08:00 - 09:00

Networking welcome

Join us for coffee, pick up your registration credentials, meet with peers, and connect with solution providers.

09:00 - 09:20

Welcome and introduction to the Summit

Meet the moderators and hear their personal take on the key themes of the plenary sessions, along with an overview of the agenda. Learn the results from the summit attendee survey, which highlights your priorities for 2023.

Ruth Betz

Summit Co-Moderator, Strategic Media Consultant, Blue Engine Collaborative, Germany

Robert Whitehead

Summit Co-Moderator, and Lead, Digital Platform Initiative, INMA, Australia

09:20 - 10:00

Keynote: Lessons in “rockonomics” or why music has 10 times more subscribers than news

American podcaster Joe Rogan alone has more subscribers than the New York Times. Spotify has more digital subscribers than all newspapers altogether. Why? Is music more appealing than text? Are streaming apps more convenient? Is access simply cheaper? Hear advice from the former chief economist of Spotify and author of a bestseller, Tarzan Economics, about how to grow your brand and expand the news subscription penetration not 10% but 10 times.

Will Page

Author, Tarzan Economics, and Ex-Chief Economist, Spotify, United Kingdom

10:00 - 10:40

Executive panel: Media business priorities for 2023

Should we focus this year on volume growth or value? Are these objectives contradictory? Where are the biggest opportunities for growth in 2023? What are the key success factors? In this interactive panel, we pick the brains of accomplished business leaders, economists, and subscription experts, and we invite you to join the debate.

Will Page

Author, Tarzan Economics, and Ex-Chief Economist, Spotify, United Kingdom

Robert Skrob

Author, Retention Point, United States

Angelica Velati

Head, News Partnerships & Ecosystem Strategy EMEA, Google, Italy

10:40 - 11:00

Benchmarks: The state of news media subscriptions

A median news brand more than doubled the total number of digital-only subscriptions in the past three years, INMA found, after benchmarking 166 news brands from 34 countries. In 2022, engagement with news returned to pre-pandemic levels, but publishers continued to acquire new subscribers. What were the winning tactics? What does INMA predict for 2023?

Greg Piechota

Readers First Initiative Lead, INMA, United Kingdom

11:00 - 11:45

Networking break

11:45 - 13:00

Big lessons: Growth strategies and engines of news subscription leaders

Meet the news subscription leaders whose brands saw rapid growth during and after the pandemic. Since the paywall launch in 2020, Spain’s El Pais has crossed 250,000 digital subscribers. France’s Le Monde hit 540,000 subscribers, launched an English edition, and is eyeing one million. The Washington Post is nearing three million. How did they do it?

Luis Baena Reig

Chief Marketing Officer, El Pais, Prisa Media, Spain

Lou Grasser

Director of Marketing and Product, Le Monde, France

Michael Ribero

Chief Subscriptions Officer, The Washington Post, United States

13:00 - 14:15

Lunch

14:15 - 15:30

Big ideas: Growing beyond the core with bundling and unbundling

Offering multiple products together in a single package provides more value to consumers and helps to gain market share. Norway’s Schibsted and Poland’s Ringier Axel Springer bundle newspapers, magazines, podcasts, and language courses. The Times of India goes further, bundling entertainment, food, fashion, and lifestyle benefits. Yet it also innovates with unbundling and selling single articles. Is this the future of the news media industry?

Tor Jacobsen

Senior Vice-President, Consumer and Subscriptions, Schibsted, Norway

Aleksander Kutela

Chief Executive Officer, Ringier Axel Springer, Poland

Radhika Shukla

Head of Subscription Growth, Times of India, India

15:30 - 16:00

Networking break

16:00 - 17:15

Big transformations: Reader revenue as a change catalyst

In 2016, the United Kingdom’s Independent shut down the printed edition and focused on digital instead. Since then, the revenue has rebounded and the Independent is profitable. What did this transition take? Hear other success stories from the trenches of digital transformation – making subscriptions work for local news in the U.K.-based DC Thomson Media, and transferring know-how from Belgian and Dutch brands of Mediahuis to Germany.

Jo Holdaway

Chief Data and Marketing Officer, The Independent, United Kingdom

Graham McDougall

Head of Subscription Growth, News & Sport, DC Thomson Media, United Kingdom

Emmanuel Naert

Digital Acceleration Director, Medienhaus Aachen, Luxembourg

Nele Toye

Chief Revenue Officer, B2C, Medienhaus Aachen, Germany

17:15 - 17:45

Big story: News media for war and peace

Ukrainian journalists may lack electricity or the internet, and often work from bomb shelters. But they continue to witness their country at war, inform communities, and tell the world about the war crimes. Hear a first-hand account from the association representing 100+ Ukrainian news outlets and from Sweden’s Bonnier News which rallied the West for support. How best to help today, so Ukrainian media survive? And how to plan the post-war future?

