Explaining the FT’s strategy

Lionel Barber, the editor of the Financial Times, delivered the annual Hugh Cudlipp Lecture on Monday at the London College of Communication and discussed the changing world of journalism and how the FT’s strategy fits in.

Barber said, “Third, we swung firmly behind the principle of charging for content. At the height of the dotcom bubble, we havered between charging for business news while offering general news for free. In practice, the distinction, at least for FT readers, was meaningless. So we came up with an ingenious compromise.

“From 2007, we started charging for content based on a meter model. Users would be given a limited number of free articles to entice them into first registering and later
signing up for subscription.

“Four years on, the meter model has proved to be an industry pioneer and an unequivocal success. FT.com now has more than 3.2m registered users and more than 200,000 paid subscribers. Other publications, including the New York Times, are now adopting or about to adopt similar meter models.

“Fourth, we abandoned or revised arrangements which allowed other news providers or aggregators to sell our content to third parties in return for a fee. In future, we determined, we would sell direct to our customers. And we would aggressively pursue any party seeking through cookies or sharing of password to gain access to our
content for free. Yes, believe it or not, some people do still think there is free lunch with the FT.”

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