Left to right: Jaldeep Katwala (Bristol Cable), Daniel Jae Webb (Wiltshire 999s), Sarah Bosley (Newbury News), Oliver Rouane-Williams (Ipswich.co.uk)
Credit: Mark Hakansson / Marten Publishing
Local journalism is crying out for innovation and increasingly, it is the independent publishers who are taking the brave stance to break the status quo.
Our last Newsrewired conference (13 May 2025) featured three risk takers and trailblazers, who shared their innovative revenue strategies that go beyond clogging the website with adverts.
The algorithm master
Daniel Jae Webb has built Wiltshire 999s into a powerhouse of emergency services coverage for the south-west UK county, attracting 200k monthly visitors to the website.
But the true magic is happening on his social accounts, with 94k followers on Facebook and 124k on TikTok. The latter has generated 100m views last year alone, as local stories have a real chance to be picked up worldwide.
Webb understands that traditional video news content does not translate to TikTok, and so he had to repackagesA news content to be more natural for TikTok audiences.
“The trick to TikTok is the first five seconds,” he says, noting that his strategy focuses on frontloading key information with the best shot and an engaging hook, before moving to a second clip four seconds in.
Only videos one minute or longer can be monetised on the TikTok Creator Rewards Program, and all views under five seconds do not count towards monetisation.
Unlike businesses, Webb is eligible for the programme because he joined as an independent creator. In theory, a publishing brand could do the same but it would run the risk of being delisted. Webb said Wilshire 999s may undergo a rebrand to his own name to rule out this possibility.
TikTok also recently introduced links to articles on posts for news businesses, swapping monetisation for referral traffic, and removing the one-minute video requirement.
Drama, controversy and dark humour work well on TikTok, but the platform takes a hard stance against shocking content like gore and weapons. Webb’s first ban on TikTok came from firearms content, showing how one video can risk an entire account.
@wiltshire999s Police officer Callum Denley has pleaded guilty to making 1,590 child images | #police #news #crime
Wilshire 999s is now in a position to recruit more journalists. But Webb warns that the social media-dependent model comes with challenges, including struggles with demonetisation, abusive comments and the risk of not growing an owned audience. On his to-do list is a direct mailing list and registration strategy.
The paywall pioneer
Sarah Bosley has been a digital journalist with Newbury News in West Berkshire since 2005. She has climbed the ranks to become the digital editor leading the title’s transformation from a traditional print newspaper to a subscriber-driven digital publication.
Newbury News first took a punt at a partial paywall a decade ago, walling off “premium content”, but the strategy simply did not stick: “It was almost haphazard, who decides what was premium and what wasn’t?,” she said.
Second time appears to be the charm, as the title launched a hard paywall 18 months ago, building a base of 3,000 paying subscribers. The difference is a cultural commitment to stand by the strategy when the going gets tough.
Beware of the wrath of readers who were disgruntled at being asked to pay, she said, despite five stories a month being available for free on the standard site.
A premium site is available to subscribers (paying £4.99 a month, or £55 a year), giving them exclusive content and minimal ads, plus access to the Newbury Today app and digital copies of the newspaper.
“Explain why you’re doing it. We’ve been really honest with our readers about the state of local media,” she says.
Gone are the days of holding off the top stories for the print newspaper, the title is now digital-first with its editorial priorities. It has also maintained the subscriber-favourite arts and entertainment section, which other local competitors have abandoned.
The community visionary
Oliver Rouane-Williams left a prestigious role at News UK, to fulfil a lifelong ambition. Last year, he paid £20k for the domain name Ipswich.co.uk, and he has taken the news site from zero to 50k monthly visitors in nine months.
Listen: Oliver Rouane-Williams of Ipswich.co.uk: ‘I spent my life savings on launching a local news site’
It is no ordinary local news site. On offer is an Axios-inspired take on local business news, which bullet points core information. It is “unashamedly set up to serve local businesses and the local market,” but with strict criteria that partners must share values and have a vested interest in the community.
He currently has around 15 funding partners – paying on average £1500 a year – to support the title, and provide expert access and analysis. But this does not guarantee positive coverage and is a relationship Rouane-Williams describes as no different from advertising. Ties can always be severed.
He is an authority on advertising, as he was in charge of growth monetisation at News UK. But he realised that this traditional model of funding news “forces you into all the behaviours that you see today in terms of the over-sensationalisation of content and the poor product experience.”
His ambition is for the title to be a regenerative community project, which will expand physically into the local high street and the newsroom will be part of a wider portfolio of community services. Innovative new roles like “community impact reporter” and “civic pride reporter” have a similar goal, which is to counter negative perceptions of Ipswich.
The strategy has produced impressive engagement so far, notably on the newsletter, reaching nearly 3,000 readers, achieving a 63 per cent daily open rate and 24 per cent click-through rate.
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