The launch of The Australian's new iPad app means that the publisher is effectively offering a half price monthly subscription for those that read purely via iPad.
News Corp is pushing the new iPad app hard with a full cover wrap on this morning's print edition. The launch means readers can subscribe to the app version via the App store for $12.99 per month versus $24 a month for a full digital subscription across digital devices.
The move follows a similar rollout in London with sister paper The Times. The company said that had resulted in session times upwards of 40 minutes and Nicholas Gray, CEO, The Australian, said that was what the publication aimed to replicate in Australia.
Gray said that the Appstore launch was not a discounting move and that the plan was not to create different pricing models. While the app is free to download, he said there would be no free or discounted subscription trial period via the app.
“Our objective is to get people to subscribe to the entire bundle … but it is possible today just to subscribe to the app [via Apple],” he said.
News Corp continues to sell only a full digital pass and highlighted the fact that the app price is for the newspaper iPad app alone and does not include access to all digital content across devices, nor access to Business Spectator.
Newspaper publishers are increasingly looking to the app environment in a bid to recreate the newspaper experience digitally.
The app model also gives publisher richer data on what audiences are doing and is increasingly being used by businesses in answer to the problem of tracking users on mobile and tablet devices.
However, as The Australian's iPad app version is a subscription product, Gray said the level of data available to the publisher was not significantly different to that from its online subscribers.
The app automatically extends print advertising to tablet form streamlining the ad buy across channels via a platform called AccessOne. Sales boss Fiorella di Santo said it extends reach for advertisers “at no extra cost very easily”.
Gray said that monetising the platform would come from creating a better “newspaper type experience in digital form” which in turn creates a “more compelling offer for advertisers …. so we expect that to create some revenue growth for us.”
Archibald/Williams is behind the new creative which will run across broadcast, digital social and outdoor as well as print. The broadcast element features cameo's from the paper's writers and contributors.
Watch it here:
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