Digiday+ Research: Subscriptions poised to make a comeback as publishers sort out revenue priorities for 2025

This is according to Digiday+ Research surveys of publisher professionals conducted annually in the third quarter.

Digiday’s surveys found that, overall, the top three revenue sources for publishers going into 2025 are direct-sold ads, video advertising (for example, branded content and pre-roll) and branded content. Almost all publisher pros surveyed by Digiday this year said they get at least a very small portion of their revenue from direct-sold ads (98% said this). Meanwhile, 91% said this year that they get at least a very small portion of revenue from video ads, and 88% said the same of branded content.

This represents a change from a year ago, when Digiday’s survey found that direct-sold ads, branded content and programmatic ads were the top three sources of publishers’ revenue overall. Video advertising came in fourth place last year, making its jump to second place this year significant. More specifically, 84% of publisher pros said last year that they got at least a very small portion of their revenue from video ads, compared with 91% this year.

Although it ranked third-to-last among publishers’ revenue sources this year, affiliate commerce also saw a notable jump in the percentage of respondents to Digiday’s survey who said they get at least a very small portion of their revenue from that source. Last year, 61% of publishers said they made money from affiliate commerce. This year, that percentage rose to 68%.

There were also notable changes in the opposite direction this year: The percentage of publishers who said they get at least a very small portion of their revenue from branded content fell from 96% last year to 88% this year, and those who said they get revenue from connected TV fell from 51% last year to 43% this year.

Digiday’s surveys found that, overall, publishers will focus on direct-sold ads, video ads and branded content over other revenue sources heading into the new year. Ninety-three percent of publisher pros said this year they’ll put at least a very small focus on building their direct-sold ads business in the next six months, followed by branded content and video advertising, both at 91%.

Video advertising also saw a boost this year over last year’s survey results in this category: 85% of publishers said last year they would put at least a very small focus on that part of their business, putting video ads in third place. The 91% who said the same this year boosted video ads to a second-place tie.

Notably, programmatic ads saw a drop in publishers’ focus this year compared with last year. Eighty-four percent of publishers said this year they would focus on building their programmatic business in the coming months, down from 91% last year. Selling products also saw a notable drop: 60% of publishers said last year that they would focus at least a little on building that part of their business, compared with 48% this year.

Most interestingly, publishers’ focus on growing their subscriptions business saw a big boost this year: 83% of publisher pros told Digiday this year that they’ll put at least a very small focus on building their subscriptions business in the next six months, up from just 67% last year.

Digiday’s surveys found that direct-sold ads and branded content still come in at the top of publishers’ revenue sources when it comes to where they make the largest portion of their money this year, but video ads fell to fifth place here while programmatic ads came in the second-place spot. Fifty-seven percent of publisher pros said this year that they get a large or very large portion of their revenue from direct-sold ads, followed by programmatic ads at 36% and branded content at 24%. Nineteen percent of publishers said this year that they get a large or very large portion of revenue from video advertising — a big drop from the 36% who said the same last year.

Subscriptions claimed the fourth-place spot in this category this year, and saw a big jump over last year in the percentage of publishers who make a lot of money from subscriptions. Twenty-one percent of publisher pros said this year that they get a large or very large portion of their revenue from subscriptions. Just 11% said the same last year.

Subscriptions also made a big jump over last year when it comes to what revenue sources publishers will be focusing on the most heading into 2025 — in fact, it made the top three in Digiday’s survey this year. Seventy-one percent of publisher pros told Digiday this year that they’ll put a large or very large focus on building their direct-sold ads business in the next six months, followed by branded content at 52% and subscriptions at 50%. A year ago, just 37% of publishers said they planned on putting a large focus on building their subscriptions business.

In this category, video advertising actually saw a large drop from last year: 41% of publishers said this year that video ads will be a large or very large focus for them in the coming months, down from 52% last year. CTV also saw a big drop in publishers’ focus from last year to this year, from 31% of publishers saying in 2023 that they would put a large or very large focus on building their CTV business to just 9% saying so in 2024.