Hard closed vs dynamically closed article visibility

Article visibility controls who can freely read your content. Based on the article’s structured data and user instrumentation, an article falls into one of three categories:

• Open: Available for free to all users.
• Dynamically closed: Closed to certain users depending on their consumption (metered paywalls) or their propensity to subscribe (dynamic paywalls).
• Hard closed: Available only to subscribers.

Content visibility is available as a dimension and filter across the Marfeel platform on Compass, Explore, Optimize, and all other views.

If you have content behind a hard paywall, make sure that requests from Marfeel crawlers IPs have access to it. Otherwise, many modules like content metrics, recommender, audits... might lack the needed information to function properly.

Compass view

Padlock icons in Compass indicate article visibility: a dark padlock for hard closed articles, a light padlock for dynamically closed articles.

Clicking on the padlock icon filters articles with the same visibility. Alternatively, you can set the visibility filter from the top filters option.

Article details

Opening the article detail page from the Compass view shows the article visibility icon below the title.

For dynamically closed articles, Marfeel shows:

• Total pageviews: the total number of pageviews the article received.
• Dynamically closed pageviews: how many times the article was closed. This metric and the ratio $\frac{dynamically closed pageviews}{total pageviews}$ help editors and subscription managers understand how propensity to subscription algorithms are closing content.

Insights and actionability

Identify valuable articles you could close

If you follow a hard-paywall strategy, these queries help you pick the right articles to close.

On Compass view you can filter by subscribers and identify which are the top articles being consumed by them with relevant internal traffic. If these articles are not closed, consider closing them to increase value perception from your subscribers and as an interest signal.

Another good way to find article candidates to close is by filtering anonymous lovers and loyals. Consider closing articles with relevant internal and/or dark social traffic.

Track closed articles over time

On a weekly or monthly basis, review the percentage of articles you close and compare it over time in the Explore view.

Understand how visibility affects subscriptions

In Optimize, you can check how your visibility strategies compare. In this query, you can see how different conversion rates compare for the last editorial hit. While a hard-paywall has the highest conversion rate (green line), the dynamic-signwall strategy brings more subscribers in absolute numbers.

What is the difference between hard closed and dynamically closed articles?

Hard closed articles are available only to subscribers. Dynamically closed articles are closed to certain users depending on their consumption (metered paywalls) or their propensity to subscribe (dynamic paywalls). Open articles are available for free to all users.

How do I identify which articles to put behind a paywall?

Filter by subscribers in Compass to find the top articles they consume with relevant internal traffic. You can also filter anonymous lovers and loyals to find articles with high engagement from non-subscribers. Articles with relevant internal or dark social traffic are strong candidates for closing.

How does article visibility affect subscription conversions?

In the Optimize view, you can compare conversion rates across visibility strategies. While a hard-paywall strategy typically shows the highest conversion rate, a dynamic-signwall strategy often brings more subscribers in absolute numbers.