Luke Bradley-Jones on The Economist’s Post-Google Playbook

At the Future of Media Technology Conference, The Economist’s president set out how the publisher plans to navigate shrinking search traffic and the rise of AI platforms.

Sep 12, 2025

When the traffic stops flowing

For years, news organisations could rely on Google to keep the audience pipeline open. Search brought in readers; SEO was part of the machinery of modern publishing. That arrangement is weakening. Google claims that its new AI-powered search tools are boosting referrals. Few publishers believe it.

Luke Bradley-Jones, President of The Economist, has been watching the numbers closely. “All of the evidence points to a significant fall in referral traffic,” he told the Press Gazette’s Future of Media Technology Conference. It was not delivered a future threat but as a blunt assessment. For The Economist, which has never leaned as heavily on search as some digital-first players, the decline is manageable. For others, it could prove existential.

The larger issue is clear: Google and other platforms no longer act like gateways. They increasingly behave as destinations in their own right, pulling in queries, keeping users inside their walls, and giving publishers little more than crumbs. In that world, publishers must change how they operate.

Bradley-Jones frames the solution around what he calls the “three Ds”: differentiation, direct relationships, and discoverability. Taken together, they form The Economist’s playbook for surviving and, ideally, thriving in a post-Google landscape.

A business in decent health

It helps to start from a position of strength. The Economist posted profits of £48m last year, with a base of around one million digital subscribers. That is not the scale of the streaming giants, but in the world of quality news it places the paper near the top of the league.

The revenue picture is wider than subscriptions alone. The Economist Intelligence Unit supplies macroeconomic forecasts and structured data to corporate clients. Advertising, which had been left on the back burner, is receiving new attention. Events have become a serious business line, with over 130 organised last year, ranging from climate summits to financial risk conferences.

None of this makes the publication immune to platform shifts. But it does mean the organisation can approach change from a position of relative resilience.

Luke Bradley-Jones and Dominic Ponsford at Press Gazette The Future of Media Technology conference in London, 11th September 2025

Differentiation: journalism AI can’t fake

The first pillar is differentiation. At a time when generative AI can churn out functional summaries of almost any story, the question becomes simple: what makes a publisher’s work irreplaceable?

Bradley-Jones’s answer is to emphasise the “artisanal” nature of The Economist’s journalism. The word may sound precious, but the point is practical. Machines can copy and summarise; what they struggle to reproduce is the blend of analysis, global context and editorial judgement that distinguishes a well-argued piece.

That applies across formats. Text remains the core, but the paper has invested heavily in podcasts and video. Its daily show The Intelligence reaches audiences who may never have subscribed to the magazine. Video explainers, whether on Instagram or YouTube, bring journalists into view, revealing the debates and arguments behind the headlines.

This inevitably raises questions about identity. For nearly two centuries, The Economist has published without bylines, presenting itself as a collective institution. Audio and video break that convention, highlighting individual personalities. Bradley-Jones views this as additive rather than corrosive: the collective voice still matters, but personality-led formats provide the colour and intimacy today’s audiences expect.

The deeper point is that differentiation cannot be left to habit. Even The Economist, with its distinct house style, has to look at each piece and ask: is this unique, or is it a take that others could provide just as well? In his keynote, Bradley-Jones admitted that stories once thought strong sometimes fall short of that standard. Ruthlessness, not tradition, is what keeps the brand sharp.

Direct relationships: avoiding disintermediation

The second D is directness, ensuring that readers come to The Economist itself rather than only encountering it via platforms. In practice, that means two things: blocking unauthorised use of content, and improving the experience so readers choose to come back.

On the defensive side, The Economist has strengthened its technical measures, working with Cloudflare to block AI bots from scraping its journalism. On the offensive side, it is experimenting with AI as a way to enrich its own products.

One experiment involved Google’s NotebookLM, an AI-powered research assistant. By loading its annual World Ahead report into the system, The Economist let subscribers query the content, generate audio summaries, and produce podcasts on demand. The trial revealed strong usage patterns. People were asking bigger questions of the journalism, and many preferred consuming it in audio rather than text.

