David Carzon (formerly of Arte, Télérama, Libération, and Binge Audio) is a journalist, consultant, and author. This article was originally published in his newsletter Hupster, and provides a follow up from Audiencers first article on Le Monde in English, published six months after its launch in 2022.

The situation before 2020

At the start of the project, Le Monde’s digital subscription offer was €1 for the first month, then €9.90/month for the first year.

This offer made it possible to acquire a significant number of subscribers…

…but failed to retain them in the long term as the price rose to €13 per month in the second year, then to €17.90 in the third.

A new set of offers (after 2020)

Thanks to the development of an internal fraud detection system called “Capping” — which blocks users who are simultaneously trying to access to articles from multiple devices using the same account, i.e. account sharing — Le Monde was able to confidently promote multi-account subscriptions (B2C and B2B)….

This has led to an increase in “duo” and “family” subscriptions, which are sold at higher prices.

Next step: price increase

The Le Monde team conducted an A/B test of a price increase on 10,000 subscribers, who were divided into two groups: +$1/month and +$2/month. An informational email was sent in December for an increase to be applied in January.

The results were analyzed the following March:

“Following this test, we observed slightly better retention with the €1 per month increase compared to the €2 increase. Out of caution, and given that this was the first price adjustment under the new pricing structure, we chose to start with the €1 monthly increase, which was considered less risky—while still generating a significant increase in revenue. For certain cohorts with lower initial prices, we opted for increases greater than $1, based on the findings of this initial test.”

What Le Monde took away from it

Their ARPU has been growing steadily since 2020, and the presentation of subscription offers has been optimized for greater clarity and conversion.

Rather than starting with price, Le Monde begins by improving the offering, perceived value, user experience, and fraud prevention. Only then do they adjust the price. This is a deliberate “price-last” approach.

The Atlantic: make the value tangible for subscribers

With prices set at $79.99/year (digital), $89.99/year (print + digital), and $120/year (premium ad-free), The Atlantic is below its competitors in terms of price, but above average in terms of retention and growth: +15% subscribers YoY, and a retention rate of over 70%.

Mariah Craddick divides subscriber benefits into three categories:

• Essentials: unlimited access, newsletters, mobile app, narrated articles, digital issues.
• Utilities: article saving, sharing, reading mode, app customization.
• Bonuses: subscriber-only podcasts, games, live events, merchandise.

They measure value through:

• the percentage of new subscribers who performed a key action within the first seven days.
• the proportion of subscribers with “engaged” or “core” status.
• a retention rate that is four points higher among those who completed on-site onboarding.
• Articles narrated via 11 Labs, the article sharing feature, and the premium mobile experience (particularly on iPad) are key differentiators.

One of the secrets of their success? On-site onboarding.

Subscribers who complete the onboarding process on The Atlantic website retain 4 points more than those who do not!

Onet Premium: the most daring bundle in Europe

In Poland, Ringier Axel Springer launched Onet Premium, a bundled subscription giving access to more than 15 major brands (Onet, Poland’s leading news site, Newsweek, Forbes, Politico, Business Insider, National Geographic, and others). Together, these brands reach 22 million Polish users every month.

The offer includes:

• exclusive items from several brands.
• 150 episodes of exclusive podcasts per month.
• 30,000 audio articles per month.
• an average listening time of 67 minutes and 10 hours per month per user in the audio app.
• cross-promotional newsletters, subscriber events, and editorial formats shared between brands.

To achieve this, they created a unified identity driven by editorial consistency and cross-brand storytelling, proving the value of the bundle through its impact beyond each individual brand and building a community around the power of critical thinking.

As a result, between 2019 and 2024, they achieved rapid growth:

• +91% average annual revenue growth;

• -32% churn rate;
• +15% share of highly engaged subscribers;
• +58% revenue growth between 2023 and 2024.

Key takeaway: To prove the value of the bundle and move from a “price-first” to a “price-last” model, the value proposition must be consistent, clear, accessible, and obvious to the user.

Since taking over as CEO of Groupe Le Monde in 2010, Louis Dreyfus has pursued a clear ambition: proving that high-quality journalism can be economically sustainable — primarily through digital subscriptions. At the World News Media Congress 2025 hosted by WAN-IFRA, he shared a series of concrete editorial, tech and marketing decisions that have powered the group’s consistent growth.

Key developments include:

• Thematic supplements on feminism, sexuality, climate, and the launch of public events (Le Festival du Monde)
• The launch of weekly magazine M 14 years ago, modeled after the New York Times Magazine, leading to an immediate +30% boost in traffic at launch, now accountiung for 25% of advertising revenue

Le Monde also developed new editorial verticals:

• The “Intimités” section, created in 2023, exploring intimacy, housing, parenting — highly popular with readers

• A major investment in African coverage, now with 36 dedicated journalists

2. Heavily investing in the newsroom

One of the group’s key moves: hiring.

From 310 journalists in 2010 to 560 today — a +80% increase in just over a decade.

“You can’t produce great journalism without journalists.”

The ambition: offer exclusive, in-depth, international content that justifies subscription value.

3. Winning over young audiences on social platforms

Le Monde made a clear bet: meet under-18s where they already are — Snapchat, TikTok, Instagram, YouTube.

The result: native video formats led by young, identifiable journalists, with a clear, educational tone.

→ These short formats act as a gateway to subscriptions

→ Young audiences later return via desktop or the app, with strong retention potential

4. Investing in 3 distinct app products

Le Monde now offers:

• A PDF replica app (faithful to the print edition)
• A “Le Monde” app publishing more than 100 articles per day, 7 days a week
• A Tinder-like news discovery product (“La Matinale”) that delivers a curated daily briefing, with a selection of 21 articles

The goal: match mobile-first habits and improve retention through tailored experiences.

5. Subscriptions: growth, profitability and the end of the deficit

Key 2024 metrics:

• +10% digital subscription growth, +8% all kind of subs
• Average ARPU (monthly revenue per subscriber): €11.84

• Within 2 years, digital revenues alone will cover the entire newsroom costs

“We’ve entered a virtuous cycle where more subscribers = more resources to produce journalism.”

6. Fighting password sharing — and turning it into revenue

When the team found that some accounts were being used by over 5,000 people (!), Le Monde launched an upsell strategy inspired by Netflix — using an in-house tech tool called Capping:

• Pop-ups triggered by suspicious simultaneous usage
• Automated upsell to duo or family plans

→ Thousands of subscribers upgraded to more profitable plans

→ Le Monde is now offering Capping to other publishers

7. A fast-growing international edition

Two years ago, Le Monde launched Le Monde in English:

• 40 articles translated daily by native English-speaking editors and journalists
• A dedicated newsletter
• 7 full-time staff members

Results:

• 50% of new international subscribers now come from this edition
• Top countries: US, UK, Canada

→ Translations are now handled by OpenAI instead of DeepL or human translators, with only light editing by in-house journalists — lowering costs significantly.

Key numbers to remember

• In 2010, Le Monde was losing €10M per year
• In 2024, it will generate €25M in EBITDA

Define an engagement score. Several speakers referred to the classic RFV (recency, frequency and volume) index, which can be used to determine editorial performance by mixing quali and quanti criteria.

Dorothée Fluckiger from Prisma added to “recurrence of visits per month” the “average duration of sessions”.

Romain Lhote of L’Equipe weights this RFV index by the journalistic value of an article or topic. This makes it possible to include value of being associated with a subject (as a brand) or societal value – for instance, few read this article on defending Madagascan women’s cause, but we’re happy to associate ourselves morally with those who defend it. This is to mitigate the outright deletion of ghost articles.

L’Equipe also tempers the index by measuring article’s advertising yield. If advertisers are keen on a subject of little interest, there’s no reason not to do it. These revenues will finance other, more popular subjects.

As for Les Echos, they’ve set up a system for evaluating “quality reads”. This technical device measures how far a user scrolls, and how long they spend on a page. The result is an average efficiency index that enables the team to assess the quality of the attention that an article holds.

This index is combined with quantitative audience performance (number of page views), to determine hot or cold editorial optimization axes.

Hot editorial optimization axes:

These indicators make it possible to adapt production in real time (change the title, caption, add recirculation links, highlight the article on the homepage or social networks, etc.).

Cold editorial optimization axes:

Identify trends in terms of formats or needs served to readers.

3. Don’t talk down to readers, especially GenZ

That’s the advice from Lisbeth Nizet of MediaHuis. The new generation, our future readers and subscribers, want to be involved in the discussion.

These 12-25 year-olds like content that is embodied, accessible and fun. They like to give their opinion, contradict, protest.

“Don’t talk down to me, but make me smarter” and respect the content creators for whom I have affection.

Other recommendations:

• Don’t sugarcoat information, but offer solutions (constructive journalism)
• Be sincere, even in your faults and mistakes
• Provide practical services
• Take inspiration from media brands such as Brut, TLDR, Volv & Zetland
  

4.  Build a strong community

After preaching in the wilderness for a long time, it seems that some media outlets are finally proving me right. That community is the prerequisite for a subscription (or any digital revenue) strategy, as I’ve been saying for a long time.

Médiapart took a considerable lead by launching its own community 15 years ago, and maintaining it. This is in contrast to free media sites, which have gradually shut their comments and interactive spaces down from 2016 onwards.

The advent of the paid model in 2017 should have led to their transformation, not their disappearance. Community building features such as these are a formidable acquisition and loyalty driver.

L’Equipe has understood this, deciding to revitalize its comments with a makeover (below). Better still, the sports site’s interactive spaces enable exchanges between subscribers, as well as with the editorial team. It’s an attention to detail that readers appreciate.

The same goes for Les Echos, which has redesigned its contributors’ area. They’ve realized that enhancing the value of readers is also a powerful factor in building loyalty, and even acquisition.

5. Establish value exchanges: content for data

Access to quizzes, personality tests, newsletters, white papers, podcasts… you need to offer something valuable to a user in exchange for data collection.

Some marketing tools, such as Actito, offer this kind of editorial functionality to attract registrations (and therefore user data).

6. Test pricing models to optimize ARPU

Le Monde has abandoned its old prices, which were holding the publisher back not only acquisition, but above all on revenue growth.

The old price range:

To reinvent their pricing model, Lou Grasser worked with Le Monde’s data-scientists to set up a predictive model based on subscription and churn (attrition) data from its entire base.

The new tariffs had to avoid cannibalizing each other. We remember the New York Times’ $8 offer for the Now application, which attracted subscribers who paid much more.

The group analyzed everything: the impact of pricing on subscriber churn, on new subscriber acquisition, on revenue… The results was three tariffs – €9.99 (web), €19.99 (2 accounts) and €29.99 euros (4 accounts) were found to be the most profitable.

What Le Monde has learned from its tests and analysis via predictive models:

• Annual price promotions aren’t that smart, because they’ll cannibalize fans, without reaching opportunists.

• It’s better to offer a monthly discount (with a one-month promotion per year, not two).

• The 5-euro offer (-50%) is not profitable, because while it works well for acquisition, better than the 10-euro offer, it doesn’t generate enough subscriptions to compensate for the smaller gain.

• The student offer was not sufficiently promoted, even though it was clicked on 7 times more than the other offers.

Other learnings

• It’s important to take care of the offers page to “show more than tell”. Hence the use of a carousel displaying the best-selling content.
• It’s also important to diversify prices and payment methods internationally (especially in Africa).

7. Ensure you’re effectively monetizing your existing audience before looking to acquire new audiences

Prisma has no shortage of user data. The group has 18 million accounts logged-in via its in-house SSO (Prisma Media Connect), and a third are subscribed to one or more newsletters.

Google one tap on Chrome is the group’s primary vector for subscriptions. The trick: Prisma re-targets these users to invite them to sign up for a newsletter (and retrieve an “in-house” login).

But not everyone can be converted into a subscriber. If Prisma converts 0.5 to 1% of its audience via paywalls, it will be a great success says Dorothée Fluckiger.

There are therefore 3 objectives for this data: 

• Attract the right reader to the right CRM channel: conversion to subscriber, enhancement through advertising, e-commerce affiliation…
• Increase advertising yield by targeting users who are logged in (+34% average RPM if logged in, according to Prisma calculations)
• Save on paid acquisition campaigns

8. Organize your team according to goals

It needs to be light, via squads (small multi-trade teams with a product manager, a developer, a sales person and an editor, for example), aligned on the same objectives, with the same incentives. And who get on well together!

At Ebra, Morgane Alimi explains that there is a central coordinator who supports the teams, and then a dozen ambassadors in each division.

At Prisma, “lead sponsors” pilot the projects and tests with the various departments (marketing, data-analysts, Ux design, Dev, CRM…).

At Les Echos (inspired by the Wall Street Journal), the organization is matrix-based and cross-functional by business rather than by media brand:

• Platform division (HP sites, app’ ) – topic control
• Audience Engagement (distribution, search, RS), editing
• Visual department (photo and video editing)

The same applies at Prisma, where the matrix organization is also based on squads, to ensure agility and proximity to the field.

Dorothée Fluckiger’s trick for conducting her tests with peace of mind is to be under the radar in terms of costs, and to highlight the savings achieved. By trying to encourage decision-makers to invest more heavily in digital marketing.

9. Subscription cancellations need to be dealt with, and quick

The first few days of cancellation are the most important, so don’t delay!

Romain Lhote tells us that 70% of resubscriptions are made within 7 days of cancellation.

Whilst ex-subscribers are 18 times more likely to re-subscribe than members, and 324 times more likely than anonymous readers!

Hence the crucial role of Customer Service, who must be given the facts: not only the history of each user, but also a maintenance guide. So as not to immediately offer a discount, before knowing what the problem is.

• Is the problem editorial? Is there content or newsletters they don’t know about, or is it possible to offer them special promotions?

• Is it the timing of distribution? Focus on configurable alerts, the free app, etc.

10. A different audience often requires a different media and branding entirely

Such is the case with Retronews, which has created a second portal to distinguish the general public from its B2B customers.

It’s a valuable lesson for other media. “What’s the probability,” asked a member of the audience, ”that a young reader who subscribes to the newspaper’s social account, where we broadcast fun short videos, will subscribe to the paper newspaper?” Zero or close to it.

The reality is that the information model proposed for Generation Z or even Millenialls (the generation after) is not adapted to their preferences, neither in content nor in form. We’re going to have to reinvent ourselves more radically if we want to attract new readers.

But in the meantime, we have to produce something that – with a few exceptions – supports most press groups. According to APIG CEO Pierre Pétillaut, paper will still account for 80% of average press revenues in 2023.

11. BONUS TRACK. Test and measure progress (derr!)

Whether it’s acquisition or retention, success, as in Fame, can only be paid for in one currency: sweat.

You have to test everything: creative direction, visuals, prices, benefits, distribution channels and timing.

For L’Equipe, this represents over 300 subscription promotion messages per year. You know what you have to do. ^^ Test test test.

Écouter des articles plutôt que les lire, parce que nous sommes en voiture, les mains prises à la cuisine ou en pleine séance de sport : si l'idée a séduit toute l'industrie au moment de l'explosion des enceintes vocales, la réalité a, soyons francs, franchement déçu. Voix métallique, erreurs de prononciation, ton monocorde : nos oreilles ont beaucoup saigné. Mais ça, c'était en 2017. Les évolutions fulgurantes des technologies de synthèse vocale ont depuis rendu l'expérience acceptable et même… plébiscitée.

Début mars 2024, le quotidien français Le Monde a lancé dans ses apps mobiles la version audio de l'ensemble de ses articles, une fonctionnalité réservée à ses abonnés. J'ai rencontré Lomig Coulon, Lead Product Manager, et Julie Lelièvre, Responsable Adjointe Audience, qui ont raconté à The Audiencers la genèse du projet, son développement et ses premiers résultats.

Bien sûr, ces dernières années nous voyions que l’usage de l’audio en France via les podcasts se développait, et qu’aux Etats-Unis et Royaume-Uni, certains médias lançaient la lecture de leurs articles par des comédiens. On surveillait cela, on notait la tendance… sans forcément travailler le sujet.

C’est en 2022, quand nous démarrons la refonte de notre application mobile La Matinale, que le projet prend corps. La mission de cette app est de faire gagner du temps aux lecteurs, via une sélection d’actu plus réduite. L’audio répond à ce même besoin de gain de temps, nous avons donc choisi de nous lancer !

D’autre part, dans nos formulaires de désabonnement, beaucoup d’abonnés nous disaient qu’ils adoraient Le Monde, mais qu’ils n’avaient pas le temps de lire, avec cette impression de ne pas profiter de leur abonnement. 

Notre position a alors été :

“S’ils n’ont pas le temps de nous lire, ils auront peut-être le temps de nous écouter !”

Parlons objectifs. À quoi sert le développement de cette fonctionnalité ?

Nous en identifions deux :

• D’abord la rétention des abonnés : pousser à l’usage, à la consommation des contenus ;
• Et aussi du recrutement, en faisant la promotion de ce service réservé aux abonnés seulement.

En 2022, le périmètre du projet, c’est uniquement sur l’app La Matinale, exact ?

Oui, effectivement. La Matinale c’est un format fini, avec des utilisateurs engagés et un rendez-vous déjà installé. Le fait que ce soit une sélection finie permet de créer une playlist audio de façon évidente. Les lecteurs font leur sélection au sein des 20 articles, et ainsi ils se font leur propre sélection à écouter sur leur trajet du matin.

Il y a aussi moins d’audience sur La Matinale que sur notre application principale Le Monde , ce qui en fait un terrain plus propice à l’expérimentation et à l’innovation.

Si nous avons opté pour une approche itérative et d’abord restreint cette fonctionnalité à La Matinale, nous avons dès le départ conçu le player et le mécanisme de transcription des articles pour êtres re-utilisable sur l’ensemble de nos articles et dans l’application principale Le Monde

Au démarrage, faites-vous une distinction articles gratuits / payants, ou lecteurs abonnés / non-abonnés ?

Nous avons beaucoup réfléchi à ce sujet, entre renforcer la valorisation de notre abonnement en y réservant la fonctionnalité, et faire découvrir cette nouvelle manière façon de s’informer au plus grand nombre.

C’est pourquoi quand nous lançons la fonctionnalité dans la Matinale, la fonctionnalité audio est disponible pour tous sur les articles gratuits comme payants. Ainsi, les non-abonnés pouvaient écouter les quelques articles gratuits présents chaque jour dans l’édition de la Matinale.

Finalement, quand nous avons déployé le service sur l’appli principale Le Monde, nous l’avons réservé aux abonnés seulement. Nous avons donc ré-aligné la Matinale sur ce même principe.”

Comment avez-vous choisi la solution technologique de text-to-speech ?

Nous avons rapidement éliminé l’option de lecture par un humain : nous publions plus de 100 articles par jour, nous souhaitions proposer la version audio dès la publication et n’avons donc pas le temps requis pour faire les faire lire par des comédiens, enregistrer les voix, etc. Dans ce contexte, la solution de la voix de synthèse a été évidente.

Nous avons étudié différentes solutions : Murf, Odia, Remixd, Voxygen, Google, ETX Studio, Read Speaker et Microsoft Azure Cognitive Service.

Nous avons fini par choisir la solution de Microsoft, sur le critère premier de la qualité de la voix. À ce moment-là, c’était eux qui avaient la voix française la plus convainquante. 

>

Nous continuons de suivre attentivement les progrès des technologies de synthèse vocale, de Microsoft comme celles d’autres acteurs, car dans ce domaine des IA génératives les choses bougent très vite !

À la question de la voix s’ajoute celle de la diffusion. Quel player audio avez-vous choisi ?

Ce projet nous a permis de développer notre propre player natif pour nos applications mobiles. Auparavant, nous utilisions un player web “embed” qui se montrait déceptif à plusieurs niveaux : pas de continuité de lecture hors navigation, peu de fonctionnalités liées au confort de lecture… 

Aujourd’hui, nos lecteurs peuvent reduire ou agrandir le player audio, récupérer le lien de  l’article qui est en train d’être lu, faire varier la vitesse de lecture et surtout, poursuivre l’écoute en navigation ou lorsque le téléphone est verrouillé.

Nous avons été surpris de constater l’usage de la vitesse de lecture ! Bien plus utilisé que ce que nous pensions…

Concrètement, quel est le processus de transcription des articles écrits vers l’audio ?

En amont, nous avons fait deux choses : 

• Créer nos propres voix de synthèse personnalisées avec des acteurs. Nous avons maintenant 4 custom voices “Le Monde”. On a choisi d’alterner les voix d’homme et de femme pour maintenir l’attention au fil des paragraphes ; 
• Notre compositrice officielle, Amandine Robillard, a créé différentes nappes sonores pour ajouter une couche musicale à notre text-to-speech, que l’on utilise en introduction de nos sons.

Ensuite, au quotidien :

• Le Monde envoie à Microsoft le texte de chaque article et un certain nombre de réglages. Par exemple, on explique qu’il y a des portions à lire et ne pas lire (comme les intertitres ou ce qui est entre crochets), le nombre de voix à utiliser…

• Microsoft nous renvoie un fichier audio avec nos règles appliquées ;
• Notre outil maison ajoute une introduction “Vous écoutez un article du Monde” et la nappe sonore ;
• Le fichier arrive alors dans Sirius, notre CMS maison, et est publié tel que.

Au début bien sûr, nous écoutions les fichiers reçus un à un, pour corriger notamment la prononciation des noms propres, les chiffres romains, les mots avec tiret… Aujourd’hui ce n’est plus le cas, la version audio est directement mise en production. Nous corrigeons uniquement si les lecteurs nous signalent des erreurs.

Quels cas de prononciation ont été les plus difficile à traiter ?

Nous avons créé notre propre dictionnaire, quelques exemples de cas particulier : 

• Le “t” final de “jet d’eau” vs “jets privés”
• Jean le prénom vs jean, le pantalon
• Dix et six (“s” final à prononcer ou non)

Un cas mal traité, typiquement, c’est la lettre X en majuscule, où pour le nouveau nom de Twitter, la voix dit 10. On savait qu’il y aurait quelques erreurs de ce type : on accepte une marge d’imperfection… 

Les voix françaises vont encore s’améliorer, mais ce n’est déjà pas si mal. Quelques lecteurs se sont fait prendre et ont cru à des voix humaines !

Toutefois, précisons que ce n’était pas notre intention, il est indiqué clairement dans nos apps qu’il s’agit d’une voix de synthèse.

Quels ont été vos premiers résultats ?

Sur La Matinale, l’engagement des lecteurs a beaucoup augmenté mais comme nous l’observions en post-refonte, difficile de savoir si c’est la feature qui génère de l’engagement, ou l’engagement qui génère l’usage de la feature…

Au printemps 2023, vous décidez de lancer ce service dans l’application principale Le Monde, mais sur une toute petite partie de l’audience…

Effectivement, à ce moment-là on se lance dans un immense A/B test qui aura duré 1 an, dont nous avons suivi le déploiement et le résultats via la plateforme d’analyse produit Amplitude

Concrètement, on a pris 25% de l’audience de l’application principale, et on l’a découpée en 8 cohortes :

• 4 cohortes de controle qui n’ont pas accès à l’audio
• 4 cohortes de tests qui ont accès à l’audio

Et les 8 sont composées de la même façon, pour s’assurer que 2 cohortes suivent le même schéma. Pour confirmer que le test est viable, on a attendu que les 4 cohortes de tests suivent les mêmes variations.

> Voir le webinar du Monde & d’Apmplitude qui présente les contours de cet A/B test d’envergue 

D’un point de vue fonctionnel, où est-ce que la fonctionnalité est présentée aux utilisateurs ?

On expose la feature dans la page article, dans la bottom bar, alors que dans La Matinale, le lecteur y a accès dès la sélection des news, soit une page avant. 

Mais on se rend compe que dans l’application principale, la feature a du mal à prendre. On se dit qu’elle manque probablement d’exposition, car après avoir cliqué sur le titre de l’article, les utilisateurs sont en démarche de lecture, et pas dans une démarche d’écoute. 

On fait quelques tests utilisateurs, et on constate que nos lecteurs n’ont même pas vu l’option audio ! Notre hypothèse principale devient alors que nous devons exposer davantage cette fonctionnalité…

Bien sûr, on a un problème de communication, car comme nous étions en plein A/B test, on ne pouvait pas faire de communication massive, seulement envoyer quelques push in-app.

Comment vous y prenez-vous alors pour la montrer à plus d’utilisateurs ?

On refait donc un push in-app à tous les beta-testeurs, avec un A/B/C/D test sur les textes :

Ci-dessus les 4 versions de nos pushs lancés avec Batch

Et là on voit un bon boost d’usage, avec une stabilité dans le temps. 

On constate que le succès de cette feature dépend (aussi) de son exposition !

Donc on décide d’afficher le bouton de lancement de la lecture audio directement dans les pages de flux (homes, home de rubrique…), et là, l’usage explose. On valide donc qu’il y a un engagement pour la fonctionnalité, il fallait juste la mettre en avant !

En mars 2024, vous lancez la fonctionnalité sur 100% de l’audience de votre application principale…

Oui, effectivement. Voici ci-dessous ce que voient nos abonnés – sur les pages de flux (à gauche), sur la page article (à droite) : 

Et ci-après, deux copies d’écran de l’incitation à l’abonnement au lancement de l’écoute depuis une page de flux (à gauche) et depuis une page article (à droite) : 

Quels sont les premières statistiques d’usage ?

Parmi les utilisateurs abonnés qui utilisent l’application, 30% utilisent la fonctionnalité au moins une fois par mois depuis son lancement.

Nous constatons que les lecteurs qui utilisent la fonctionnalité sont 1,7 fois plus engagés que les autres lecteurs (en nombre d’articles lus).

Avez-vous déjà observé des effets sur la rétention des abonnés ?

Pour le moment, non, pas vraiment. Ceux qui écoutent ne restent pas forcément abonnés plus longtemps. En revanche, on note un effet sur l’engagement : ceux qui écoutent lisent plus d’articles !

Peut-on tirer le raisonnement jusqu’à dire que s’il y a plus d’articles qui sont lus, alors l’abonnement est plus solide ? Difficile de le dire à ce stade.

Comment étudiez-vous l’usage de vos lecteurs/auditeurs ?

On a un évidemment tout un plan de taggage pour faire du quanti (où est-ce que la feature est utilisée, quelle part de complétion de l’audio…?).

Côté quali, nous avons mis en place un formulaire de feedback dans l’app, et un autre dans le player

Nous recherchons deux types de retours :

• Est-ce qu’il y a un problème sur la qualité de l’audio : chiffres ou non propres mal prononcés, voix trop robotique…?
• Et des feedbacks plus globaux : est-ce que c’est facile à utiliser, que pensez-vous de l’habillage sonore…?

Qu’apprenez-vous ?

D’abord un chiffre : 80% des utilisateurs se disent “satisfaits” ou “très satisfaits” de la fonctionnalité.

Ensuite évidemment, la plupart des verbatims font très plaisir…

“C’est hyper intéressant de pouvoir écouter les longs articles, c’est une super idée !”

“J’écoute beaucoup de podcast et j’apprécie grandement pouvoir écouter mes articles du Monde”

“Bravo ! J’ai rarement vu une aussi bonne intégration d’une voix synthétique ! “

Liés à l’usage

“Tres bonne initiative, permet d’écouter des articles en marchant.”

“Pouvoir écouter des articles sous la douche ou en voiture”

Accessibilité

“Bonjour. Bravo pour cette fonctionnalité, c’est super. Je suis non-voyant et je kiff utiliser en faisant mon sport.”

“Merci pour les dyslexiques qui peuvent enfin vous écouter.”

Abonnement

“Je trouve ça top et c’est pour cette fonctionnalité que je me suis abonné!”

Par contre, on remonte peu d’info sur les lieux de lecture. Est-on plus écoutés en voiture ou en faisant la vaisselle ?

Cherchez-vous à prouver le retour sur investissement de ce développement ?

Cette version audio des articles, c’est surtout une volonté de jouer l’innovation, et une expérimentation. Il s’agit de développer un nouvel usage sur du moyen/long terme, donc on ne s’attend pas à un retour sur investissement en année 1.

Il est à noter que ce projet a été mené grâce a la Google News Initiative, qui nous a permis de financer une large partie des développements initiaux. Pour le moment nous ne prévoyons pas d’autres développements, mais nous avons des coûts d’exploitation (licence Azure et génération des audios avec nos voix Le Monde).

Sur les revenus, comme c’est une fonctionnalité réservée aux abonnés, on peut bien sûr calculer le taux de conversion sur le paywall et suivre à quel point la fonctionnalité participe au recrutement et à la rétention des abonnés. Enfin, il est possible techniquement de monétiser ces audios par la publicité, mais ce n’est pas encore le cas. Toutefois notre régie réfléchit à développer cette possibilité dans le futur.

According to the latest Reuters Digital News Report, 36% of people worldwide choose to avoid news. In France, the Jean Jaurès Foundation found that in 2023, 53% of people suffer from information fatigue. From a business perspective, this represents a significant number of readers who may never subscribe to any news title or are at risk of unsubscribing soon. For the French newspaper Le Monde, this matter is taken seriously. This is why their team launched "Découvrir" ("Discover" in English), a new tab in their mobile app that showcases mainly positive and feel-good stories. We met Quentin Leredde, Product & Audience Director, who led this project.

Each feature team gathers a Product Manager, a Product Owner, a Developer, and a Product Designer. The role of “Product Manager” is new to us, we created it in 2022. Their mission is to lead product strategies that will bring value to users.

“Découvrir” is a mobile app feature that was developed by our mobile app team, but in fact, it was an idea born during a hackathon we organized last year…

Tell us more about this hackathon!

So in October 2022, our CTO/CIO, Sacha Morard, and Lou Grasser, Chief Marketing & Product Officer, brought 60 members of our digital teams together into one room for two intensive days. They were tasked with brainstorming new and innovative project ideas for Le Monde. We had just established this new product organization and wanted to get everyone working together. This was obviously a team-building event, but we organized it as a competition, with cash rewards for the winners!

Twelve groups, each with five members, were formed. We had PM, POs, product designers, marketers, data analysts, and developers on board – but no journalists. Each of them had to create a prototype of their idea, which had to be functional by the end of the hackathon.

To rank the projects, we used four criteria:
• Reach and impact: how many users will benefit from this project?
• Quality of execution
• ROI: business value for Le Monde
• Speed of implementation

The jury was made up of Le Monde management, including Jérôme Fénoglio, Le Monde’s Director, and Louis Dreyfus, Le Monde Group’s CEO.

Out of the 12 projects presented, two made it to our 2023 roadmap, and both have since been released, with “Découvrir” claiming the first prize.

Ah great ! Do tell us more…

The team who came up with this idea had the latest Reuters Digital News Report in mind. It reveals that 36% of people worldwide now chose to avoid the news, a significant increase from the 29% recorded in 2017! They also gathered insights from many of our unsubscribed readers, who emphasized the negative impact of news – how it was often depressing and anxiety-inducing. These readers expressed a strong desire for more positive stories. In France, the Jean Jaurès Foundation reported that, in 2023, 53% of people suffer from information fatigue…

From a business standpoint, this represents a substantial number of readers who might never subscribe to Le Monde or may churn soon. That is a serious business challenge for us, and all news media outlets worldwide.

So, Florence Pouvatchy, Nicolas Viry, Jérémie Chambrion, Agnès Bregeon and Georgia Gaye had this brilliant idea. They wanted to give our readers some ‘breathing space’ within the mobile app, quite the opposite of the busy, fast-moving home page. The plan was to curate uplifting content to provide readers with some relief from anxiety-inducing news. At the same time, they wanted to shine a light on those hidden gems of content, the kind that often gets buried in the constant news flow.

The project, which code name was “Escape with Le Monde”, had three dimensions:

• an immersive experience to reinforce the escapist effect,
• introducing a mood selector with reader purposes (get inspired, enjoy, understand, act…),
• and integrating personalization based on the reader’s interests.

But the last two items are not included in the current version yet.

What business goals are you pursuing with this project?

With “Découvrir”, we have two primary objectives:

• Combat the disengagement of our products
• Improve subscriber retention

Why did this project win the first prize in the hackathon?

This project stood out because it aligns perfectly with Le Monde’s mission. Fighting news avoidance and information fatigue is a priority for Le Monde. Of course, this has an impact on our bottom line, but it also leads readers to seek alternative, sometimes less reliable sources of information. So it’s becoming a democratic problem, and for Le Monde, it’s a major source of concern.

Another advantage of the project was that it didn’t require additional editorial production. All the articles featured in the “Découvrir” tab already existed; they were just not very visible.

A couple of years ago, we launched the “Fil Good” newsletter (play of words with “Feel good”), which sends our subscribers a selection of feel-good stories. This weekly newsletter has been a huge success. We’re constantly on the lookout for new ways to showcase the positive content we produce, which often gets overshadowed by negative news as I explained earlier.

Did you take inspiration from other media for this new section?

When working on new projects, we always like to benchmark against what other media outlets are doing, especially overseas.

We’ve been looking at The Guardian’s mobile app feature, “Discover”, which presents long-format stories in a dedicated tab for subscribers.

We also explored the Washington Post’s “Well Being” vertical.

Technically speaking, how does “Découvrir” work? How are articles selected to appear in this section?

First, in terms of themes, it’s important to note that “Discover” not only features “feel good” articles, but also content that accompanies readers in their daily lives, with topics on culture, love, health, cooking, lifestyle, and more. We keep the news content to a minimum, or break down news to help readers better understand current events. We take great care in ensuring that “Découvrir” is not just a repetition of the home page…

Functionally, we’ve selected about forty eligible tags for “Découvrir”, and it’s a fully automated feed. There is no human editor involved. In total, we present between 10 and 15 articles a day.

How did this project go internally? When did you start working on it and which teams were involved?

We kicked things off last spring. As I mentioned earlier, the idea came up during a digital product hackathon, but it was a highly editorial project, so we had to include the newsroom from the very beginning. Francoise Tovo, Le Monde’s deputy editor-in-chief, worked closely with us, and her expert eye has been incredibly valuable. The journalists were immediately seduced by the idea, but we wanted to validate our intuitions with User Research.

We learnt a lot from our focus groups :

• Readers easily grasped the section’s philosophy, which was good news!
• They liked the diverse content mix, so we held off on developing content filters.
• The storie’s intro paragraph that appeared to be useless, so we hid it

As of now, “Découvrir” only exists on your mobile app. Do you plan on launching it on your website Lemonde.fr as well?

For now, it’s only on our mobile app, where we have our most engaged users. We may consider launching it on our website in the future, but our tech roadmap is currently full of projects!

What has been the most challenging aspect of this project?

Finding the right name! We wanted something that sounded like “evasion” or “escape”, but neither of these options worked… so we settled for the simple “Découvrir” (“Discover” in English).

It’s been a week since you launched “Découvrir”, what’s the initial feedback?

Initially, we had planned to launch on October 11th, but due to the Israël-Hamas conflict, we decided to postpone it for a week. We realized that this horrific event wasn’t going to subside anytime soon, and we couldn’t delay the launch indefinitely. However, the initial reception we got from our readers emphasized the need for this kind of editorial content, particularly during such difficult times.

We launched a quick survey among our readers: 82% told us they were satisfied or very satisfied with “Découvrir”. What pleased us the most was that people clearly understood our objectives: less news, more information, nice visuals, and no anxiety.

Which Key Performance Indicators will you be monitoring in the coming months?

Engagement is our core focus. We’ll be looking at:

• Frequency of visits over a week and a month among both our subscribers and free readers.
• Retention of subscribers during the critical first few weeks. We’ll track subscriber retention after 3 months, 6 months, and a year.

We’ll also look at our qualitative surveys, where news fatigue is often mentioned – do those signals calm down over time?

What are the next phases of development you have planned on this project?

There are no further developments planned for the remainder of this year. In 2024, we’ll be introducing personalization to align with reader’s interests, and deploying news filters.

We’re really happy with the product as it stands right now. The digital team has perfectly grasped the challenges faced by major general-interest daily newspapers, like Le Monde, particularly in terms of information avoidance and subscriber retention. This editorial project has the full support of our editorial team and, in its early stages, has been met with satisfaction from our readers.

As part of a reorganization of The New York Times marketing department, Perrine Pavageau took on the role of "Program Manager" (PMO), a role at the crossroads of strategic vision and execution (read our article introducing her role here). Her main objective: to put in place operational mechanisms to ensure the success of marketing strategies. It's a function that answers the questions "how do we do it?" a contact person for teams to turn to express and overcome their organizational challenges. 

In this series of articles, Perrine recounts 5 operational projects carried out in this role for The New York Times.

As The New York Times revisited its paywall strategy, a specialist media strategy team was created in-house – expertise that had previously been completely outsourced. Why this decision?

• Firstly, the cost. Working only with agencies could limit the work to “scopes”. With The New York Times strategy in the midst of reform at the time, greater flexibility was needed. As Janis Huang, VP Subscription Growth, says, “Working with an agency required a lot of work to convey our strategy, but we were in the process of redefining our strategy.”

• Also, the desire to rethink the marketing campaigns for The New York Times, which were mainly made up of banners and emails. According to Janis, the answer to the question “What should The New York Times Marketing look like to the world?” was to bring the campaigns to life, for a stronger emotional impact. This could be done with new media such as audio, radio, TV or outdoor.

• Finally, there was a desire to measure the “brand affinity” impact of these new formats on specific brand attributes.

The New York Times therefore switched to a hybrid model. Experts in digital and traditional media were recruited to join a team called “Marketing & Media Strategy”. The New York Times chose to bring in experienced leaders to guide the strategy and establish capabilities from the ground up. While still using agencies, especially for brand campaigns or specific expertise.

My first project as Program Manager was to review the campaign execution processes to integrate the media team’s work. This was called the “Interaction model“. A new term, which has become part of everyday language.

An Interaction Model is a framework that defines the roles and responsibilities of each team, strengthens collaboration, and brings transparency and alignment. For The New York Times, the objectives were:

• Minimize disruption from reorganization

• Provide a common structure, understood by all

• Improve visibility throughout projects

• Establish a structured and positive collaboration

• Reduce operational risks

A bit like an internal consultant, I went through the following steps:

1. Listening to existing processes and challenges
2. Defining a framework that included phases, roles, interactions and deliverables
3. Obtaining validation from the teams and management
4. Integrating the framework into the templates of project management tool
5. Communicating and evangelizing the framework to ensure adoption

It included:

A high-level framework for monthly, quarterly or annual planning. The objective: that teams anticipate together, and are aligned on the priorities and necessary resources.

An end-to-end campaign framework with all steps and interactions.

Here are the points that really made an impact, in my opinion:

• Clearly naming each phase – like in agile. It doesn’t sound like much, but it helps. When I said to management “we have a sticking point in the media build phase”, they knew what I was talking about

• An “official” kickoff phase followed by a brief for the creative and media teams. This avoided projects being launched on an impromptu request. And everyone was briefed in the same way

• Creative & Media checkins so that creative teams and media planners would work together, just like in an agency. Imagine: the creative team starts with an illustration-based concept, but the media team ends up recommending audio. These teams need to communicate upstream to have time to look at each other’s progress

• Sharing results with the creative teams, so that they understand what worked and what didn’t. Through this, the creatives have started to acquire a business language and a better understanding of the issues at hand.

The challenge was to get this framework adopted. We quickly had to make specific versions for different types of campaigns or business lines. The 3 weeks of Concept & Planning were not always possible with the increasing pressure on the pace of promotions. And not all projects needed an innovative media plan. In contrast, Brand Campaigns had a much longer Concept & Planning phase.

For me, what has kept these interaction patterns going was:

• Management support 

• The Program Management function, which guaranteed their adoption

• Daily stand-ups with the project teams. They allowed us to discuss the status of each phase, the blocking points and the dependencies

Today, the teams still rely on a system of Interaction Models, which have of course evolved over time, constantly being called into question according to structural changes and company objectives.

> To add to your reading list: The New York Times dynamic paywall model, analyzed