Bundling digital journalism: exploring the potential of subscription‐based product bundles

This study explores the potential of cross‐publisher bundled offers as a strategy for increasing subscription sales in digital journalism. While innovative forms of bundling are an integral part of media distribution in music (e.g., Spotify) and film (e.g., Netflix), their adoption in digital journalism has been limited, despite research showing that bundled access to products can increase consumers’ willingness to pay, especially in younger target groups. Against this background, we conduct a choice‐based conjoint analysis using data from a representative survey of the German online population (n = 1,542). Results show that bundling digital journalism has the potential to raise publisher revenues and subscription sales in digital markets. In particular, they highlight that a comprehensive, cross‐publisher bundled offer, available at a fixed monthly rate, has the potential to stimulate digital journalism sales among different consumer groups in a relatively balanced way, including those who are typically more reluctant towards journalism. These findings align with the principles of information goods economics, which posit that maximising the size of digital content bundles often tends to be the most profitable distribution strategy. However, it is crucial to examine these findings in the context of the potential negative effects associated with this emerging business model in digital journalism, such as the cannibalisation of print subscriptions, diminished brand identification, and a possible imbalanced distribution of revenues.

Subjects

bundling

choice‐based conjoint analysis

collaborative platforms

digital journalism

innovation

market expansion

DDC Class

371: Teachers, Methods, and Discipline

Lizenz

https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Name

MaC 12 - Bundling Digital Journalism_ Exploring the Potential of Subscription-Based Product Bundles (1).pdf

Type

Main Article

Size

330.73 KB

Format

Adobe PDF

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Bundling digital journalism: exploring the potential of subscription‐based product bundles