Is a CNN.com paywall a problem?
The website has been a major source of traffic as a free site. How does that square with a paywall model?
As I returned from a (very welcome) vacation this week, a Nieman Lab story from July 10 caught my eye with this intriguing headline: “Are you willing to pay for CNN.com? Prepare to be asked before year’s end.”
The cable news giant’s website has been a wellspring of digital traffic over the years, but with cable subscribers plummeting some 40% over the past seven years (down from 98.7 million in 2016 to 58 million in 2023, per the Nieman article) the company is looking for ways to offset those losses. And that’s alongside declining ratings and ad revenue dips, which the article also cited.
Chief among incoming CEO Mark Thompson’s strategic outline for CNN’s future, is the creation of “best-in-class, subscription-ready products that will provide need-to-know news, analysis and context in compelling new formats and experiences, starting with CNN.com’s first subscription product launching before the end of 2024.” It’s worth noting, that line was bolded by Thompson in his memo.
As we consider the merits of a paywall on CNN.com — a site that led the news industry in digital traffic in 2023 with 159 million unique viewers, some 52 million more than the New York Times — it’s worth noting a few interesting phrasings from the memo, starting with the line that follows that bolded section:
“We want to build on CNN.com’s reach with a new focus on engagement and frequency — how long our users spend with us and how often they return — by improving the quality of the product experience and giving users powerful reasons to come back to us more often.”
Okay, wait a second … Thompson wants to improve CNN.com’s “reach” but they’re going to put up a paywall? Anyone thinking about growing the total audience size should know that you don’t increase accessibility to a product by immediately asking someone to pay for it. So exactly what is going on here?
Like other recent strategic announcements from major news companies, much of the language Thompson uses to outline his vision is malleable. There are not a lot of details. The framing is far from concrete and includes a lot of buzzwords I’m sure Time Warner investors would like. (“Did you see he mentioned AI?!?!?!”) But there is one term from those above sections that I think is crucial to the application of any paywall to CNN.com.
That term is “product.” Thompson does not say they will drop a paywall across the entirety of CNN.com. That would be folly, as it would threaten the single biggest appeal of the site to advertisers, its audience scale. Instead of smoking the New York Times in annual unique viewers, CNN.com would now effectively be competing with the Times on level footing, a much trickier proposition. But I don’t think that’s what’s going to happen.
Rather, Thompson says they will introduce “CNN.com’s first subscription product.” So, likely, we’re talking about a very specific and, also likely, new offering from the site. That’s a very different approach, though it’s still a challenging trick to pull off … as CNN should well know.
CNN dove headlong into the direct-to-consumer streaming game with the launch of CNN+ in 2022 only to find its pool far too shallow and almost instantly shudder the service. The reasons for this are myriad, but I believe this is in part driven by something I believe deeply: In the information age, news is not a commodity. Nightly newscasts covering the biggest stories of the day are both not timely and widely available to consumers both via networks and cable. And breaking news stories are far easier and faster to discover and digest via mobile-first platforms, including social media. So where is the value to a product like CNN+?
There is no denying the appeal of revenue driven directly from consumers. As I’ve noted in this space before, I believe it’s the most sustainable model for the media industry to balance their supply-side production costs with the demands of consumers/audience and what they’re willing to pay for. But to establish that revenue stream, you have to first focus on, well, what are consumers willing to pay for? And that’s where I’m curious to hear Thompson’s answer. What can the next iteration of CNN.com provide that I’m willing to pay for? What can I get from that subscription, that I can’t already get from my other subscription products?
Let’s look at some of the reasons consumers purchase subscriptions and how they might apply to a CNN.com premium product:
Exclusivity: This is the inventory approach. I subscribe to Disney+ because it has all of the Disney, Marvel and Star Wars properties and this is (mostly) the only place I can get them. Take my money.
But given how even exclusive news can be aggregated and disseminated by any number of free platforms, what can CNN.com provide here that other news providers cannot with their subscription products? Maybe more from their most popular on-air personalities? Speaking of …
Personality: I subscribe to various newsletters and follow certain YouTube channels because I like the way the content is presented and the personality of the creators. It’s a more human dynamic. It resonates on a deeper level, which deepens engagement because I like this person and I want them to succeed. (Aspirational author’s note: Hopefully this is why some of you are subscribing the this newsletter and are recommending it to your friends and colleagues!)
