Digital Publishing
1 min read

How The New York Times gets people to spend 5 minutes per visit on its site

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People aren’t just subscribing to The New York Times in greater numbers; they’re also spending more time on its site.

In 2017, people spent about five minutes per visit on the Times’ site, which is up 35 percent from 2016, according to comScore reports pulled by an ad buyer (Ed: don’t you mean their PR? 😉). For the Times, getting users to spend more time on the site is part of a broader effort to drive subscriptions, which have become central to its business model.

“If we get people spending more time with us and reading more stories across our properties, it is good for our subscription business,” said Cynthia Collins, the Times’ social media editor.

To get people hooked on its content so they eventually subscribe, the Times loads articles with multimedia components. In Chartbeat’s list of articles from its digital publishing clients that users spent the most time on in 2017, the Times had 10 of the top 25 entries, many of which included embedded documentaries, podcasts, maps and interactive charts.

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