Case Synopsis

This case is about the Metered Paywall System adopted by TNY. The success of paywall, crises in traditional newspaper industry, low capability of online advertisement to replace the loss of print revenue. The TNY had two choices in designing the paywall:

Should they design a "leaky" paywall where determined users could easily slip through, or

A "bulletproof" paywall, where users had to pay before they could access any content?

Strategy

Number of articles:

The limit of 20 free articles for users who surfed on TNY content is very much accepted as from the case study it is derived that the vast traffic on the website is made by casual users rather than paid subscribers and since in the initial year of entering into online platform of newspaper it is very much essential to rope in as much as subscriber base as possible.

Pricing:

Exhibit 11 shows that “The New York Times” has highest annual subscription fees for online content (more than $450) almost double than what “The Wall Street Journal” charges. Therefore, the company should considerably lower their rates and offer competitive price so that more and more people can join the service which will increase the site traffic and hence the company can demand more fees from advertiser.

Leaky Paywall or Bullet Proof:

For initial days, TNY should go with the Leaky paywall model as they need more subscribers to increase their awareness and generate more traffic to their sites from various platforms like Facebook, twitter, linked-in, etc. and since it’s a e-newspaper which is largely preferred by youths over the traditional newspaper, so they should go with the Leaky paywall model.

Is Online Newspaper or print Newspaper complement or substitute? Yes, I feel Online Newspaper is substitute to traditional newspaper as most of the college students are installing news apps in there smartphones. The main advantage of online newspaper is, we can save as much as articles we want.

Conclusion The NewYork Times should adopt mix strategy, i.e; Traditional as well as Digital. In Digital, they are having 2 ways, all needed is strategic thinking.