Turning off the printing presses is the scariest decision a legacy publisher can make. Even when paper, ink, and shipping costs are eating your margins, the fear of losing legacy subscribers keeps a lot of media companies frozen.
The trouble is, every year you put it off costs you.
On the latest episode of the Paywall Podcast, Pete sits down with Wally from the digital agency 50 Fish to break down how Brew Your Own Magazine pulled the plug on print, kept its advertisers happy, and went 100% digital without killing the business.
The print replica fix: how they kept legacy advertisers by moving them into trackable digital flipbooks with live links.
The content re-architecture: why organizing your site by magazine departments loses readers, and how a topical layout helps engagement and search.
The lead-in hack: how they use the Leaky Paywall Lead-In block to hook organic traffic and pull more free email registrations from their best articles.
We also published the full write-up, with the year-long transition plan and the honest cost of making the jump.
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Two publishers tried to fix their email costs this month. One deleted 30,000 contacts. The other cut daily to weekly. Both lost more in paid subscriptions than they saved on...
