When I visited Público in Portugal recently, one architectural detail told me more about the state of our industry than any strategy deck.

In their Lisbon harbour-front headquarters — a bright, open space overlooking Tagus River — a physical wall once separated the newsroom from the commercial team. 

The divide made sense in an advertising-first world. Editorial served readers. Commercial served advertisers. The church-and-state divide was literal.

In 2017, someone cut a hole in that wall. 

Four years earlier, Público had introduced a digital paywall. Soon it was obvious that when the reader became the primary payer, the goals of the newsroom and commercial aligned, and the success required closer coordination.

Suddenly, the wall had become an operational obstacle, so it had to break.

Público’s widening hole in the wall illustrates its shift from advertising-first to subscription-first media. With roughly 50,000 subscribers, its business is already funded 50:50 by readers and advertisers.

“Our target is to move towards 65% subscriptions and 35% advertising,” said Chief Operating Officer Christina Soares.

Bridge teams

Founded in 1990, Público is a national, liberal newspaper recognised for in-depth reporting and strong opinions. With 150 journalists in Lisbon and Porto, it is read widely among policymarkers, entrepreneurs, and intellectuals. 

“Covering a story is no longer just about writing a single article for print and online,” explained Editor David Pontes. “Impact now depends on video, audio, infographics, UX/UI and social, and  distributing content across multiple channels.”

Who’s handling distribution and promotion of online journalism, traditionally the logistics and marketing job in printed newspapers? “A team of journalists reporting to me,” said Pontes.

Soares and Pontes invited me to Lisbon in late January to help kick-off their new North Star strategy, which included further investment in audience development.

Across INMA members globally, I see a similar pattern: the expansion of “bridge” teams. They go by different names — audience teams, content performance desks, conversion desks, premium or “plus” journalism teams, subscription editors — but their function is similar. 

These teams sit between editorial and commercial. They translate data into editorial decisions and editorial work into business impact.

Different structures, same intent

At The New York Times, I learned during a study visit last year that the audience team has grown to 5% of the newsroom headcount, or about 100 people in the newsroom of 2,000.

The team reports to the editor and includes embeds from data, research, engineering and product, and is separate from subscription growth organisation. 

It is organised into specialised teams focused on social media, editorial and technical search, community, visual storytelling, data science, and it includes audience experts embedded across newsroom desks. 

At The Philadelphia Inquirer, the same function lives within a consumer marketing organisation under the chief marketing officer. The director of audience development has a small team of four (2% of the newsroom of 200).

At The New York Times, the audience effort used to be led by the chief data officer. At Göteborgs-Posten in Sweden, it’s an editor (leading the team of four, or 3% of the newsroom of 120). At Het Nieuwsblad in Belgium, it’s a marketer (leading the team of three, or 4% of the newsroom of 70). Whatever works.

From strategy to execution

Many news media firms separate strategic and tactical roles. 

Newsroom strategy or editorial development roles or teams tend to focus on long-term planning, implementing the newsroom tech, collaborating with product or marketing on new initiatives, training. But they rarely touch daily operations. 

The same is common for marketers or subscription teams. They work on planning and executing brand or performance campaigns, managing offers, prices, and promotion. But other than during extraordinary news cycles, they don’t market individual stories.

Audience roles or teams are primarily tactical. Their ability to deliver measurable results on a daily or weekly basis is what makes the difference.

The job typically includes:

• Monitoring engagement and identifying stories for follow-ups or boosting.

• Assisting in planning, bringing data insights into editorial conferences.

• Optimising headlines, packaging, and homepage placements.

• Managing distribution channels, such as social, search, or aggregators.

• Setting and adjusting paywall locks if not automated.

• Tracking daily and weekly audience or subscription targets.

Starting from scratch

For executives reading this newsletter, the lesson is not simply “create an audience team.”

The key questions are:

• Do editorial and commercial share the same North Star goals?

• Do they look at the same data to inform decisions?

• Are they jointly accountable for audience and subscription growth?

• Is there a bridge function empowered to act daily?

Here are a few tips based on case studies from INMA members:

1. Start small but start now. A pilot team of one to two audience editors embedded in a flagship desk is enough to prove the concept. For example, Stuttgarter Zeitung in Germany began with two people, expanded to five, and is now expanding to eight (or 3% of 250-people newsroom). Even at that scale, the impact on direct traffic was measurable within months.

2. Embed, don't isolate. The team must sit with journalists, attend editorial meetings, and have the authority to recommend changes to coverage plans. A team that only receives finished articles to optimise will underperform a team that influences editorial decisions upstream.

3. Define clear, measurable goals. Daily or weekly usage targets, visitor-to-subscriber rates, newsletter sign-ups, subscription conversions. The precision of digital audience data is an advantage, so use it.

4. Build shared dashboards. When newsroom, marketing, and product teams see the same data, ownership of outcomes becomes collective rather than siloed. This is the digital equivalent of breaking the wall.

5. Phase the expansion. In the first three months, appoint the lead, embed coaches in one or two desks, integrate analytics, and define reader personas. In months four through six, expand coaching across desks, launch initiatives, and begin rigorous A/B testing. By month seven through 12, scale what works across regions or brands, establish quarterly reviews, and iterate based on results.

6. Expect to wish you'd done it sooner. After the first year of the audience team at Stuttgarter Zeitung, then CEO Carsten Groß told INMA he would have launched the desk earlier and made it bigger.

Greg’s Readers First newsletter is a public face of a revenue and media subscriptions initiative by INMA, outlined here. INMA members can subscribe here.

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