Categories: OLD Media Moves

FT’s new website could spur more subscribers

Jack Marshall of The Wall Street Journal writes about a faster Financial Times website and its impact on subscribers.

Marshall writes, “Publishers are attempting to improve their web offerings as speed and user experience are increasingly seen as ways to differentiate from competitors, especially as users consume more online content via mobile devices. The Washington Post unveiled its own ‘lightning-fast’ mobile website in September, which it plans to roll out fully by the year’s end.

“In tests of the new FT.com, users were up to 30% more ‘engaged’ than they were with the previous version of the site, according to FT Chief Executive John Ridding. That means readers are visiting the site more frequently and consuming more content once they are there.

“‘Readers are spending more time on the site and that will help deliver further growth in our global subscriber base,’ Mr. Ridding said.

Read more here.

Chris Roush

Chris Roush was the dean of the School of Communications at Quinnipiac University in Hamden, Connecticut. He was previously Walter E. Hussman Sr. Distinguished Professor in business journalism at UNC-Chapel Hill. He is a former business journalist for Bloomberg News, Businessweek, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, The Tampa Tribune and the Sarasota Herald-Tribune. He is the author of the leading business reporting textbook "Show me the Money: Writing Business and Economics Stories for Mass Communication" and "Thinking Things Over," a biography of former Wall Street Journal editor Vermont Royster.