In the middle of the growing discomfort of digital media Due to the traffic drop derived from the new search with artificial intelligence, Google launches a new product with an implicit message: We cannot return the traffic, but perhaps we can help you earn money in another way.

The tool is called Offerwall and has been presented as a new monetization route for editors from Google Ad Manager. Its promise is to allow users to access the content of a medium in exchange for actions such as micropagos, see ads, answer surveys or subscribe to a newsletter. All this within a Google controlled environment, configurable by editors and optimized by artificial intelligence.

When traffic is eaten

Since the deployment of search functions with artificial intelligence in Google, the media have begun to see how their articles cease to be the final destination to become, in the best case, in the source of an automated summary generated by the search engine itself. He Organic Trafficthat for years it was the sap of the editorial ecosystem, it is undertaking little by little. And Google, aware of this structural change that has accelerated, now launches Offerwall as a way of redistributing part of the lost value.

It should be noted, as collected by the newsletter of Multiversialthat the AI ​​of Perplexity already appears as a result when searching for the owner of a news, in this case of Bloomberg, the extract appearing before the medium in searches. And the Google summary also appears, which encourages not having to click on any link.

Offerwall allows each editor to configure an alternative access wall that does not necessarily require paying with money: the reader can choose between several actions for Unlock the content. Among the integrated default options are:

• Micropagos By temporary article or access through integration with SuperTab, a third -party service that allows paying a small amount for access of 24 hours, several days or a week. This function is in beta, but also includes subscription options and direct integration with ad manager
• See a advertising video short
• Answer one survey
• Subscribe to a newsletter
• Choose interest For advertising customization

In addition, editors can add their own actions or Modify the appearance of offerwall (Logo, texts …). Google ensures that the system uses AI to decide when to show offerwall, although it also offers manual control to define activation thresholds.

Although Google presents Offerwall as a new tool, many of the solutions it incorporates have already been tested by the media previously. The micropagosfor example, they have been used for years as the supposed alternative to the advertising model, but they have not finished consolidating. The reasons are multiple: friction in the payment process, operational costs, scarce return or lack of habit by users.

Even recent initiatives such as Post, a Twitter type social network supported by the Andreessen Horowitz background (A16Z), tried to reactivate this logic of micropagos for media, but failed due to lack of traction.

The novelty, therefore, is not in the options, but in Integration: An existing system in the Google ecosystem, with automatic customization technology and without the need for own developments by the environment. The offerwall value could be more in its operational efficiency than in the originality of the model.

First test data

Google says it has been providing offerwall for more than a year with 1,000 editors in beta. According to data shared with Techcrunchthe results have been “Moderately positive”: The editors who used the system saw an average increase of 9% in their income. In some specific cases, such as that of the Indian group Sakal Media Group, the increase was 20% in revenues and up to 2 million additional impressions in just three months.

In the Adsense environment, the editors who implemented short advertisements (one of the offerwall options) saw an average growth of 9% after one million messages shown. Google also ensures that the editors who used Offerwall within Ad Manager observed an increase in income from 5% to 15%.

The strategic reading of this movement is complex. On the one hand, Offerwall offers the media A useful tool to diversify your incometry new monetization pathways and reduce its dependence on pure traffic. On the other, it comes at a time when Google – with its changes in the search engine – has drastically reduced the organic visibility of editorial content. In that sense, Offerwall can be seen as a patch.

Nor is it clear how the end user will react to these access walls, or if new consumption dynamics will be consolidated beyond the classic freemium model of digital journalism. And any solution that depends on ad manager, own the Google ecosystem tools, ends up reinforcing the editor’s dependence on the search engine.

More info.: Offerwall