Sales Experiment of a Newspaper Publisher: "Pay What You Want"

Abstract

Digitalization poses great challenges for companies and especially for newspaper publishers. Due to the large number of digital competitors on the advertising market, media companies are forced to proactively win customers. A major German media company has thus dared to experiment and put the question of pricing for booking newspaper advertising in the hands of its customers. With the so-called "pay what you want" (PWYW) payment model, customers can be won and additional budgets spent. This paper explores the question of whether PWYW is a suitable sales model for newspaper companies and which factors have an influence. The results of the interviews with those involved show solutions, opportunities, problems and that additional turnover can be generated.