In digital publishing, loyalty is everything. Yet most of today’s traffic still comes from platforms we don’t control: social media, search and aggregators like Google Discover. That worked for a while. But now, the rules are changing fast. And, to build a loyal audience, you’ll need to change your approach.
Google recently announced that AI-generated summaries will appear in Discover previews. This means fewer clicks to publishers, and more time spent inside Google’s own environment. Even DiscoverSnoop, a tool built specifically to track Discover performance, warns that they don’t offer annual plans because they don’t know if Discover will still be relevant in a few months.
Social traffic is shrinking, too. Facebook has reduced visibility for news links by over 80% since its pivot away from journalism in 2021. And with AI summaries becoming more common in search results, even Google Search is becoming less reliable as a traffic source.
That leaves one source of traffic with long-term value: people who come to you directly. The good news is that this has been perfected by many publishers, and it’s an easy strategy to emulate.
Direct traffic means real connection
Direct traffic isn’t just a number in a dashboard. It’s a sign of trust. It means someone typed in your URL, opened your app, clicked a bookmark, or followed your newsletter link. They didn’t stumble onto your content. They came to you on purpose.
In the Nordics, we see publishers with 80–90% of their traffic coming direct. This is not a coincidence. It’s a result of long-term product decisions that support reader habits: live coverage, frequently updated and often personalized front pages with high click-through rates, well-timed and relevant push notifications that bring readers back in real time, newsletters tailored to reader interests and sent at moments when your audience is most likely to engage, and strong editorial presence.
Subscriptions follow loyalty
Many publishers try to win subscriptions from users who come through search, Discover, or social. That’s fine, but most of these readers are only there for a single article. And most won’t stay on to become loyal audience members.
The most valuable subscriptions come from users who already know your brand. They return often. They read more than one story. They come back even without a link.
Recent research from Northwestern’s Medill Spiegel Research Center confirms that reader regularity – how often a subscriber visits your site – is the strongest predictor of retention. This finding held across 107 U.S. newspapers, beating out pageviews and time on site as indicators of subscriber health.
In fact, a Medill study of a business weekly showed that having readers who read more often is 10 times more important than having them read more articles.
A subscription model built on one-off clicks amounts to renting your audience rather than building a lasting relationship.
How Stuttgarter Zeitung built more direct traffic
One example comes from Stuttgarter Zeitung. In a recent LinkedIn post, Carsten Groß shared how the paper almost doubled its direct traffic in 18 months. They didn’t rely on hacks. They focused on five areas:
- Clear targeting of core audiences
- Supporting teams with data and feedback
- Building ecosystems around newsletters and video
- Improving on-site value for loyal audience members
- Strong breaking news coverage
The result was not just more traffic, but more predictable, repeatable, and resilient engagement.
What remains when platforms disappear
Platforms will continue to change. Some may disappear. The only thing they have in common is that they are not serving your long-term interests. The only audience you control is the one that comes to you directly.
Any publisher that expects to remain relevant in the years ahead needs a clear strategy for increasing direct traffic. Without one, you remain dependent on systems you do not control. That is a risk no publisher can afford to ignore.
The front page is your most important habit-forming tool
In his book Atomic Habits, James Clear describes how habits form through a loop of cue, craving, response and reward. This loop is driven by dopamine.
The same mechanism applies when a reader visits a news site. The front page is the cue. If the visit is rewarded, the habit is reinforced. If not, the impulse weakens.
In the beginning (illustrated as A in the diagram), dopamine is released when the reward is experienced. Over time, as the habit takes shape (B), dopamine begins to rise earlier—at the moment the cue is recognized—because the brain now expects the reward. This anticipation creates a sense of motivation and reinforces the habit.
But when the expected reward doesn’t come (C), dopamine drops. The result is disappointment, and over time, the habit may stop altogether.
This applies directly to how readers interact with a front page. Each visit is a response to a cue—often formed by habit. If the page offers something new or relevant, the reward is delivered and the habit is strengthened. But if the content is unchanged, predictable, or uninteresting, the reader leaves with nothing—and the loop is broken.
Earlier in this article, I referenced research from Medill showing that visit frequency is more important than article depth when it comes to long-term subscription value. Readers who come back often are far more likely to stay. But to support that pattern, each visit needs to deliver something fresh.
That’s why personalization must begin at the top of the page. Not halfway down, and not just in selected modules. For it to work in a newsroom context, it has to be done responsibly—with editorial oversight and clear boundaries. A news brand cannot personalize like a social platform. I’ve written more about what responsible personalization looks like here: Informed personalization: editors in charge, trust at stake.