Oksana Brovko

Chief Executive Officer, Association of Independent Regional Publishers, Ukraine

Thomas Mattsson

Senior Advisor, Bonnier News, Sweden

17:45 - 18:00

Takeaways of the day

Let us summarise and distil the day’s highlights together with our moderators. What new ideas did we hear? What lessons should we bring home?

18:00 - 19:30

Cocktail reception

Unwind after intensive presentations and discussions in a relaxed atmosphere with a glass in hand. Catch up with your peers, connect with new colleagues, find your party for dinner in one of Stockholm’s many restaurants. You’re just minutes away from the old town!

08:00 - 09:00

Networking welcome

Join us for coffee, pick up your registration credentials, meet with peers, and connect with solution providers.

09:00 - 09:10

Welcome back and introduction to the Summit Day 2

A brief update about the main themes and the agenda from our moderators. Participate in live polls, share and learn the best performing tactics and the most promising experiments that you should try in 2023.

Ruth Betz

Summit Co-Moderator, Strategic Media Consultant, Blue Engine Collaborative, Germany

Robert Whitehead

Summit Co-Moderator, and Lead, Digital Platform Initiative, INMA, Australia

09:10 - 09:50

Keynote: What chief subscriptions officers should do now – and why do you need one?

The newsroom got the right story, the product made it shine, the marketing sold it, but whose job is retaining the new subscriber? A new position is on the rise, that of the Chief Subscription Officer, or whoever else is overseeing the media company’s subscription strategy and revenue, from the first touchpoint to the last. What is this job really about? And where to start?

Robert Skrob

Author, Retention Point, United States

09:50 - 10:30

The big change: How reader revenue models mature

Great brands never stand still. They change strategy, operations, customer experience, technology, and culture as they grow. Hear the remarkable stories of self reflection and transformation of reader revenue models at Italy’s Corriere della Sera (just passed 500,000 digital subscribers).

Fabio Napoli

Business Digital Director, RCS Media Group, Italy

Maria Sgromo

Head of Subscriptions, Corriere della Sera, RCS Media Group, Italy

10:30 - 11:15

Networking break

11:15 - 12:45

Best practices: Managing subscriber journeys from acquisition to retention and win-back

Publishers drive lifetime value of their subscribers across their journeys: speeding acquisition, delaying churn, and reactivating lapsed subscribers. They build relationships beyond the transaction, they engage, nurture, delight. Learn what works best for international (The Guardian), national (Neue Zürcher Zeitung), and business news brands (Nikkei).

Nashua Gallagher

Head of Customer Journey Management, Neue Zürcher Zeitung (NZZ), Switzerland

Mio Kataoka

Product Manager, Nikkei, Japan

Jesse Wilkins

Senior Growth Manager, Global Reader Revenues, The Guardian, United Kingdom

12:45 - 14:00

Lunch

14:00 - 14:45

Data-driven ideas: Driving growth with subscription analytics and experiments

Data analytics is a super power of fast-growing subscription brands. It informs decisions, fuels algorithms, changes culture. The capacity and skill to rigorously test ideas through experiment is another super power. Hear how two groups — multinational Mediahuis and Swiss national Tamedia — become smarter and more agile, and what ideas for analyses and experiments you should try at home.

Trui Lanckriet

Data and Insights Director, Mediahuis Group, Belgium

Nicolas Baumgartner

Product and Pricing, Manager, Tamedia, Switzerland

14:45 - 15:50

Lessons from new launches: Capturing and diversifying audiences with subscription products

One of the last independent newsrooms in Hungary – 444 – asked readers to give them money so they could build a paywall and charge them more. You won’t believe what happened next. Launching a product is exciting, but the startup stories are full of thrills. Listen to a story about how Norway’s Schibsted turned a podcast startup, PodMe, into a staple of its subscription goals. Learn from a U.S. giant, Gannett, that found and captured new local audiences.

Kristin Heimdal

Country Manager, PodMe, Norway

Amalie Nash

Senior Vice President, Local News and Audience Development, Gannett, United States

Gábor Kardos

Chief Executive Officer, 444.hu, Hungary

15:50 - 16:00

Takeaways of the day and Summit conclusions

Let us recap the ideas and lessons learned at this summit, and hear the moderators offer their personal takeaways that we should remember.

16:00 - 17:00

Closing cocktails

Join us for farewell drinks and chats. Let us exchange e-mail addresses and LinkedIn invites, and raise a glass together for a fantastic 2023.