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9 highlights from the March Pugpig publisher check-in
Catch up on the highlights from this month’s Pugpig publisher check-in, including product releases, customer news and more.
26th March 2025
Yesterday marked our second instalment of the Pugpig monthly publisher check-in. We’ve rounded up the highlights in this brand new monthly newsletter so you can get up to speed on the latest news and product developments from Pugpig HQ. You can also watch the full recording here.
Next month’s check-in will be on Tuesday 29th April (11am EDT/4pm BST). Alongside product & customer updates, we’ll be chatting to Eric Ulken, VP of Product at The Baltimore Banner all about their learnings from their recent vertical video strategy. It’s set to be a great session – RSVP below to secure your seat (you’re already all set if you’ve previously registered for any check-in).
And finally, your involvement in helping us shape our upcoming 2025 State of Mobile report would be hugely appreciated – here’s our quick survey specifically for Pugpig publishers – we’d love your input. The report is going to be even more app-specific this year, and your insights around content, features, engagement and app strategy will help us make it the best yet.
Pugpig customer team update
Welcome to our new publishers…
We gave a warm welcome the newest publishers on our platform: McPherson Media Group, Newspapers of New England, The Houston Herald, The Free Press, and 3x new brands for Aviation Week’s ‘Times Aerospace’ division. Watch this space for some very cool app launches for these brands in the coming months.
A look at the latest Pugpig app launches…
- All Island Media launched Jersey Evening Post and The Bailiwick Express with a range of out-of-the-box features including region selector for Jersey/Guernsey, puzzles and e-papers. They join the growing roster of Newspack publishers launching their app on Pugpig.
- Times of Malta launched with a mix of free and premium content, comments powered by Disqus (an out-of-the-box integration), e-paper and puzzles. Read more.
- Iceland’s only daily-printed newspaper, Morgunblaðið launched with content across multiple timelines made accessible with our Explore card, and an extensive watch and listen section with video, podcasts and radio.
Runner’s World, launches new ‘running companion’ app on Pugpig Bolt with training plans and tiered memberships
Runner’s World has launched a brand new app on the Pugpig platform complete with exclusive training plans and tiered membership, as well as premium content and a host of added value for subscribers.
Jennifer Bozon, Membership Director at Runner’s World said: “I’m delighted with our re-imagined companion app. The training plan library with filter functionality is a particular highlight for me, as it’s allowed us to deliver the customisation our customers told us they wanted when we conducted market research ahead of launch – but at scale. We’ve already seen a 35% increase in daily app usage, which is a great result so far, and I can’t wait to see how we iterate the app in the future.”
Read more about the Runner’s World app
Pugpig Product Team update
Recent releases and upcoming features on Pugpig Bolt
Pugpig Product Director, Emillie, gave us an update on recent releases since last month’s call, which mostly include CMS workflow and web improvements. We’re also wrapping up our new Bolt iOS version, which integrates the SDK 18 update (including the iPad layout change).
Roadmap initiatives we’re currently working on include improvements to Bolt’s search functionality, Bolt Follow 1.0, redesigned subscription modal, tool tips and A/B testing. Reach out to your Customer Success manager if you’d like more info.
Bolt Search 2.0
The new and improved Bolt Search really will be built from the ground up. Content cards that are already used elsewhere in your app will now pull through as your search results, making it much easier and quicker to surface podcasts and videos in the in the search results, as well as enabling an even more cohesive design across your app.
The update also includes filter tabs allowing users to drill down into different content types and taxonomies – it’s totally up to you how you customise those. For instance, if you’re categorising your content by author, users can search for an author’s name, tap through, and view content from that particular author.
If you’re particularly interested in Bolt Search 2.0, please get in touch. The product team would love to get your thoughts on the ideas we’re considering.
Paywall expansion
We have some significant upcoming improvements to Bolt’s paywall functionality. In-app conversion is becoming more important for publishers looking at the app as part of the subscription funnel as well as an engagement tool, so this is a key focus for us.
The most notable update here is the two-stage metered paywall. Rather than simply having a specified number of articles the user can read for free before they’re asked to subscribe, you can define an article limit allowed before the user hits a registration wall, and then another before they hit the paywall and are prompted to subscribe. So you’re turning unknown users into known users very early on in the process. In terms of where you set those limits, it’s completely customisable.
We’re also exploring contextual messaging that will allow you to tailor your paywall messaging depending on a user’s content preferences. For instance, if a user is engaging with a particular area of the app, such as trying to access podcasts, you can ensure your copy makes sense in that context and drives conversions.
Customer poll: A/B testing
This month’s quick-fire poll focused on what we’re currently working on around A/B testing. Check out the results…
Do you have unanswered questions or hypotheses about your app you feel A/B testing tools could answer?
What level of familiarity do you currently have with A/B testing?
From L-R:
- We already run regular experiments on our other properties
- We’ve run sporadic experiments, but it’s not a core part of our process
- We’d like to do more but don’t have the time/resource
- We haven’t really engaged with experimentation as a tool
- We don’t see the benefit
What areas or ideas would you like to be able to test?
Monthly focus:
Using a customer-centric approach to grow audience, David Robinson, Chief Customer Officer, Hearst UK
This month, we were joined by Hearst UK Chief Customer Officer, David Robinson. Together, we dove into Hearst’s customer-focused growth strategy, explored their tiered membership propositions and got insight into how they have managed to consistently grow overall audience despite the huge drop in referral traffic being experienced by all publishers in recent years.
It’s well worth a watch and as luck would have it, you can check it below:
Skip to 21 minutes of the recording to watch David’s session in full
Upcoming events & next month’s call
Webinar: Learn The Boston Globe’s Winning Formula for 3x Push Engagement & Winning Personalisation Strategies
Join Pugpig, Airship and The Boston Globe next Thursday 3rd April to learn how The Boston Globe tripled engagement with push notifications, how early engagement can boosts opt-ins by 40%, winning personalisation strategies and industry benchmarks to measure success.
RSVP here to save your seat – it’s set to be a great session and we hope to see you there.
Where you’ll find us during this year’s conference season
As conference season kicks off, here are the events you’ll catch us at over the next few months. We’d love to see you there!
- MEGA Conference, 14-16 April, Orlando
- WAN IFRA World News Media Congress, 4-6 May, Krakow
- Media Voices Publisher App Summit, 11 June, London
Here’s what’s on the agenda for the March publisher check-in…
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