Sensible audience & revenue strategies but DE&I efforts in decline

There’s good news and bad news. The good news is that the successful revenue diversification efforts of recent years are set to continue, and publishers are leaping on the opportunities presented by expanding into video and implementing AI-driven efficiencies. The bad news is that while efforts to diversify revenues continue, the same cannot be said for efforts to diversify the workplace, as DE&I has been deprioritised for the third year in a row.

Business priorities stay the course towards sensible and sustainable growth

When it comes to their top strategic organisational priorities, publishers have remained remarkably consistent. The top three – ranked by combining ‘agree’ and ‘strongly agree’ in each respective category’s importance – remain unchanged: developing revenue streams through product innovations, growing new audiences, and increasing advertising revenues, with only a swap of the top two marking a difference between this year’s survey and the last.

Where the survey gets interesting is the new categories added for the 2026 survey, two of which fill out positions four and five in the rankings: improving user experience and site layout (important to 73% of respondents) and expanding into new content areas (62%). Given the pressure to expand and retain audiences, the top five are all sensible priorities for meeting this challenge and then monetising the resultant uplift in attention and loyalty.

The other two additions to this year’s survey – support training for employees and investing in new AI-driven tech solutions provided by external suppliers – were more modest in their placement, at a neck-and-neck 40% and 39%, respectively.

While the top of the priorities list has stayed steady, we do see evidence of change between 2025 and 2026 further down, especially where rankings have shifted substantially. Developing policies relating to the use of generative AI has, naturally, shot up three places, and is a top priority for 61% of respondents. We can safely assume 100% of respondents are doing some work on this front.

The biggest drop was in recruiting and retaining new talent, a top priority for 61% of respondents in 2025 but just 36% in 2026; falling seven ranks in the process. These results are evidence of hiring pressures being relieved in the interim rather than representing a reduction in effort, as the share of publishers experiencing a talent shortfall has fallen from 46% in 2024 to 33% in 2025 and now 31% in 2026. There is also the possibility that productivity gains from backend AI implementations have reduced hiring pressure.

What cannot be celebrated is the deprioritisation of ensuring a diverse and inclusive workplace and promoting sustainable organisational practices. The former fell from being a priority for 48% of respondents to just 39%, dropping seven places in the rankings, while the latter fell from 45% to 31%, dropping four places, and is now at the bottom of the list.

One potential interpretation for sustainability being less important this year than before is that the work towards sustainability has already been done, switching it from an area of active effort to one of maintenance, and making it less of a day-to-day concern. It is, unfortunately, a stretch to charitably interpret the reduced importance of diversity and inclusion, however, for reasons we will explore in more detail when we cover corporate responsibility below.

Subscription and video lead revenue priorities, but advertising still keeps the lights on

Subscriptions remain the top predicted driver of revenue growth, though it now shares the spot with video, with both selected by 45% of publishers as one of their top options. Publishers are well aware of the popularity of video – especially front-facing vertical video – as the preferred medium for absorbing news, opinion, and lifestyle content for a large chunk of today’s audiences. In response, many publishers have developed bespoke video advertising solutions to monetise video content even when it is distributed off-site, so it is no surprise to see video revenues rank highly.

Events and branded content share the second spot at 38%, though it should be noted there is significant variance between B2C and B2B publishers. Events are a predicted growth driver for 69% of B2B publishers but just 21% of B2C, while the reverse is true for branded content, at 63% for B2C and just 23% for B2B. First-party data sales come in next at 34%, a significant fall from 45% in 2025, though this may be due to data partnerships having been established in the prior year that continue to bear fruit.

Further variances in predicted revenue drivers worth noting are: lead generation (21% B2C vs 62% B2B), sponsorship (16% B2C vs 39% B2B), and display advertising (42% B2C vs 8% B2B). All reflect the broad versus narrow audiences that each respective category of publisher serves.

Though B2C publishers are far more bullish on the potential of subscription growth than they are for display advertising, they remain highly dependent on advertising revenues to keep the lights on. The vast majority (89%) of B2C publishers agreed or strongly agreed that, without advertising, their ability to deliver on their mission would be significantly reduced, with a similar proportion (85%) feeling the same for advertising being essential to sustaining editorial output.

Theo Luke, senior director, inventory development, The Trade Desk, shared his perspective on the research findings: “This research underlines a simple reality: advertising is still a critical pillar for funding quality journalism at scale. But the next step is making it work harder through strengthening first-party data strategies and adopting privacy-forward identity and measurement approaches. These tools help publishers prove the value of their trusted environments and build more transparent relationships with advertisers. It’s crucial we work collaboratively across the ecosystem to support a more sustainable digital publishing ecosystem in the long term.”

Looking at the Digital Publishers Revenue Index, this dependency on advertising may not be the Achilles’ heel it has typically been. In the third quarter of 2025, display advertising revenues grew for the first time since 2022, which marked the beginning of the post-pandemic decline in advertiser spend going towards premium publishers. One quarter of growth is not enough to indicate a trend, of course, but it is encouraging nonetheless and hopefully means subscriptions and advertising will settle into a sustained 50/50 split of publisher revenues.

