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On 21st March 2021, our CEO, Abhishek Dadoo, was invited to speak at a WAN-IFRA webinar to discuss some of the major trends shaping the news industry in 2021. Missed the session? Fret not, we’ve captured everything for you in this summary and recap of key pointers.
Speakers include:
- Abhishek Dadoo, Co-Founder & CEO, Few¢ents
- Christoph Pleitgen, Chief Revenue Officer, CRUX Knowledge
- Andreas Demuth, CEO, Upscore
Moderated by:
- Valérie Arnould, Deputy Director, Digital Revenue Network, WAN-IFRA
With the content industry is moving away from a reliance on advertising revenues, many content creators have shifted away from conventional advertising to subscription-based revenue models. However, there are still several unresolved issues in the industry.
Key areas under focus
Abhishek identified two major missed monetisation gaps. These difficulties faced by digital content creators and publishing companies remained unaddressed. He showcased how Few¢ents changes that through micro-payments.
Webinar Timestamp
Few¢ents
07:13 - Content monetisation platform allowing publishers to monetise non-subscribers
07:35 - Trends that dominated revenue generation for publishers
09:49 - Monetisation gap
10:29 - Universal paywall
11:02 - The role of Few¢ents
13:49 - Stats on micropayments
15:34 - Four stages of subscription maturity
UpScore
18:07 - The origin of UpScore and what it stands for
20:30 - Content Intelligence
21:42 - Editorial and Analytic Tools
23:08 - Optimisation and Automation Tools
CRUX Knowledge
26:49 - Information Overload
29:23 - The idea of a scorekeeping algorithm
30:10 - Example of working of the algorithm (Sifted)
33:14 - Feedback of Readers after being exposed to CRUX Knowledge
34:06 - Combination of concepts (measurement, gamification, and recommendation)
Question and Answer Session
35:35 - Are subscriptions and micropayments mutually exclusive?
44:45 - Application of CRUX knowledge
46:05 - How does UpScore differ from other conventional content intelligence tools
49:00 - Integrating tools
50:00 - Users of Few¢ents
54:00 - Engagement Data from CRUX Knowledge
Conclusion
57:00 - Final comments by moderator
Micro-payments and Revenue Maximisation
72% of the traffic on websites comes from casual visitors through referred sources. Publishers are unable to charge these casual readers in a flexible way suited to their needs, and readers who are not interested in a longer-term subscription are denied access.
This indicates a gap in the monetisation of a large audience segment. Micro-payments allow such casual readers to be charged for the content they consume. This can become an additional revenue stream to flow for the publishers.
Reducing Subscriber Churn
Another problem that Few¢ents tackles is that the subscribers unsubscribe over time. According to The Piano, the average subscription churn is 18% per month.
Few¢ents solves the issues by offering pay-per-content-piece features. This solution can be implemented besides subscriptions, to maximise the revenue. It enables digital publishers to charge non-subscribers.
Via our solution, a distributed paywall sits on the publisher's website. This allows casual users interested in the content to pay a few cents each time they visit. 98% of a publisher's users are frequent visitors who do not convert to subscribers at any point. Publishers can now monetise a hundred per cent of their audience through micropayments. Few¢ents can help in lowering subscription churn rates stemming from mildly-interested readers.
This encourages readers to come back for content 5 to 6 times a month. This is significantly more than a typical subscriber.
Few¢ents provides a funnel to attract the right users as potential subscribers. This funnel holds those users in the micropayment ecosystem who do not make it to the bottom of the funnel. This complementary ecosystem helps in the growth of subscriptions and prevents churn.
‘Multiple publishers can use this wallet to monetise globally with multiple currencies. It also helps identify regular users, pricing and premium content.’
-Abhishek Dadoo, Co-Founder & CEO, Few¢ents
Content Intelligence
UpScore's CEO Andreas Demuth highlighted other issues content creators face in content production. He then explained how UpScore as a Content Intelligence Platform works. It identifies the content that resonates with the audience and provides tools for editing.
The real-time data is highly granular and customisable. Measurement of this data is a three-stage process. It starts with Data-Capture followed by Data-Structuring and Data-Management.
The functionality behind the editorial and analytic tool is comprehensive. It includes elements like Real-Time Monitoring, On-Screen Display, Content Reporting, Built-in Content Score and several media analytics. Built-in Content Score uses the same data which the editorial teams use for analytics and reporting.
‘‘Our model is not to build a specialist tool, it’s a tool for the entire newsroom including sales and other staff.’’
-Andreas Demuth, CEO, UpScore
Information Overload
Christoph Pleitgen, Chief Revenue Officer of CRUX Knowledge discussed the solution to Information Overload. CRUX Knowledge is working on gamifying the reader experience. It helps the publishers in retaining users despite distracting content competing for attention.
Their system quantifies the amount of knowledge a person is exposed to. This helps in identifying the type of content that induces loyalty and prevents churn.
The concept is driven by an algorithm that determines a person’s level of knowledge about a topic based on his previous internet activity. It makes intelligent recommendations based on this score to help you improve them. This shifts the nature of reading from qualitative to quantitative. Christoph Pleitgen refers to these scores as ‘Knowledge GPS’.
Christoph Pleitgen reports that two-thirds of the users have given very positive feedback on the idea of live article scoring.
“Imagine if you could use this lego block of knowledge quantification. This can be used to build dashboards, augment search and intelligent alerting.”
-Christoph Pleitgen, Chief Revenue Officer, CRUX Knowledge
Relevance of content intelligence
UpScore began with the idea of developing a tool accessible to everyone in a content organisation. It is simple to use for those with average knowledge and training.
UpScore believes every content creator is a part of the future newsroom and editorial management. UpScore analytical tool prevents the editorial teams from repetitive work.
The optimization tool aids in highlighting a publisher's best content. This results in increased engagement and interaction.
Can micropayments and subscriptions be mutually exclusive?
Few¢ents CEO, Abhishek Dadoo, gave an affirmative response to this question. Few¢ents detects the most suitable geography for a specific type of content. It also identifies the price that will work in that region.
Publishers can use this solution to reach audiences that want flexible pricing. This helps content creators to expand their scope and revenue streams.
Conclusion:
The content industry is going through major changes in terms of production and distribution procedures in the digital age. Technology is facilitating content creators in an unprecedented way. Creators can leverage these sophisticated tech solutions to fuel their ideas and rise above competitors in their domain competing for attention.
