With increasing competition for attention, the Star needed to develop a strong bond with its readership through a more considered brand experience.
Designed at Creative Business Company
A vision for a new subscriber experience
Quality reporting presented in a utilitarian way, makes digital news feel like a commodity. Cluttered layouts, text-heavy articles with multiple recommendation boxes interrupting the reading experience, inconsistent use of colours, photography and illustration, make the product feel cheap. Readers are price-sensitive, and ultimately more resistant to pay for a news subscription.
We developed an ideal future state experience for the Star that could engineer value back into the product.
Approach
We began by asking ourselves some simple questions. What would a news experience worth paying for look like? And what would happen if we applied some of the best practices from successful online-only subscription services - like Spotify and Netflix - to the Star?
Four principles informed the work:
(1) Cross-platform
We needed to break down silos and create a seamless experience across platforms - from podcasts to the print product.
(2) End-to-end
Subscribing to the Star should feel special. And the experience should get better once you’ve joined the club.
(3) Premium
Thoughtful design executed consistency and coherently engineers value back into the product, reducing price sensitivity.
(4) Human
Most news brands fail to speak to younger readers in a language they can understand. We needed to drop the jargon.
New website home page
The homepage of the website is a marquee touchpoint that allows us to optimize typographic conventions.
Print paper and magazine
Treating print as a more elevated experience for those that like spending time with a physical medium, endears the brand to its most faithful subscribers.
Paywall
Messaging on most paywalls is often curt, functional and lacking in charm. Instead of simply presenting a price and a demand to pay, we would use personal appeals that spoke to our reporter's truths.