That has informed the creation of an internal AI Lab, staffed with engineers, product leads and designers, operating independently from the newsroom. Their brief is not about this quarter’s subscription churn but about what The Economist should look like three to five years from now. Could a leader be delivered as a two-minute audio clip? Could playlists be built around a reader’s commute or walk? Could AI agents curate a dynamic bundle of analysis without diluting the editorial voice?

The aim is clear: to remain one of the handful of apps a reader keeps on their phone, not something they stumble across via a platform.

Luke Bradley-Jones, President of The Economist at Press Gazette The Future of Media Technology conference in London, 11th September 2025

Discoverability: building new entry points

If differentiation and directness are about protecting the moat, discoverability is about building bridges. With search referrals declining, publishers need new ways for audiences to find them.

The Economist is spending more on brand marketing. The United States is the main focus, for three reasons: willingness to pay for quality journalism is higher, conversion rates are stronger, and media costs are lower. The UK remains a core market, but the headroom is smaller.

The marketing mix is strikingly traditional. Linear TV, linear radio and targeted out-of-home placements are the priority channels. Econometric analysis suggests these outperform digital campaigns for brand impact. Airport lounges and premium city sites have become prized spots for Economist posters.

Social platforms are used less as distributors and more as brand amplifiers. With over 60m followers across channels, the goal is not to drive traffic directly but to keep the brand visible, generating what marketers call “upper funnel demand.”

The boldest move, however, is the launch of Off the Charts, a Substack newsletter dedicated to data visual journalism. Unlike the core subscription, it is free at launch. The idea is to capture a niche audience already engaged with Substack, without cannibalising the main product. Data enthusiasts may come in for charts and eventually stay for broader coverage.

There are risks. Substack is someone else’s platform. Journalists running their own side newsletters could weaken the institution. But Bradley-Jones argues that the trade-off is worth it: better to meet potential readers on their chosen ground than to wait for them to wander into The Economist’s orbit.

The revenue mosaic

Subscriptions remain the engine, but the revenue mix is more varied than many assume.

Data and intelligence: The Economist Intelligence Unit sells structured forecasts on macroeconomic and industry trends. Demand is rising, especially among corporate clients in the US, where expansion is underway.
Advertising: Neglected for years, advertising is being revived. Premium placements and new products are being rolled out to match latent demand.
Events: Now numbering more than 130 a year, events provide sponsorship revenue and brand extension. Topics range from trade to climate change to financial risk, with editorial involvement adding credibility.

Together, these businesses create a mosaic: no single piece dominates, but collectively they provide stability.

Drawing the line on AI licensing

On one issue, The Economist has chosen clarity over compromise. Unlike some peers, it has declined to license content to AI platforms. Bradley-Jones’s reasoning is blunt: these are not neutral distributors but publishing platforms in their own right. To license at scale would be to feed a competitor.

That does not mean permanent refusal. AI interfaces may well become unavoidable gateways, and some publishers will seek prominence within them just as others once optimised for Google. But for now, The Economist prefers to strengthen its own position rather than trade away content for short-term reach.

Lessons for the industry

Bradley-Jones’s keynote distilled into three pieces of advice.

First, be ruthless about differentiation. Not everything a newsroom produces is unique. Publishers must be willing to stop doing work that is no longer distinctive, however successful it once seemed.

Second, build sticky experiences. AI can replicate information, but it cannot replicate the sense of belonging to a brand or the utility of a subscription that adapts to a reader’s habits.

Third, choose partnerships carefully. The old reluctance to “dance with” certain platforms may have to be set aside, provided the core relationship with readers remains direct.

The advice is not revolutionary, but it is grounded in practice. The Economist has been willing to experiment, willing to say no, and willing to reallocate resources where the data leads.

A pragmatic compact

In the end, there are no magic formulas. Bradley-Jones put it plainly: “Are you differentiated enough, is your product experience compelling enough, and are your partnerships strategic enough?” If the answers are yes, survival is possible. If not, even strong brands risk decline.

For The Economist, the compact with its readers remains straightforward. Protect the quality of its journalism. Invest in formats that deepen engagement. Ensure that people come directly to the brand rather than encountering it only through an intermediary.

In a post-Google, AI-driven internet, that may be the only sustainable strategy

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