Why The Information’s pay strategy works

Jessica Lessin, founder of tech news site The Information, spoke with Brian Morrissey of Digiday about how its strategy works.

Morrissey writes, “The knock on a subscription site like The Information is it won’t scale. It’s focused on tech and media decision-makers, not a consumer audience, and its $399 price point in a sea of free alternatives means its fate is to be a boutique publication with a decidedly small reach, the argument goes.

“‘It baffles me,’ Lessin said. The Information model ‘totally scales — and it gives us control over how it scales. What doesn’t scale is high-priced events businesses, where you have to sell these huge one-off deals to be profitable that month. What doesn’t scale is crossing your fingers and hoping you’ll get a big ad deal. What does scale is having a product that people are willing to pay for.’

“There isn’t one correct media model. Publishers like BuzzFeed and Business Insider are amassing large audiences that can be monetized, for the most part, through advertising. But that business model means the content must follow: It has to be mass.”

Read more here.