Publishers are evidently keen to grow or maintain advertising revenues on their own terms. While direct deals remain the main avenue for sales at 68% of the total share, there has been a substantial increase in revenues from private marketplaces, from 2% in 2025 to 6.4% in 2026. This is the result of deliberate effort on the part of publishers, 28% of whom see private marketplaces as the biggest opportunity for advertising revenue growth, while just 8.5% expect the same of open marketplaces.

Open marketplaces currently account for around a quarter of deals, but it’s clear publishers want to gradually swap its position with private alternatives going forward. They’ve tripled private marketplaces’ share of deals in just one year, so it will be interesting to see how much further they push it next year.

AI enthusiasm wanes but publishers are proactive on implementation

This year’s survey marks the third in which we’ve investigated publishers’ attitudes towards AI, and it has been a rollercoaster. When asked to gauge AI’s impact on operations and processes, where 0 represents negative and 10 represents positive, publishers responded with an average of 5.5 in 2024, 6.5 in 2025, and now back down to 5.4 in 2026. Middling enthusiasm throughout, but it’s notable that there has been a decline rather than the upwards trend anticipated in the prior survey. Publishers do continue to expect better in the future; the expected impact by 2030 is sitting at a much rosier 6.9.

There has been an even steeper decline in the perceived impact of AI on publishers’ business models and profitability, falling from 6 down to 4.7 today. Given that the past year has seen further growth in ChatGPT usage and the expansion of AI Overviews in Google search, which coincided with sharp declines in referral traffic, it is no surprise that publishers lack optimism here. They don’t expect much better from the future, either, with the expected impact by 2030 just a hair more positive at 4.8.

Publishers are evidently happy to take the good with the bad when it comes to AI and have been proactive in implementing generative AI internally. Almost two-thirds (64%) are using AI to improve editorial workflows and free journalists from mundane tasks, a similar proportion (63%) are using the technology to enhance the user experience, and more than half (56%) are training their editorial teams on the use of generative AI.

There has been a substantial decline in publishers implementing AI to drive efficiencies in advertising operations, from 77% in 2025 to 53% today, though this may be because implementations are now complete, reducing the need for further investment. More than half (53%) of publishers are investigating the impact of generative engine optimisation (GEO) on consumer search behaviours, though given the wide-reaching impact of AI on referral traffic mentioned above, I expect this proportion will soon be much higher.

The impact of AI was also referenced in our questions on talent. AI may be able to reproduce and surface content, but what it lacks is personality. The identity of individual journalists and the following they cultivate is a natural bulwark against AI, especially given the increased focus on video content, which hinges on hosts being authentic and presentable. We expected this would filter through to publisher strategy and were proved correct: 69% agreed or strongly agreed that they were asking journalists to develop a voice and profile on social channels.

Continued backslide on DE&I conflicts with audience growth plans

Unfortunately, the statistics around DE&I all tell the same story. For the third year in a row, there has been a significant reduction in the importance placed on environmental, social, and corporate governance (ESG) and diversity, equity, and inclusion (DE&I). From the proportion of publishers stating they have a clear or effective DE&I strategy to those claiming ESG is central to their values, there is a marked decline across every single response.

As mentioned above, less emphasis on carbon reductions is one area where I do not have cause for concern, as I believe – from my experience in AOP steering groups – that this is a result of successful prior initiatives reducing the need for ongoing work. I cannot say the same for DE&I, however, and though it is heartening that around half (48%) of respondents still state they have a clear strategy to create a more diverse and inclusive workforce, the ongoing downward trend is concerning.

Reversing course on DE&I is antithetical to the priority publishers are placing on expanding and retaining audiences. I can’t help but be reminded of the work and comments of Ridhi Radia, head of ED&I at Immediate Media, who spoke at AOP CRUNCH last year on how internal diversity filters through to diverse content and, eventually, audience growth. Conversely, internal homogeneity leads to homogenous content and audience stagnation.

Then there is the question of trust. People from underrepresented groups will remember if support was contingent on it being commercially or politically convenient. At a time when the reactionary backswing in the USA bleeds into corporate priorities this side of the Atlantic, the UK publishing industry should be standing strong against forces that seek to resegregate the workplace and society itself. Giving voices to those otherwise unheard is a core purpose of publishing, and that begins with robust and durable internal policies.

I wish I was ending on a more positive note, but the purpose of the AOP is not only to celebrate when the industry is sailing towards success, but also to sound the alarm when it is moving in the other direction. We will continue to champion DE&I, advocate for ESG, and platform those in the industry who work tirelessly – often in addition to their core responsibilities – to make it a place where everyone can find safety and success.

This article was first published in InPublishing magazine. If you would like to be added to the free mailing list to receive the magazine, please register here.