Publishers have long been rethinking how they measure and hold audience attention as referral traffic declines and search behavior changes.
This was a recurring theme at Press Gazette’s Future of Media Technology Conference in London, where Gretel Kahn of the Reuters Institute gathered five takeaways for Nieman Lab.
At The Times and The Sunday Times, AI now helps with comment moderation. Deputy head of digital Anna Sbuttoni said humans still oversee the work.
She said the technology has brought the moderation workload “way down.” That has freed the team to spend more time on community-focused projects.
Publishers are also exploring recommendation tools and other ways to deepen engagement.
They are measuring that engagement beyond clicks, too. The Guardian’s chief support officer, Liz Wynn, highlighted app downloads, visit frequency and newsletter signups.
Wynn said mission can attract readers, but publishers need to give people reasons to return regularly.
The new tactics comes as referral traffic from Google has declined as AI features now answer questions directly within search.
A Pew Research Center study found users clicked traditional search results in 8% of visits with an AI summary. They clicked in 15% of visits without one. The study showed an association; it did not establish that AI summaries caused broader publisher traffic declines.
Conference speakers described AI search as the “Wild West.” Acknowledging uncertainty, News UK CTO Tom Jackson said publishers should adapt while avoiding major bets on today’s patterns.
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Jackson said richer metadata may become more important as AI-driven discovery develops. Daily Mail SEO director Carly Steven said her company is testing ways to improve visibility on AI platforms.
That experimentation sits alongside efforts to strengthen direct audience relationships. Politico UK has introduced registration for free content to learn more about readers and identify likely subscribers.
To offset declining search-referral revenue and support those shifts, publishers are negotiating with AI companies. Jackson said News UK has a deal with Meta and is in licensing talks with others.
He also warned that News UK would sue companies that take its content without permission. Separately, New York Times publisher A.G. Sulzberger has accused AI companies of “stealing” journalism.
Personality-led journalism was also presented as a means of preserving readers. The Economist is putting more journalists’ names and faces in front of audiences. The Guardian has launched Guardian Studios around video-first, on-screen talent.
Guardian Studios leader Leah Green said legacy outlets can learn from creators without trying to copy them outright. Her warning applied to creator strategy, not AI search.
The conference did not produce one audience playbook. Instead, speakers described several experiments: stronger direct channels, AI-assisted community work, more visible journalists and a cautious presence in AI search.
Separately, Media Copilot has argued that publishers can verify and license AI access without simply trusting vendors.
The common thread is not abandoning platforms or clicks. It is building more ways to understand, reach and retain readers as discovery becomes less predictable.
