The Times says a strategy of publishing “fewer, better stories” has led to three consecutive months of record-breaking international audience growth.
The Times information desk has lowered the variety of tales it publishes by 20% because the mindset change whereas the sports activities desk minimize its output by 30%.
But deputy head of digital Anna Sbuttoni stated “they didn’t lose any audience. In fact, they gained it.”
Across the entire newsroom, The Times has gone from publishing greater than 200 tales a day to about 150 – a 25% minimize.
This was not a cost-cutting train, Sbuttoni stated, with workers ranges remaining impartial.
She added: “We’ve had three consecutive months of all-time, record-breaking audience growth at The Times,” referring to inner international visitors figures for the web site and app (excluding Apple News), “and we’re publishing fewer stories than we ever have.”
Sbuttoni stated natural search visitors to the web site was up 29% yr on yr and 13% month on month in February, bucking the industry trend.
Google Discover traffic was up greater than 150% yr on yr and social referral visitors was up greater than 100%, she added.
The “fewer, better stories” strategy has 5 priorities, in accordance to Sbuttoni, who stated it was “a real change in mindset”.
The first precedence is “exclusive, original reporting that you can’t get anywhere else”.
Sbuttoni stated one of many greatest modifications was letting reporters know they didn’t “have to file every spit and cough of a story” and that they might “take the time to work on something that’s really high value”.
She highlighted a 2024 piece about the end of 142 years of coal in Britain, which she stated setting editor Adam Vaughan might beforehand have filed as a fast one-fact story. Instead, Sbuttoni stated, it was “prepared in a really impactful visual style, lots of archive imagery, lots of great reporting”. It was rewarded by being the most-read piece on the web site with a “big audience” on Apple News.
The second strand of the strategy is “telling big developing stories as they happen”, for instance through stay blogs, which have turn out to be an more and more necessary a part of the output at The Times, alongside accompanying content material similar to explainers, timelines or profiles.
The third, Sbuttoni stated, is “how can we add value and make a story distinct to The Times, even if it’s already out there or broken by a competitor?”
Another is utilizing information to maintain tempo with curiosity in a long-running story, to verify the audience continues to be engaged and what precisely they need from it “rather than just trying to fill print pages”.
The Times launched a brand new analytics device referred to as TED (Times Editorial Data) which was in a position to present when a narrative was within the “red zone”.
“It’s just about being data informed,” Sbuttoni stated. “Editorial judgement is still really important in this mix. But actually, when you do look closely, there were loads of things we could learn, so not just what we were publishing, but how we were publishing it, how we were telling the story, when we were publishing, all of those questions.”
The “last piece of the puzzle”, Sbuttoni stated, is making it clear to the reader “why they should click” by means of primarily based on the headline, picture and standfirst.
These should reply the query: “Why is the story worth subscribing for and what’s the value it’s going to give you?”
The Times (together with the Times Literary Supplement or TLS) now has 659,000 digital subscribers, up 7% prior to now yr.
Publishers Audience Measurement Company (Pamco) information printed in March confirmed The Times had a complete model attain within the UK of greater than 12.5 million monthly, with 10.5 million digitally.
In the yr to 29 June 2025, Times Media grew revenue by 2% to £390.7m, attributed to digital subscriber will increase and enhanced internet advertising experiences narrowly offsetting print declines. Pre-tax revenue was up 13% to £69.2m.
Quarter of Times tales being learn by lower than 2,000 individuals earlier than ‘fewer, better stories’ strategy started
The content material strategy started about two years in the past with a full audit of the tales being produced by the information desk.
Sbuttoni stated they realised 1 / 4 of tales had been being learn by lower than 2,000 subscribers or visitor guests.
Many of those tales had been “incremental stories you could get anywhere else”, Sbuttoni stated, which had been typically “one-fact stories”.
Sbuttoni labored with the pinnacle of reports and stay information editors to take a look at what was being printed each day and so they “decided to essentially stop publishing those”.
Audience growth at The Times has additionally been helped by a swap to a .com web site URL in 2024 and loads of technical search engine optimization work within the background.
The Times has pivoted in direction of placing its journalists “front and centre” on social media, Sbuttoni stated, “putting their face and their name on it and showing the value of what we do and what it really takes to report some of these stories”.
A video of chief reporter Fiona Hamilton explaining the case of a UCL scholar whose “date-rape” drug death the Met Police are accused of botching had a couple of million views off platform and generated subscriber sign-ups, Sbuttoni stated. The article was additionally well-read amongst subscribers and visitor guests. “You can see how that social video gives it the extra projection,” she added.
Since 2016 The Times had followed an edition-based publishing model online during which tales had been printed at 9am, 12pm, 5pm and midnight fairly than every time they had been prepared all through the day.
Sbuttoni stated they determined to “radically move away from midnight publishing”.
This implies that Times tales at the moment are extra doubtless to exit on-line earlier than they’re within the print paper. Saturday interviews, for instance, at the moment are staggered by means of the week as it might be a lot tougher for one reader to digest all of them on-line in in the future. This means every bit might be extra distinguished on the web site and be given extra promotional assist.
Sbuttoni stated it can be crucial to be sure a narrative “lands with impact, with audience support, with marketing support, a promotional plan”. This is just doable beneath the brand new strategy “because it’s really making the most of the resources we have”.
The Times can be nonetheless dedicated to “really important” campaigns similar to British Journalism Award-winning Clean It Up (about sewage air pollution in UK waterways) no matter what the info dashboard says. Sbuttoni stated: “This is not just a numbers game. Editorial judgment is part of this every step of the way.”
Times North Star objective is day by day behavior
Sbuttoni stated the brand new strategy additionally helps The Times off platform on distributors like Apple News as a result of “these are the issues which can be actually price paying for. They are simply so distinctive.
“It’s really competitive out there so I think we just need to make it really clear when we have something special and different, and make sure that we keep bringing the exclusives, scoops, these more elevated ways of telling the stories.”
The complete Times enterprise, from editorial to advertising and product, has now taken on day by day behavior as their North Star objective.
Sbuttoni stated this “incentivises quality. It’s about encouraging our subscribers to come back to the site, and quality is really at the heart of that.”
Moving Times subscribers into the app (which is presently utilized by 70% of them) is vital for retaining them and making a direct relationship through instruments like push alerts and newsletters, she added.
Pamco figures printed in March confirmed customers within the UK spend a median of eight hours and 55 minutes studying content material on the Times app monthly.
New neighborhood options are additionally being created, led by new head of neighborhood Rachel Duffy who has joined from an identical function at The Telegraph. Sbuttoni stated the intention is to “make sure that subscribers feel like they really belong to The Times”.
Other upcoming product enhancements embody a brand new stay weblog template, bringing video extra prominently into the app and article narration so customers can both learn or hear.
Sbuttoni additionally highlighted the launch of Times Money last year, with new private finance content material and instruments, as a “real subscription driver”, second solely to the UK information part. Subscriber reads of cash articles have doubled because the revamped part began, she added.
Another change final yr was to give subscribers up to three “bonus accounts” at no further value to share with family and friends, making a barrier to cancelling.
Sbuttoni stated The Times now has greater than 100,000 bonus customers who skew youthful and extra feminine than the principle subscriber base, giving the newsroom an opportunity to construct a direct relationship with new audiences.
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