The figures have been out for almost two days and we still know little more than we ever have about the relative sucesses and failures of The Times paywall. Even Roy Greenslade is none the wiser and he is very wise.
Robert Andrews at PaidContent has made a good go of making as much sense as possible of the opaque figures. He points out that from a pre-paywall readership of 20 million unique monthly users The Times now claims 105,000 cumulative reader payments in the last four months. Which means, he says, they have managed to get just 0.5 percent of their online audience to pay.
An interesting comparison Andrews makes is to the music streaming website Spotify. He says that the freemium business model demands a 5% base to become valid. While it is clear that the News International paywall has a way to go before it reaches those dizzying heights – but I think the similarities need not end there.
What has always endeared me to Spotify is its ability to change peoples’ perception of their presumed right to free music. It offers a fantastic free service, one many of my friends are quite content with. All the while it ensure the full premium service is affordable and that the added value is simple and quantifiable an obvious to all it’s users – no ads need be endured.
It is this value adding that a simple paywall falls down on. The Times, hidden so securely behind it’s paywall, has little lure for me now. Unlike free-spotify users who continue to use and interact with a brand on a daily if not hourly basis. The switch, when feeling flush or frustrated with advertisements, is a natural one.
The Times does not have this. I don’t visit that home page anymore because it just frustrates me – no one wants a door, digital, or otherwise slammed in their face time and again.
There must be a way to keep people interacting with the interface of The Times without giving away the premium service. I haven’t thought of it yet, but when I do you’ll be the first to know.
In many ways I want the paywall to work – and I wrote this blog saying as much when it was launched – but by releasing figures so opaque figures that, as the head of journalism at my old university George Brock puts it: “Any business journalist on either title [Times or Sunday Times] confronted with this sort of chicanery from another company in the online market would gleefully rip into the executives releasing numbers in such opaque form,” they aren’t doing anyone any favours.
Rag Doll 
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