The value of the reader: a spotlight on new approaches to newsroom sustainability

Suggested Speakers

  • Mary Walter Brown | @mwbvosd
    Voice of San Diego and News Revenue Hub
  • Josh Stearns | @jcstearns
    Democracy Fund
Sustainability without scale: how newsrooms are finding paths to revenue through a focus on quality and deeper relationships with readers.

Session Description

More aggressively than in any time in recent history, newsrooms are exploring alternate revenue streams to advertising. This is not only because it’s a solution built for scale, but because during a time of rampant misinformation there is currency in trust. Building a relationship with readers, and asking for their support as members or subscribers, are both understood to have more than monetary value–it is an approach that sustains good journalism. The panelists will share their experiences in exploring and implementing subscription or membership supported strategies, with a special focus on early lessons from News Revenue Hub, which assists member news organizations with deploying a membership strategy.

Nushin Rashidian of Tow Center and Cannabis Wire, Josh Stearns of Democracy Fund, Mary Walter Brown of Voice of San Diego and News Revenue Hub, Kate Myers of First Look Media (The Intercept), and Celeste LeCompte of ProPublica will dive deeper into new tools and technologies available to develop relationships with readers, and will draw out the important differences between them (for example, membership and subscription approaches, while both rely on readers, are two distinct relationships).

Ideally, there will ample time for Q&A and open discussion with the audience, many of whom may be trying to find ways to incorporate these strategies into their own organizations.

How does your submission contribute to the diversity of the conference?

First, all but one panelist is a woman (yay!). But the topic, I hope, provides an alternative to conversations around platform distribution strategies and advertising, which, albeit very timely and necessary, may not represent some ONA participants' existing or future business models and strategies.

What will your audience have gained by the time your session is over?