How NOT to Charge for Online Content

I've been a subscriber to the online edition of The Wall Street Journal for as long as it's been in existence (since 1996, I believe). It's a great product, and an excellent example of the kind of smart online packaging of news I talked about the other day. And of course, WSJ.com is the grandaddy of all online subscription business models, everybody's favorite example of paid content online that really works.

But the Online Journal is about to lose me as a subscriber because its pricing model has gone haywire.

The Journal has been gradually raising its online price over the years. It started at $49 a year, then went to $59, then $79, then $99, then to $119 last year. This is the online-only price; print subscribers get access to WSJ.com for free. My latest renewal, a couple weeks ago, was for $151 a year. 

That's a big jump over last year's rate, and it got me doing a bit of digging for a better deal. Sure enough, there's an offer on the Journal's site for a $89 online rate for new subscribers. So I called customer support.

This is where things get weird. 

Turns out, yes, the $151 a year price is the going rate for current online-only subscribers. There's no way to get a discount. Unless: If I agreed to also subscribe to the print edition, my total subscription price would be cut in half.

What?!

This is crazy. I don't want unread copies of the print edition cluttering up my recycling box (it is Earth Day, incidentally!). I just want the Web edition—cheaper. I guess in a search for eyeballs for print advertisers, Dow Jones is willing to essentially give the print edition away, damn the printing and delivery costs, at half the price it's been charging online subscribers, no less. Another online subscription success story, ESPN.com, has a similar strategy: You can't get the online version without also getting the cheesy print edition of ESPN: The Magazine. That caused me to cancel both a while back.

And now I'm close to canceling the online Journal. The new WSJ.com iPhone app provides much of the same content—and it's free. There's lots of other good financial content online, albeit not quite as well-packaged. But a publisher who disregards customers that blatantly—trying to force them to buy something they don't want to get something they do want—is just nuts.

Anybody from Dow Jones reading this? You need to fix this. You're about to lose at least one longtime subscriber because your pricing model has gone awry. I can't be the only subscriber pissed about this (probably not). I'm more than happy to pay for an online subscription at a decent price. I just don't want a wasteful print edition delivered to my door. How complicated is that?

Comments

[michebel]

The fault newspapers are making is that they continue to persist in believing that their legacy product (the one printed on paper) is the BEST one. The web continues to be an afterthought or a bastard stepchild, instead of reorienting to the concept that the WEB IS IT, which is most people's reading reality these days.

In short, that's why newspapers are dying.

I do applaud you for this article, though. And continuing to be a subscriber.

--Michelle

http://michebel.blogspot.com
http://michebelzhollywood.mevio.com
http://www.twitter.com/michebel

[Angela Connor]

If the WSJ and Dow Jones is monitoring its brand in the social media space (google blogsearch at the VERY least) surely they will come across this post and reply to you for all to see how important it is to them to interact with their readers. I will subscribe to the comments to see exactly when that happens.

-Angela Connor
http://blog.angelaconnor.com

[Fitzroyalty]

Outstamrt them. Sign up for a new online subscription at the lower price using your dog's name or something...

[Bill Smith]

They aren't forcing you to subscribe to the print edition (either WSJ or ESPN) because they think it's best, they are doing it because their advertising department needs to keep the hard-copy circulation numbers up. Why? Because their Mad Men don't believe in or understand those Internets.

[Tarcisio]

Mas que absurdo, as pessoas deveriam aprender a descomplicar mais as coisas

[Happy WSJ customer]

And on top of all this, the WSJ must think that current subscribers are total idiots who don't notice the $99 offers (for print and online) for "new" subs.

I think I've used 3 different names at my home (an apartment building) for WSJ subscriptions over the last several years. Works just fine. $99 (sometimes with 6-8 addtl weeks tacked on) every time.

[RotterWrites]

Keeps getting worse. Today it's between $220 and $312/year, depending on what offer you're lucky enough to land on.
:-/