L’Équipe: 12 projects to retain subscribers following the Paris Olympics
This article summarizes the session given by Fabien Mulot, Marketing Director at L’Équipe, at The Audiencers’ Festival in Paris on September 16, 2025.
TL;DR
- After the peak in acquisitions during the Paris 2024 Olympic Games, L’Équipe identified four key moments to drive retention: onboarding, usage stimulation, retention, and re-subscription.
- A new web and app onboarding process encourages users to read two paid articles within the first three days, as each additional article reduces M+1 churn by five points.
- Newsletters have become a key lever, from “Rendez-vous du mois” to newsletters written by journalists, as well as a new “Games” vertical.
- The cancellation form has been redesigned with a series of A/B tests: adding a summary screen and displaying personalized discounts has improved retention.
- An RFV engagement score adapted to L’Équipe’s style guides all actions: two-thirds of subscribers exceed the strategic threshold of 100.
How can subscribers be retained once the Olympic Games are over? For L’Équipe, the challenge is immense: transforming the momentum of a global event into lasting loyalty. Fabien Mulot shared the methods implemented in 2025, which he summarized as “12 projects” organized around four stages in subscribers lifecycle: onboarding, stimulating usage, retention, and re-subscription:
Each stage has been assigned its own performance indicator:
1. Onboarding: the crucial first 3 days
Data analysis showed a strong correlation between immediate consumption and retention. Reading at least two paid articles within the first three days significantly reduces churn M+1.
This is the core of L’Équipe’s new onboarding strategy: a web and app loop that showcases the benefits of subscription, encourages users to personalize their experience (alerts, newsletters, favorites), and then prompts them to immediately read paid content tailored to their interests.
