Soaring costs, falling advertising revenues, and AI influencing how readers consume news, are all negatively impacting the industry. So what can publishers do to evolve and survive?
Upending the model
AI continues to impact the world as we know it, seemingly ‘upending the online news model’ according to theguardian.com. The introduction of Google’s AI Overviews and AI Mode have reportedly cut click-throughs by up to 90% on some content, with searchers satiated by summaries.
“For most of the last decade Google has introduced more and more features into the SERP [Search Engine Results Page], which reduces the need for consumers to visit a website. That is the challenge that we as a sector face.” (Stuart Forrest, global director of SEO digital publishing at Bauer Media.)
Risk and Reform
The Times reported that the owner of Rolling Stone magazine is suing Google for illegally using its journalism to create AI summaries of stories for its search engine results, negatively impacting the publisher’s web clicks.
Following a 3.4% drop in H1 revenues, the Mirror publisher (Reach) has put 600 jobs at risk in a restructure involving 321 editorial redundancies and the creation of 135 new roles. This has been prompted by the impact of AI and changes in reader behaviour leading to an increased focus on digital subscriptions and ‘producing more video and audio content, as well as a live news network’.
Industrial Transformation
Reach chief content officer, David Higgerson recently said“If Google flips onto full AI Mode, and there is a big uptake in that…that [will be] completely quite devastating for the industry”. He summed up the impetus for their transformation: “The changes we are seeing in the landscape right now demand a wholesale change in how we operate and how we tell stories.”
Whilst Reach publications remain largely ad-funded, the intent is set on building their subscriber base. Subscriptions have been launched with varying degrees of success by a number of publications. The Sun tried and failed in 2013 while MailOnline launched Mail+ attracting 100,000+ subscribers since launch early 2024. But if AI Overviews and AI Mode reduce the need for users to click through to articles, then the value of monetising subscription services is severely compromised.
Google’s AI Products vs Publishers
Dr Felix Simon, research fellow in AI and news at the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism, University of Oxford warned that “A major worry, backed by some individual datapoints, has been that AI overviews would lead to fewer people clicking through to the content behind them, with negative knock-on effects for publishers.” And this seems to have been the experience of many.
The Daily Mail has reported a drop in click-through traffic to sites of up to 89% to the Competition and Markets Authority’s consultation, seemingly a direct result of the introduction of Google’s AI Overviews. A number of leading news organisations have urged the watchdog to compel Google to provide traffic statistics from AI Overview and AI Mode to be able to fully understand their effect.
Google’s head of search Liz Reid insists that the introduction of AI in search is “driving more queries and quality clicks”, claiming that user trends are “decreasing traffic to some sites and increasing traffic to others.” While chief executive of the Professional Publishers Association, Saj Merali, believes that a fair balance needs to be struck between the tech-driven change in consumers’ digital habits and the fair value of trusted news – and that the AI and tech community should be “supporting publisher revenue”.
The Sustainability of Publishing
With AI companies plundering content to train large language models (often infringing copyright), the industry is being forced into what some are calling an ‘existential crisis’. Some are lobbying regulators, some taking legal action whilst others are striking bilateral licensing deals to try to secure a more sustainable future.
At a recent media conference, The Financial Times CEO suggested forming a “Nato for news” alliance to strengthen negotiations, which fell on deaf ears, but maybe this is the way forward?
Technical Solutions
With bot traffic expected to exceed human internet traffic by the end of 2029, and bot traffic alone surpassing all current internet traffic by 2031, Cloudflare’s response has been to launch a couple of initiatives to protect publishers. Publishers using Cloudflare can now block AI bots from accessing content without permission and will ultimately be able to request payment to pay per crawl.
Cloudflare have also released the Content Signals Policy which contains both machine-readable and human-readable text that defines how the three content signals – search, ai-input, and ai-train, are relevant to crawlers. This new addition to robots.txt files enables publishers to state which bot or browser user-agents (crawlers) can access which content and how it can be used. Whilst this indicates the publishers preference, it’s unfortunately not a technical countermeasure against scraping and crawlers and bots aren’t obligated to obey it so its best to combine this with WAF rules and Bot Management.
“If the internet is going to survive the age of AI, we need to give publishers the control they deserve and build a new economic model that works for everyone.” (Matthew Prince, Cloudeflare’s Chief Executive).
The CMA is also set to impose new regulations on Google search in the UK (October 2025) to enable publishers to opt out of Google AI Overviews without removing their entire websites from search.
Building strong brands has never been more important as Google tests things like ‘preferred sources’ to personalise Top Stories in Search. So growing a loyal audience and providing them unique onsite value is key to securing their preference. With the rollout of Google Discover, understanding your target personas and the media they consume can also help provide greater visibility and steer qualified traffic to your website.
As part of our commitment to supporting the publishing industry, we’re keeping abreast of developments and ensuring that we can guide and optimise them through this ongoing technological revolution. If you’d appreciate a conversation about anything in this article please get in touch.