Launches

The Week, the first ever publisher on our Bolt platform, refreshes their app in line with their subscriptions strategy

The Week, trusted weekly news magazine and our first ever Pugpig customer back in 2011, has refreshed their app with a brand new look and lots of deeply engaging features.

8th February 2024

The Week, trusted weekly news magazine and our first ever Pugpig customer back in 2011, has refreshed their app with a brand new look and lots of deeply engaging features.

Over the last 13 years, we’ve loved working with the team at The Week and so we were just as excited as they were at the idea of revamping their app to become an intrinsic element of their subscriptions strategy.

Before the refresh, The Week app used Bolt’s standard out-of-the-box framework to deliver their weekly digital edition and webview content which linked out to their website.

Added value for subscribers

The primary goal of the refresh was to give the app a more premium feel to drive bundle subscriptions (print & digital) amongst existing legacy print subscribers after an initial three-month free trial.

To do this, our Professional Services team spent time mirroring the look and feel of their much-loved daily email newsletters: Morning Report, Evening Review, Saturday Wrap and Sunday Shortlist in a new main content timeline within the app.

These short, snappy news digests are incredibly engaging and were a crucial aspect of the refresh – they provide added value for digital and bundle subscribers beyond just the weekly digital edition and position the app as more of a premium offering while making some of The Week’s most popular content accessible to a higher portion of their audience base.

A home for The Week Unwrapped podcast and an enhanced digital editions experience

The new app also provides a home for The Week’s popular weekly podcast, The Week Unwrapped, which is powered by Bolt’s off-the-shelf audio player.

Users are able to catch up on the biggest news of the week while on the go, browse episodes, speed up or slow down playback, add to queue and more.

The in-app digital editions have been improved too – users now have the option of simply reading as a standard PDF with pan and zoom functionality or clicking into each article and viewing each article in beautifully responsive HTML format.

Find out more about Bolt’s off-the-shelf audio player

The new and improved The Week app is live in both iOS and Android app stores. Take a look and let us know what you think. If you’d like any further information on any Bolt features mentioned in this article, please get in touch or reach out to your Customer Success Manager if you’re a Pugpig customer.