,” he said. “They analyse user behaviour to decide whether to raise prices at renewal and bundle services. Yes, they bet on bundles.”

Media companies have figured out how to get readers to pay for content, but the challenge remains in recovering advertising revenue from major brands.

“Perhaps what we’ve learned from subscriptions — focusing on audience needs and developing technology to understand and target people,” Piechota said, “can help us offer something valuable to advertisers as well.”

At Mediahuis, a Dutch media outlet, successful subscription strategies include offering customers the option to pause their service instead of cancelling, and enabling a one-click reactivation feature to easily restart subscriptions.

Influencer-driven strategies

Since content creators accounted for 92% of views in 2024, Piechota said newsrooms may soon start to resemble record labels, as they will need to hire people who can attract large audiences.

“They have already gathered more attention than media companies do,” he said. “And they are currently going for your money. For the first time, more advertising money will be spent with content creators than with professional media companies.”

In the future, top journalists are also expected to become content creators, and media companies may need to adapt to their way of working. Investigative reporters could coexist with creators who collaborate closely with editors in developing stories.

“You will have lawyers and business developers,” he said. “And perhaps you will try to help them with a much better contract than you have today with your journalists.”

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .