For newspapers and magazines, the digital transition is a present reality, not a future challenge. Readers expect immediate, personalized, and seamless access to content across devices. Yet, for many publishers, app adoption and engagement remain far below their potential, leaving significant growth opportunities untapped.
The mobile imperative
- Most digital is mobile. More than 70% of digital consumption happens on mobile devices.
- Most mobile activity happens in apps. Over 90% of mobile time is spent in apps, not browsers.
For publishers, this means the app isn’t just a “nice-to-have.” It’s the most powerful channel for building loyalty, driving repeat visits, and increasing lifetime value (LTV).
Why apps matter for publishers
A great app experience goes far beyond replicating the web. It strengthens:
- Retention: Push notifications bring readers back for breaking news, new issues, or special coverage.
- Revenue: Subscriptions, premium features, and ad impressions increase when users engage in-app.
- Continuity: Deep linking lets readers pick up exactly where they left off, whether from an email, social share, or search result.
- Community: In-app sharing and personalization foster virality and habit-forming behavior.
App users visit more often, stay longer, and share more content. That’s a direct path to higher retention, revenue, and brand loyalty.
The friction problem
Friction is the enemy of engagement. Many publishers still send readers from an email or social post to a mobile web login wall — or worse, a generic homepage. The result? Lost interest, churn, and wasted marketing spend.
Every unnecessary step in a reader’s journey risks abandonment. A click from a newsletter should lead directly to the right article in the app, not a dead-end experience.
Mobile growth for publishers
To unlock the full potential of mobile, newspapers and magazines can follow a simple but powerful playbook:
- Drive app adoption from owned channels
- Use smart banners, QR codes, and desktop-to-app prompts to migrate loyal web readers into the app.
- Don’t rely only on paid ads — your strongest audience is already on your site and in your emails.
- Deep link everywhere
- Ensure that every touchpoint (email, SEO, social, QR, referrals) routes readers directly to the right content in-app.
- Use deferred deep linking to make the transition seamless, even for new app installers.
- Personalize engagement
- Tailor in-app notifications and banners by audience behavior, location, or content type.
- Send push alerts for breaking news, local updates, or premium content to drive repeat visits and upgrades.
- Measure what matters
- Move beyond last-touch attribution. Understand how email, social, and SEO really contribute to app adoption and engagement.
- Tie together data across channels for a true picture of what grows readership and revenue.
From occasional readers to power users
According to Mather, the average session duration of the top 25% highest performing publishers’ apps they analyzed was 4.5x higher than the top 100 U.S. news websites and 5.5x higher than the top 100 U.K. news websites. So as readers engage more deeply in the app — through newsletters, push alerts, sharing, and saved content — their lifetime value grows exponentially.
The ultimate goal is to turn casual browsers into loyal subscribers and power users by encouraging app usage.
- Minimal user: occasional clicks, low revenue
- Engaged user: frequent visits, higher LTV
- Power user: daily engagement, subscription, advocacy
The future of publishing is app-first
Newspapers and magazines face intense competition from digital-native publishers, social platforms, and streaming services. The ones that thrive will be those that treat mobile apps not as an add-on, but as the primary vehicle for growth.
By reducing friction, embracing deep linking, and leveraging owned channels, publishers can unlock a virtuous cycle of adoption, engagement, and revenue expansion.
In short: The path to sustainable growth in media isn’t more ads — it’s a smarter mobile strategy.
Want to learn more? Reach out today!
