By Kevin Anderson

During a discussion during WAN-IFRA’s World News Media Congress in Krakow, panelists described how they are aiming to maximise voluntary reader revenue with one-off donations, recurring contributions, and crowdfunding to support independent journalism. They also offered three key

• Dominika Michalak, the head of institutional funding at Oko.press in Poland, said their entire business model is based on donations.
• Sham Jaff writes a newsletter, “What Happened Last Week,” focusing on the Global South. She has 29,000 subscribers, and the newsletter has a 70% open rate.
• Magda Bandera is the co-founder of La Marea, a journalism cooperative in Spain.

1- Relationships: Communicate your values

Jaff said it was a key shift for her to move to a membership model, which gave her a steady source of income. “I turned that transactional thing into a relational thing.”

“We are humans creating journalism of humans,” was the message for a successful campaign at La Marea, Bandera said. It communicated their values and how they were different than other outlets in Spain.

2- Messaging: Use mission-driven messaging

“We focus on the message,” Michalak said.

All three of the panelists said that mission-driven messaging performed better than simply asking for money because they needed it.

“There is a difference between asking and begging,” Michalak said. And Jaff said her readers could tell when she was desperate.

Michalak said messaging explaining why Oko.press did what they do and how it is important to society Instead, Bandera said readers responded to calls for support after they had published unique, in-depth investigations.

3- Technology: Use analytics to improve donation drives

Michalak said their technology team were the silent heroes, and she stressed that their analytics provided them with critical information to improve their donation campaigns.

Bandera wishes she had the funds to hire a full-time developer to add a donation option on their website.

It takes a mix of forms of voluntary reader revenue. – One-off donations are an important revenue stream for Oko.press because they have the scale. The one-off donations also gave them contact information so they could market to the donors to increase their contribution.

The crowdfunding model has delivered the necessary revenue for La Marea to pay above-market rates to journalists for their work. The membership model has meant stability and sustainability for Jaff.

About the author: Kevin Anderson is the App Strategy and Industry Insights Director for Pugpig.