CASE STUDY

The Disengaged-user Panel

Monetizing a common email behavior 

Often times a user opens their email, reads, and possibly responds but then leaves the email open while attending to other things. This model takes advantage of that behavior by presenting additional content in a slide-out panel.

When a user is inactive for n amount of time the user is presented with a slide-out panel containing:

• “News & Talking Points” – By framing it in this manner we reduce the disconnect between the current experience (email) and the new content by keeping them within a communication (“talking points”) context
• An additional ad unit – which still won’t monetize that well being that there was no user-intent, but which has a high viewability score and can be refreshed for at least some revenue
• Additional content – in this case a horoscope widget, that can be displayed based on the users past engagement with similar content

This same model could also be used when the provider doesn’t want any monetization in the immediate experience, but are willing to display additional content and/or messaging when the user has disengaged in the experience.

Adding the additional context of security

While the above approach could seem like a cheap tactic to make a little cash, when adding the additional layer of an obscured inbox (via an overlay and CSS blur), the construct becomes a security enhancement and more of a feature than just a quick eyeball grab. This approach has been successful for a number of providers who were worried about a backlash from their already paying subscribers.