Subscription isn’t just access—it’s a promise of value: Puneet Kukreja

Times Internet Vice President Puneet Kukreja spoke in depth on the growth, challenges and strategies of the subscription-based media business at Indian Magazine Congress (IMC) 2025. Sharing his career experiences of 15–16 years, he said that his biggest passion has been how to make the continuous payment model work in a price-sensitive market like India. 

'The real challenge is to make payments more frequently and not just once'

Puneet started his career with MagicBricks.com, where owners were charged up to ₹20,000 for property listing and then home seekers were also asked to make payment. Later, he got the experience of selling expensive products like iPad and laptop in Amazon. He shared that the subscription journey in Economic Times started in 2018, when ARPU (average revenue per user) was falling and MAU (monthly active users) had become stable. In such a situation, products like ET Prime, ET Markets and Masterclasses were launched.

'Subscription is not just access, it's a promise of value'

He said that the focus of the subscription model should not be only on content access, but it should be transformed into a 'value circle' that helps the user to make a better decision. He believes that if a user gets promotion with the help of his tools or articles, makes a better investment, then that is the biggest success.

Puneet clearly said that initially they made the mistake of keeping the price low, but later realized that the target user base is very different and they should price according to value. They launched products like ET Prime at a price of ₹2,000–₹2,500 and always kept Masterclasses at a premium.

'The importance of retention - 60% of revenue is pre-decided'

According to Puneet, today 60% of the revenue is fixed from day one because user retention is strong. He explained that it is wrong to focus only on user access, the real work starts when a user makes the payment. He associated the subscriber with 'gym membership' - no one becomes fit by going to the gym for a day, similarly it is important to keep the subscriber connected to the platform for a long time.

Change is necessary in the era of AI 

He explained how AI is challenging the traditional model of media companies. While earlier the 'information advantage' was the USP, now tools like ChatGPT, Gemini have eliminated that advantage. In such a situation, Times Internet has started reinventing itself by adopting AI.

Some of the AI experiments that Times Internet is doing:

• ET Markets AI TV Anchor : Completely AI based financial videos, with data, anchors and analysis automated.
• AI-Generated Songs and Faceless Videos : Songs and videos created by AI without any creative team.
• Tailored AI Agents : In the future, users will have access to AI agents like ChatGPT on the ET platform, which will respond according to the content of the platform.

'Every user's subscription reason is different'

He said that subscribers are divided into 5–6 different 'cohorts' - like 'superfans', 'superadherents', 'readers only', etc. Each group is sent custom messaging and value-based nudges to keep users engaged.

Three key learnings:

1. Retention tracking alone is not enough — personalizing each user’s journey is essential.
2. General nudges aren't effective — every user has different reasons."
3. The first 7 days are crucial — the first week itself determines which users will renew and who will not.

Puneet Kukreja said, 'Life is not very complicated, just create strong value, build a good retention engine and keep reinventing yourself with the help of AI.'