How content publishers can monetize and maintain control in the AI age

As GenAI transforms how content is created, delivered and consumed, publishers assess B2B licensing, middleware services and owned channels.

In brief

• GenAI and large language models are changing the way published content is consumed and monetized.
• Publishers have an opportunity to create new business models and partnerships that complement their current efforts without cannibalizing existing business strategy.
• B2B middleware services offer publishers a way to monetize content through per-query payments in AI ecosystems.

From lawsuits to licensing deals, we are already seeing artificial intelligence (AI) disrupt the economy for published content. Publishers are rushing to strike partnerships with tech companies to train large language models (LLMs) from their historical data sets. Writers and authors are suing tech companies, alleging improper use of their copyrighted work to train models. All the while, LLMs want to shake their reputation for hallucinations and inaccuracies by collecting stronger, more relevant data.

While generative AI (GenAI) presents new obstacles, publishers have a long history of responding to emerging technology and shifting with audience needs — from print to digital, to the rise of aggregators and app-delivered instant articles. Today, examples of publishers adapting to and utilizing GenAI are already abundant (see below). One example is news aggregators using LLMs to gather and curate content for each reader. This manifests in the form of “For You” pages, but in time, GenAI could even be used to customize the stories to the reader’s interest and comprehension levels.

GenAI can transform how published content is created and delivered

Tomorrow, as consumers become more accustomed to these content features and interfaces, publishers will feel pressured to adopt them. Between traditional search experiences enhanced with GenAI, which present answers and summaries above traditional links, and LLMs, which quickly provide users with answers, traffic will likely decrease to publishers’ original sites. By 2028, one study predicts that brands’ organic search traffic will decrease by 50% or more as consumers embrace GenAI-powered search.¹ If LLM mass adoption continues, the number of search referrals could continue to fall.

Although the landscape is still being defined, this shift in consumer behavior puts publishers at risk of losing revenue from subscriptions and ad sales. In addition, publishers will lose the opportunity to engage with their readers on their own platforms, missing out on key customer data and giving up control of the ways in which their IP is displayed. If users only interact with published content via generative engines and not on publisher sites, the publishers’ brands will lose value, relevancy and voice.

Rather than passively allowing market shifts to diminish publishers’ value, publishers have the opportunity to negotiate and consider new monetization and interaction models with LLMs to adapt to these changes and release new products. As tech companies and LLMs seek to gain market share by offering differentiated products and improving the customer experience — including the need for up-to-date, trusted information — publishers can bring unique value and can define their role in the evolving value chain vs. merely becoming a data provider or a footnote.

One monetization avenue publishers have already been exploring is data licensing to train models via lump-sum payments. Despite short-term upside, this revenue will not be enough to sustain most publishers in the long term after traffic is reduced and at the expense of brand voice. Licensing data for training also limits publisher control over how the content is displayed and how the user experience is delivered.

Contributors to this article were Madhurika Rao, Senior Manager, Ernst & Young LLP; Amer Abed Rabbo, Senior Manager, Ernst & Young LLP; Vidisha Kanchan, Manager, Ernst & Young LLP; Sarah Rosso, Consultant, Ernst & Young LLP