CASE STUDY
NEWS & PUBLISHING
Byline Times digital edition
We devised and built an online news subscription product that’s better for readers and editors… and earns measurable revenue
product innovation
WordPress expertise
workflow optimisation
strategic thinking
The challenge
Bucking the trend in a difficult economic climate for publications, subscriptions-funded Byline Times has earned a strong following in the UK for its investigative reporting and editorial principles. We have designed and managed their (free) news site and (paid) print edition since 2018.
The news magazine offers print and digital subscriptions. Like many publications, the digital product was initially a glorified PDF, and despite a lot of effort, it had problems:
- for readers: it was awkward to navigate and read on-screen because it followed the print layout of columns and spreads
- for editors (and readers): articles couldn’t be categorised, connected, shared, or searched across editions
- for the business: it wasn’t possible to link directly to content to convert subscribers, and there was no way to track what people read, nor discover which articles generated shares, action, or revenue.
“Our goal was to improve our digital subscribers’ reading experience without losing the essence of the printed newspaper. We wanted our readers to navigate our newspaper online, discover exclusive content that matters to them, and enjoy a smoother, more intuitive digital journey.
Ella Baddeley, Head of Operations, Byline Times
“Yes we work’s new system delivers on all fronts. Their bespoke software has significantly elevated our digital offering, turning what was once a PDF file into a dynamic, reader-first experience that truly reflects the quality of our journalism.”
What we did
During the first months of 2025 we designed and built a new web-based digital edition as a tailored extension of Byline Times’ existing bespoke WordPress site.
Adopting the latest features of the CMS meant we could give editors the flexibility to lay out features close to the way they’re designed in print, but also adapted for comfortable reading on any screen.
Regular columns are kept consistent by using reusable components, pre-set patterns and starter layouts; and we created workflow tools to make the flow from InDesign to WordPress as frictionless as possible.
We implemented a simple in-article paywall to quickly convert new subscribers, and tools to link articles on the free news site directly to paywalled articles on the news site.
As part of the planning we looked into third-party solutions including custom apps, PDF conversion apps, and SaaS platforms, but they lacked the design flexibility and brand consistency that was needed, and (worse) would have meant lock-in to a proprietary platform.
Before: trying to read a PDF on any screen, especially mobile devices, was clumsy and offputting
Now: the digital edition is easy to navigate and read, and the paywall converts readers into subscribers
“It’s all very direct … which really helps things move along.”
Katia Patin, Digital Editor
Measures of success
- Readers now receive an accessible, easy to read publication that works anywhere.
- Editors get a familiar, consistent, cost-effective workflow. One editor can publish a digital edition of ~40 articles with custom layouts in a matter of hours; no extra training or software required.
- The business can now check analytics, cross-promote relevant content / products, and track revenue. And they avoided expensive apps or platform fees.
- 30% of new subscriptions already come via the digital edition’s paywall (with the old PDF, it was impossible to know if anyone did anything other than download it).
- The distinctive digital news product is easier to promote, and not entirely incidentally, it’s one that has a high profit margin.
“It looks fantastic and works really well. Yes we work have brilliantly rendered the design qualities of our print edition in digital form. I didn’t think it was possible, but they made it seamless and easy.”
Peter Jukes, Executive Editor, Byline Times
Why this might be interesting to you
This case study illustrates how our approach brings value at every level:
- We make digital products readers and editors actually enjoy using, removing friction and frustrations.
- We understand WordPress inside out – from custom blocks and taxonomies to granular control of FSE – and apply that knowledge to real editorial workflows.
- We help businesses avoid costly dead-ends and lock-in, helping them focus on what will last.
Byline Times is a publisher, but the same principles apply when we’re helping NGOs communicate complex findings, cultural organisations publish archives, or charities report impact to donors.
If you want digital editorial tools that work beautifully for both your team and your audience, let’s talk.
The WordPress fine detail
- We set up the new digital edition to inherit and enhance the stylesheets (both
theme.jsonand CSS files) of the existing news site, allowing more flexibility of layout and typography for the digital edition specifically (to allow individual pages to be designed like the print edition), while maintaining consistency with basic design principles. - We built a taxonomy-driven edition navigation block that lets readers move easily through the digital edition in the same order as the print version. Part of the appeal of the monthly edition – compared to a typical news website – is that it has an editorial flow and structure; and crucially, it has an end: you can flick through it and reach the last page and feel that you’ve completed it. (Though it was built for editions the block can navigate posts via any taxonomy, so could be used for reading through archives by category, tag or anything else.)
- To make life easier for subeditors and digital producers, we coded a custom utility to convert InDesign’s HTML exports to WordPress’s native format. Every object, paragraph and character style used in InDesign gets mapped and output to the correct HTML, comments and CSS classes for WordPress, taking the repetition out of data entry, and ensuring the digital version of an article is styled the same way as it is in print. As you can see in the video below, this means it takes just a few seconds to bring an article from InDesign into WordPress, maintaining all text styling.
- We designed Synced Patterns (aka “Reusable Blocks”) that echo the flavour of the print edition’s regular columns and investigations, ready to be dropped in to quickly lay out new articles faithfully. In this way, we consciously aim to avoid the bland uniformity that template code can sometimes produce. Instead, we wanted to reflect the editorial tone and voice of each piece to the digital reader.
- We implemented a lightweight paywall as a custom extension of WooCommerce. Subscribers log in to get access, and new readers are given an easy way to subscribe if they’d like to (or get to the also-great free website if not).
- Via WooCommerce the digital edition is linked up to Metorik (an analytics package) to make sure that it is working for readers and generating money for Byline Times.
If you’d like to get WordPress to fit your business, staff and customers’ needs like a glove, let’s talk.