But if this were the case with CNN’s personalities, then why did CNN+ flub so badly? Maybe they didn’t have the right personalities? If so, can CNN can find better personalities for this new CNN.com product? Maybe.
There are a number of CNN anchors and reporters that I like, but that’s just me. For a mass audience, compared to CNN’s chief cable news competitors like Fox News and MSNBC, I feel like it lacks the star power that can generate a sizeable following/subscriber base. And this is borne out in the ratings.
In June, not only did Fox News finish first in primetime and full day, but MSNBC finished third in primetime and second in full day. Meanwhile CNN finished No. 6 in primetime and fourth in full day.
This is made even more clear when you look at the ratings for the top news programs of the month. Check out some of Fox’s top shows that month — “Jesse Watters Primetime,” “Hannity,” “Gutfeld!” — as well as MSNBC’s — “Last Word: With Lawrence O’Donnell,” “Deadline: White House with Nicole Wallace.” What do they all have in common? Names in the show title. Heck, Gutfeld even gets an exclamation mark in the title.
When you start thinking about how those shows dominate the competition, it gets into another subscription catalyst …
Perspective: I subscribe because I value the thoughts and opinions showcased by a person or platform. These are your New Yorker and Atlantic subscribers, but it’s also why people have largely glommed onto Fox News and MSNBC in recent years, at least in my opinion.
While those two cable networks have long made clear their political leanings, CNN has always painted itself as more of a centrist network (despite what some former presidents may say). This is an era in which algorithms curate content based on consumer preferences. And those algorithms do that because they know that content is more likely to resonate with that consumer, thus driving engagement.
Apply that to a subscription model in which consumers are being asked to pay money for a product. What’s more likely, the consumer will pick a product that aligns with their views and perspectives (“I KNEW I was right to think this way!”), or one that challenges them (“You shut your mouth when you’re talking to me!”)? Or perhaps least likely, one that seeks to not align with either side of the spectrum?1
I am definitely not saying CNN should pick a side (far from it), but understanding that consumer behavior is crucial to building a successful product around news.
Insights/Utility: I wanted to include this here because it gets at the final part of the Nieman article, which raises CNN’s old plan to position its subsites like CNN Politics and CNN Money as premium products way back in 2017. (You may have noticed that didn’t happen.) People also subscribe to products that make their jobs/lives easier. Investors subscribe to Bloomberg or The Wall Street Journal to better assess investment opportunities. Sports bettors subscribe to sharps to improve their chances of winning wagers. Consumers subscribe to Wirecutter so they can read one review instead of dozens from random people on Amazon. Lobbyists sign up for Politico or The Washington Post for insights on Capitol Hill.
Here I think CNN also has a tough road because a lot of the site’s coverage areas would compete directly with other, far more established premium products that offer similar utility. This could also be the reason these plans for CNN.com premium products never got off the ground in 2017.
So where does all of that leave CNN.com in 2024? A new premium product feels like a tough sell to would-be subscribers, but again, we don’t know exactly what it is. Success is certainly not impossible, but given the above factors, it could be a rough road. What I do think is that if this new product is to succeed it will need to be something we have not seen before from CNN, either on TV or the site.
Thompson has succeeded on this front before when he was with The Times, a tenure that included adding properties like Wirecutter and The Athletic. The strategic vision for CNN was accompanied by a notice of 100 layoffs, which may be an indicator that the company is not in a position to acquire new talent and properties. On the other hand, it could also be a move to reposition spending to better align with this coming premium strategy.
Hi, I’m Mike. I’m a former editor for The Washington Post and ESPN. In 2024 I founded and now operate Launcher, LLC, a digital media consultancy operating out of Arlington, Va. Want to work together? Reach out on LinkedIn.
Brief aside, but this makes me wonder if algorithms just look for user preferences on right- and left-leaning news content and completely ignore “middle of the road” perspectives. Anyone know? Also, this footnote feature is kind of cool. I’ll have to use it more!