It’s Time to Change the Paywall’s Negative Perception
No matter how (or how often) you look at it, paywalls have delivered a negative impact on the public perception of news. The reason for this negativity is simple:
Paywall implementations are a mystery to readers.
Whether it’s a metered implementation or a completely locked subscription environment, readers have little to no idea when (or if) a paywall is going to be present.
Whether it’s search, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn or email, all readers are trying to do is access a recommended article. In return for their efforts they are met with the equivalent of a not open for business sign.
This is inherently a bad process:
- The reader’s surprise at being unable to access the article leads directly to immediate dissatisfaction.
- Immediate dissatisfaction leads to the reader immediately seeking readily available alternatives.
- The publisher missing out on this revenue opportunity.
In order to change the negative perception of the paywall, publishers must offer their readers an alternative - a way to access the select piece of content to which the reader was referred without having to break out a credit card.
Why not offer a single article “pass” that allows the reader to access what they came for - a single article - and then get on their way?
This is the whole premise of DoubleRecall - to enable access and engage readers while driving net new revenue streams for publishers.
Are we tooting our own horn here? A bit, yes - but this is because we have seen the positive impact this process can have on publishers.
Isn’t engaging a prospective subscriber better than having them tweet to thousands of people how readily available their alternative news sources are?
It’s definitely time to change the paywall’s negative perception - and it can begin today.
