Relaunching memberships at CT Examiner

Our research showed The Connecticut Examiner was underpricing its journalism. Working with our editor in chief, marketing team, and engineering team, I helped relaunch our $20-a-year subscription as a $100-a-year membership on Sept. 30, 2026.

Audience research

Ahead of the relaunch, I surveyed 114 readers to understand our audience needs. Readers said they chose to pay for local stories (43%), in-depth reporting (43%), nonpartisan coverage (36%), and old-school journalism values (35%). Those answers became the three pillars of our membership messaging: local focus, depth, and ethics.

The strongest signal that readers valued our journalism came when we asked about benefits. Given options like subscriber events, exclusive newsletters, and gift articles, more than half of respondents (56.4%) said they'd want every extra dollar they give to go directly into more journalism.

Pricing strategy

To develop the new pricing strategy, I ran a competitive analysis of membership pricing at local newsrooms across the country, backed up by academic and industry research.

Based on this research, I recommended the move to $100-a-year memberships. We also introduced a $10-a-month tier that offers a lower commitment, and a $1,000-a-year Editor's Circle for readers who want their support to go directly to journalism. Existing members move to the new pricing at renewal, with notices built around the same three pillars.

On-site membership funnel

I built prototypes in Figma and developed PRDs that gave our editor in chief and our external marketing and engineering teams one shared plan. I also scoped tickets for our engineers.

At the top of the funnel, I rebuilt the newsletter signup page around readers' need for independent, investigative local journalism, with mockups that show readers what they'll receive.

The old paywall led with low cost and ad-free reading, and readers cited neither as a reason they pay. I rebuilt it around our three pillars: local focus, depth, and ethics. Readers had also reported trouble logging in from article pages, so I reduced the copy above the fold to make the login easier to find.

I redesigned the membership page to center our annual plan and introduce the new monthly and Editor's Circle tiers. I also added a section explaining why to become a member, making our value clearer to prospective readers and optimizing the page for search.

Lifecycle emails

I built a 14-day welcome series for new readers, informed by market research and conversations with membership leaders at Block Club Chicago, The Verge, and the Membership Puzzle Project. The five-step series includes an onboarding email, an email for each of our three pillars, and a membership ask for free readers.

Next steps

This case study covers the work through the Sept. 30 launch. We're measuring conversion at each step of the funnel, from newsletter signup to paid membership, and renewal retention at the new price, with early results expected by the end of 2026. Next, we'll optimize the checkout flow and add winback campaigns for departing members.