Hey, my name is Greg Piechota. I study news media business models for INMA and write about innovations in digital subscriptions and beyond in this regular newsletter.

In today’s newsletter:

• I review the data behind the recent AI search panic in the United States and find no evidence — yet — for AI devastating publisher traffic.

• I speak with Stuttgarter Zeitung about how they have doubled direct traffic in a year.

• I tell the inside story behind Google’s new content micropayment solution.

If you have questions or suggestions, e-mail me at greg.piechota@inma.org.

From traffic panic to a plan: how publishers can prepare for AI search disruption

Online publishing is gripped by AI search panic. While this panic is premature, news media companies should double down on direct relationships with audiences.

Since 2024, Google has been rolling out new AI search features. By May 2025, AI Overviews were live in over 200 countries, and the more advanced AI Mode was active in just two: the United States and India.

Google’s shift from referral engine to answer machine made publishers anxious. The company holds 90% of the global search market and sends one-third of online publishers’ traffic.

In Q2 2025, Similarweb reported the share of Google searches resulting in zero clicks increased, while total referrals from Google declined.

Headlines screamed: “News sites are getting crushed by Google’s new AI tools.”

No evidence of devastation — yet: U.S. consultancy Mather analysed traffic to 50 U.S. news Web sites through May 2025. 

At a Webinar, Mather’s Luke Magerko and Pete Doucette reported “all referral sources trending at similar rates to search, indicating limited evidence of a direct correlation between AI Overviews and traffic declines.”

In my view, recent U.S. traffic declines could be explained by a slower news cycle, compared to 2024’s presidential elections, Olympics, and other major events.

Demand for news closely follows news cycles — as shown in INMA data from 274 member news brands from 2019 to 2025.

Moreover, Similarweb doesn’t distinguish between Google Search referrals from other surfaces, like Discover or News. 

According to NewzDash, Web search accounted for just 28% of Google referrals to news sites in 2025. Discover accounted for 66%. 

The looming disruption: Anyway, while the current AI panic looks premature, the disruption is likely coming. 

The Internet, social media, and now generative AI have made it easier to create and distribute information. The result? Overload.

It’s no wonder consumers are turning to tools that help them navigate this flood — search engines, social feeds, personalised aggregators, and now, AI answer machines. 

In a 2025 survey by Oxford’s Reuters Institute, 7% of Americans said they already use AI bots for news.

The giants with billions of online users — Google, Meta — are positioned to drive mass adoption. But they’re not alone: Open AI, Perplexity, and others are pushing boundaries. 

When consumers get an answer directly from AI, they decouple content discovery from consumption, breaking the current business models that rely on showing ads or subscription offers on linked Web sites.

I studied these disruption patterns with professor Thales Teixeira at Harvard Business School. Our 2019 book Unlocking the Customer Value Chain introduced the theory of decoupling. And it still resonates. 

(And now, after Chinese and Korean editions, it’s just been published in Vietnamese: Cảm ơn!)

Strategic responses: As with previous waves of disruption, the key is understanding customer  decision-making and adapting your business model accordingly.

Professor Teixeira and I identified two broad strategic responses. Here they are applied to news media.

1. Re-couple what AI decouples: 

• Protect content from scraping and unauthorised use.

• Invest in brand and product differentiation: e.g., in-depth, personality-driven, expressive journalism, and human-centred communities that AI can’t replicate.

• Own your distribution via direct traffic, mobile apps, and e-mail.

2. Update the business model:

• Shift from reach-based monetisation to engagement-based; think subscriptions or first-party data-driven advertising.

• Do the jobs digital platforms and aggregators do: aggregate, personalise, improve user experience.

• Demand compensation from AI companies that use your content.

Takeaways: Panic helps no one. Platforms change. Consumers evolve. AI accelerates. The sustainable path forward? Own the relationship. Start where you are, but start now.

Don’t miss the recent INMA report by INMA Editor Paula Felps, “As search ends for news, here is what’s next.” Free download for members.

One-minute case study: How Stuttgarter Zeitung mobilised direct traffic

With over half its traffic coming from Google, Germany’s regional newspaper Stuttgarter Zeitung (Medienholding Süd) saw direct traffic as a matter of survival.

“Only through our own channels can we reliably reach our customers, build stable relationships, and distribute journalistic content independently,” CEO Carsten Groß told INMA.

“We didn’t start from a comfortable market position. Our direct traffic was below industry average, and customer loyalty was weak.”

In just 18 months, the share of direct pageviews nearly doubled: from 13% to over 22% (excluding recirculation).

In the first half of 2025, direct pageviews were up 90% year-on-year, three times the growth of total pageviews.

How? Groß explained:

• Laser focus on core audiences: Prioritised local communities and topics (e.g. fans of the football club VfB Stuttgart, employees of automotive giants Mercedes-Benz and Porsche).

