Business Insider testing a reader paywall

Business Insider is testing a metered paywall, according to Jeremy Barr of Ad Age.

Barr writes, “The company plans to test those ambitions, starting this week, with a ‘small,’ randomly selected group of readers, who will be prompted to subscribe to Business Insider. As is standard with so-called metered paywalls, the readers selected for this test will get an allotment of free articles. Multiple meter levels will be tried, starting at 10 free stories. For those impacted, the meter will re-start every 30 days.

“These selected users will see the subscription message three times, at the beginning of the test, at the mid-point of their free story allotment, and with one story remaining.

“Business Insider, which was sold last year to European publisher Axel Springer, will charge $1 for the first month of a subscription, and $9.95 for the successive months. It’s probably not a coincidence that the Financial Times, which Mr. Blodget mentioned as an inspiration and a competitor, also charges $1 for the first four weeks of a subscription, an approach the company introduced in early 2015.”

Read more here.