The Atlantic's Nicholas Thompson on milestones, paywalls, and setting future goals
Apr 29, 2024
auto_awesome
The CEO of The Atlantic, Nicholas Thompson, shares insights on the brand's profitability and subscriber strategy success. He discusses paywall experiments, AI trends, and setting future goals after achieving milestones of 1 million subscribers and profitability. The podcast also covers retention strategies, Apple News+, and the importance of data-driven decision-making in the media industry.
Nicholas Thompson transformed The Atlantic holistically through paywall experiments, prioritizing depth over quantity.
Enhancing retention post-acquisition at The Atlantic involved analyzing churn factors and implementing tailored strategies.
After reaching 1 million subscribers, The Atlantic focuses on sustainable growth through reader engagement and revenue alignment.
Deep dives
Nicholas Thompson's Mandate at The Atlantic
When Nicholas Thompson joined The Atlantic as CEO, he was tasked with steering the company toward profitability. The primary focus was on enhancing the paywall to elevate consumer revenue, a shift from his initial belief that launching a third revenue stream would be pivotal. By conducting numerous experiments, Thompson tripled consumer revenue, leading to the company's financial success.
Varied Experimentation and Consumer Revenue Growth
Thompson and his team ran diverse experiments, from pricing tests to adjusting the paywall placement. Complex tests involved factors like the frequency of story reads before subscription prompts, with up to 50 variables considered. Discoveries like tighter paywalls boosting revenue led to operational adjustments, such as implementing trial subscriptions and customized paywall strategies.
Challenges in Upholding Retention and Strategic Changes
Enhancing retention rates post-acquisition was a key focus for The Atlantic. By analyzing behaviors impacting churn, initiatives were crafted to improve retention factors like newsletter sign-ups and varied content consumption. Balancing incentives for sustainable growth while avoiding short-term tactics to solely increase subscriber counts posed challenges, reflecting the need for strategic goal-setting.
Future Goals and Strategic Shifts at The Atlantic
Post reaching a milestone of one million subscribers, the focus at The Atlantic shifted towards setting cohesive goals for sustained development. Exploring avenues to maintain and expand subscriber base, including fostering daily reader habits, emerged as a priority. In the evolving digital landscape, strategies aligning content engagement with revenue growth remained critical.
Adaptation to Industry Shifts: AI and Newsletter Evolution
Anticipating the influence of AI on publishing, Thompson acknowledged the blend of excitement and uncertainty it brings. The evolution of newsletters as a direct reader relationship tool was highlighted, with insights into the trade-offs between independent newsletter endeavors and fostering direct ties through platform offerings. Prioritizing strategic adaptations amid industry transformations, including retention-centric measures and revenue diversification, remained imperative.
In this bonus episode of Media Voices, we hear from Nicholas Thompson, CEO at The Atlantic. We first had Nicholas as a guest on the podcast back in 2019 when he was WIRED's Editor in Chief, about what he'd learned a year after introducing a paywall to the brand.
Nicholas has since been credited with being a driving force behind The Atlantic's recent return to profitability and subscriber strategy success. So we were keen to invite him back on for a wide-ranging conversation about how he achieved the turnaround, as well as what happened to their paid newsletter scheme, Apple News+, and his thoughts on wider industry trends like AI.
Nicholas spoke about the experiments The Atlantic has run around its paywall strategy over the past few years, transforming the business holistically, and doing less but in much more depth. He also shares his outlook for the rest of 2024 - including the election effect - and how he's setting his next goals for the publication after meeting both the 1 million subscriber and profitability milestones earlier this month.
Find out more here about tickets and the agendas of the Publisher Podcast and Newsletter Summits in London on 12th June.
Get the Snipd podcast app
Unlock the knowledge in podcasts with the podcast player of the future.
AI-powered podcast player
Listen to all your favourite podcasts with AI-powered features
Discover highlights
Listen to the best highlights from the podcasts you love and dive into the full episode
Save any moment
Hear something you like? Tap your headphones to save it with AI-generated key takeaways
Share & Export
Send highlights to Twitter, WhatsApp or export them to Notion, Readwise & more
AI-powered podcast player
Listen to all your favourite podcasts with AI-powered features
Discover highlights
Listen to the best highlights from the podcasts you love and dive into the full episode