Lincoln, an existing advertiser with the New York Times, has targeted 200,000 heavy readers of the newspaper's website with an offer to sponsor their digital subscription for 2011, according to a story by Nat Worden and Jon Kamp at wsj.com.
Lincoln won't pay the actual subscription costs for those taking part, but the car maker will increase its online ad spending with the publisher. Details of the arrangement weren't disclosed Lincoln will make an online pitch for the free Times access to targeted customers through emails.
The offer is expected to provide the publisher with around 100,000 digital subscribers in its initial foray into the thorny business of getting consumers to pay for online access to news content that they have long enjoyed free.
Last week, Times Co. announced plans to charge $15 a month to non-print subscribers reading more than 20 articles a month on NYTimes.com. The publisher hopes the subscription will stem declines at its print business and lay the groundwork for a new revenue stream that can help it flourish on the web. It will continue offering a limited amount of online content for free in order to avoid causing a drop-off in the large numbers of readers that find their way to its site periodically from news aggregators, bloggers and social media platforms.
Other news publishers grappling with their own print declines are watching the experiment closely as a potential new business model in the digital age.
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