• Newsroom training: Built habits around user needs and analytics, introduced new content formats, adapted workflows, and improved editors’ feedback.

• Ecosystem thinking: Tailored newsletters, social media channels, short video content to the needs of specific audiences. Added subscriber-only section.

• Breaking news excellence: Prioritising timely, reliable coverage showed readers they could rely on Stuttgarter Zeitung directly.

• Cross-team collaboration: Editorial, product, and marketing worked together, testing paywalls and conversion funnels.

“The path we’ve taken is working, and so far we see no ceiling for growth,” Groß said. 

Destination strategy vs. channel diversification? Read my classic 2023 blog analysing The New York Times approach to online distribution.

Google brings news content micropayments to their moment of truth

Let me tell you a story about an immigrant kid who became obsessed with a business idea that most news publishers had given up on: content micropayments.

In June, Google launched Offerwall — a feature in Google Ad Manager that lets users unlock content by watching video ads, answering surveys, subscribing to newsletters, or paying per article.

More than 1,000 publishers joined last year’s pilot. TechCrunch reported an average revenue uplift of 9%. 

India’s Sakal Media Group saw a 20% boost.

A stubborn entrepreneur: The micropayment part of Offerwall is powered by a Swiss startup Supertab, formerly known as LaterPay.

Its founder and CEO Cosmin Ene has evangelised pay-per-article since 2010 despite minimal traction and much skepticism. Many similar startups struggled: Axate, Blendle, Invisibly, Scroll. 

Supertab’s model lets users put articles or time passes “on a tab” and pay later — after hitting a US$1 or US$5 threshold. That’s a crucial difference from “wallets” that require paying before reading. 

The Google partnership began in 2022 with a surprise LinkedIn message. Supertab pivoted to build a scalable platform for the tech giant.

“I’m stubborn,” Ene told INMA. At 12, his family fled communist Romania. Within three years in West Germany, he’d mastered the language, read hundreds of books, and excelled in school. “If I believe in something, I get there.”

As an adult, Ene became convinced that readers deserve choice — and not a forced subscription: “You cannot win if you go against a user.”

The context: In Q1 2025, median digital subscription penetration was just 1.9% households, or 1.2% of monthly online users, per INMA Benchmarks. 

What about the remaining 98%? “Give them a choice,” Ene begs. 

“Publishers make money regardless of what users choose in Offerwall: higher-priced video ads, richer first-party data, or direct payments for articles or subscriptions.”

Supertab customers saw a three-fold increase in paying readers; 10% of those who had put articles on a tab converted to subscriptions within three to four months.

A long road to vindication: INMA tracked micropayment experiments for over a decade. The verdict? Often underwhelming.

• With rare exceptions, the news publishers reported demand and revenue were smaller than expected and not worth the effort. Micropayments cannibalised more valuable subscription offers. 

• A 2023 Danish study concluded consumers and publishers alike preferred all-you-can-eat subscriptions. 

• In 2025, Oxford’s Reuters Institute found only 5% of U.S. online users (or 7% of non-payers) would consider article, day, or week passes. 

• Compare that to 20% already paying and another 10% (or 13% of non-payers) interested in bundled subscriptions.

Yet Google’s distribution scale and frictionless user experience may finally unlock the potential.  

Google Ad Manager is used by 73% to 81% of publishers worldwide. Offerwall is available in 73 countries. The moment of truth for micropayments is here. 

Future of payments: Cosmin Ene is already looking ahead and leveraging open source agent-to-agent protocols where AI bots could negotiate access and transact on behalf of users and publishers.

Have you experimented with micropayments? Tested Offerwall or other solutions? I’d love to hear from you: greg.piechota@inma.org.

What’s next in the Readers First Initiative 

• INMA Subscription Masters Webinar: I will interview Luis Baena on July 23 about how he and his team made Spain’s El País into one of the world’s fastest-growing digital subscription success stories. Register now.

• INMA CEO Roundtable: I will brief the world’s top media CEOs on business model trends and innovations as they gather at Napa Valley in California on August 19-21. The event is sold out. Apply for the waiting list.

• INMA Media Innovation Week: I will be leading a study tour of the Irish news media right before our annual European conference in Dublin September 22-26 and moderating a conference session on subscriptions. What’s new? A two-day Newsroom Innovation Hub curated by Amalie Nash. Check the agenda and register your seat.

About this newsletter

Today’s newsletter is written by Grzegorz (Greg) Piechota, INMA’s researcher-in-residence and lead for the Readers First Initiative and Subscription Benchmarks.

E-mail Greg at greg.piechota@inma.org, message him on Slack, meet him in St. Helena in August at the INMA CEO Roundtable or in Dublin in September at INMA Media Innovation Week.

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