Being Ikea and Beating the Kitchen Memo Effect
2025 Finalist
Overview of this campaign
Despite working completely digital-first, our newsroom’s focus was on how the content would perform on desktop, not mobile. This led to problems such as hard-to-read graphics and 'text skyscrapers' on small screens. Stories that look great on desktop are not necessarily great on mobile.
The realization that audiences were looking at mobile really hit home when the desktop site went down, and the mobile site and app kept on running. This led to a complete shift to mobile-first. Editorial and product workflows were radically overhauled
The objectives of this project were centered around increasing reader engagement, optimizing content presentation, and improving subscription conversions.
1. Transition to a Mobile-First Experience
With 87% of traffic coming from mobile devices, the newsroom aimed to prioritize mobile over desktop in both design and editorial workflow. Graphics, headlines, and content formatting were restructured to ensure optimal readability on smaller screens.
2. Increase Reader Engagement & Recirculation
The data revealed that only 1 in 10 readers continued to another article after reading one. By applying the “Ikea principle”, the team sought to create an experience where users naturally navigate through multiple stories, increasing the click-through rate from 1.1 to 3.0.
3. Redesign the news flow
The previous page structure, featuring static and fixed elements, led to reader blindness (the "kitchen memo effect"). The goal was to introduce a dynamic, visually engaging, and hierarchy-driven content layout that ensures each story gets appropriate exposure.
4. Optimize Article Layout & Minimize Distractions
Since the article detail page became the primary entry point, all distractions—such as tags, comment sections, and unnecessary newsletter prompts—were removed. The goal was to seamlessly guide readers to additional content, improving engagement and paywall interactions.
Results for this campaign
All graphs can be found on our special INMA entry page: https://digitalnewsinsights.nl/inma_2025/
Launch & The Results
At the end of June 2024, the five regional websites and apps of our newspapers went live. It was a moment of celebration, marking nearly a year of hard work across the organization. But beyond the excitement, one pressing question remained: Would all these changes deliver better results? More readers, more stories read, more engagement, and more new subscribers?
No matter how much research, A/B testing, and usability studies we had conducted—or how much effort we had poured into it—the true test was always whether the audience would agree. Great storytelling is one thing, but data (and readers) never lie.
Fortunately, six months in, we can breathe a sigh of relief and look at the results with pride.
Key Metrics at a Glance:
Recirculation: from 1.1 to 3.0
One of the most critical KPIs—recirculation from the article detail page—has significantly improved. Since two-thirds of our audience enters through articles, the ability to drive them to other stories is a major step forward. We always had great journalism; now, many more eyes are seeing it.
Number of Stories Per Session
Closely linked to recirculation, the number of stories read per session has also shown a solid increase.
Premium Attention Time on Mobile
We’ve long rejected the notion that mobile readers don’t engage deeply. Since shifting to web-first in 2019—and continuously letting data challenge and inform our choices—attention time on our site has steadily risen. For our editors, this remains a key metric in validating the quality of our content.
Scroll Depth
Our new homepage design, free of screen-filling interruptions, has led to a lower overall scroll depth.
Paywall Hits
The number of paywall triggers has increased since launching the new sites and apps, further validating our strategy.
Conversions
Without adjusting pricing or promotional offers, the new sites have driven more subscriptions through the article paywall.
