The Kyiv Independent was born of a newsroom rebellion, and forged in full blown war. Little wonder, perhaps, that its founders chose a very different approach to funding from the classic ads/subscriptions models. As the title, and its membership have grown, we look at the lessons to learn about sustainable revenue models in an era of zero click searches and social media.
You are reading the first instalment of our Digital Subscription Series.
In a nutshell:
Founding & Principles
- The Kyiv Independent (KI) was founded in November 2021 by former Kyiv Post staff after a newsroom rebellion over editorial independence.
- Built on two core principles:
- Editorial independence — no political or owner influence.
- A self-sustaining business model to underpin and reinforce that independence.
Business Model & Growth
- Initial funding came from a mix of reader support, advertising, and grants.
- Following Russia’s full-scale invasion in 2022, global attention increased and reader revenue became central.
- KI shifted focus entirely from donations to paid membership, ending crowdfunding promotions by mid-2022.
- Membership grew from a few hundred to 22,000 paying members by mid-2025.
- KI maintains an exceptionally low churn rate (<2%), rare even among well-established publishers.
Keys to Retaining Members
- High-quality, trusted journalism
- Ensures credibility for a global audience skeptical of propaganda.
- “Global publication on a niche topic.”
- Active member communication
- Weekly member newsletter: “Here’s What You Helped Us Achieve This Week.”
- Discord community (2,000+ members) for interaction, travel tips, meme-sharing, and volunteering.
- Every email or query is answered personally by community managers.
- Shared hardship & authenticity
- Operating during wartime has deepened members’ emotional connection and loyalty.
- Many staff know members by name and vice versa.
We spoke to Zakhar Protsiuk, COO of the Kyiv Independent about the publication’s pivot from funding through Patreon donations, to a full membership approach.
From Donations to Membership: A Strategic Pivot
If the Kyiv Independent’s model is unusual, it is perhaps because it was the publication found itself being forged in fire from very early days. Zakhar, who oversees the membership operation, explains that while the outlet “set up the membership on Patreon even before the website was live,” the initial model was “a mixture of things”—combining membership revenue with advertising and grant support.
Then everything changed as Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. As the Kyiv Independent became one of the primary English-language sources covering the war, reader support surged. A GoFundMe crowdfunding campaign “really skyrocketed” and membership grew from “a few hundred members to I think a bit over 6,000.”
That explosive success, however, came with the threat of being a potential flash in the pan.”What we noticed was that in spring 2022 the membership started to fall as a lot of people decided to just donate via membership, but they haven’t planned to stay,” Zakhar recalls. This pattern of donation-driven churn threatened the publication’s long-term sustainability.
The response was decisive. In June or July 2022, the editorial team made what Zakhar describes as a critical bet: “We will prioritize membership over donations.” The publication stopped promoting its crowdfunding campaign entirely. “Every communication was focused on getting people to become paid members, and that became the central aspect of our business model that we have now.”
The Results: Growth Without Walls
The strategy has delivered impressive results. The Kyiv Independent reached 20,000 members in June 2024 and has since grown to 22,000—with a churn rate below 2%, a figure that would be enviable for any publisher at any scale. The organization has grown from 18 employees at launch to approximately 75, with more than 40 working in the newsroom.
What makes this achievement particularly noteworthy is that the Kyiv Independent operates without a paywall. This decision fundamentally shapes the membership value proposition, creating what Zakhar describes as “a bit of indirect relationship” where “a lot of people decide to become a member without really checking all the benefits we would give them, but they just wanna support it.”
This model creates both opportunity and challenge. “We actually had moments where we had, you know, good journalism was still there, but we had the stagnation on the new members or it wasn’t growing,” Zakhar notes. “We need to constantly find a new way to convince people why they should join. I think we have a good way of keeping them, but how do you convince people to get in has been changing a lot. We have to be very creative about it.”
Three Pillars of Retention
Pressed on how the publication maintains such a low churn rate, Zakhar identifies three essential elements.
Quality Journalism and Trust
“Number one, it’s our journalism,” Zakhar emphasizes. “The quality of our journalism is what keeps the love and the trust that our members have in us.”
For a publication based in Kyiv, written in English, and read globally, trust-building involves unique challenges. “We are like a global publication on a niche topic,” Zakhar explains. “If you’re based somewhere in California, the trust element is very hard… we need to convey to them that it’s high quality, objective reporting from on the ground here on Ukraine. And actually we have a very good journalistic team.”
This trust has proven resilient. “We never had Washington Post moments,” Zakhar notes, referencing recent controversies at larger outlets. “We never had a big churn because of a story. Obviously we have some members who come and go because they don’t like something—that’s natural in our industry. But I think we’ve managed to preserve the trust and we prioritize it a lot.”
Active Community Management
The second pillar is sustained, thoughtful communication with members. The publication employs two dedicated community managers, but the entire organization participates in member engagement. “We do spend a lot of time communicating with our members and trying to build as much as we can that sort of a direct relationship with them,” Zakhar says.
The publication has developed multiple touchpoints. A weekly exclusive newsletter titled “Here is What You Helped Us Achieve” reframes the publication’s work through the lens of member contribution. “We outline key things we did during the week, but we always frame it as if that’s because of you [the reader], because that’s true—it’s because of them we are able to do this work.”
A Discord community of approximately 2,000 members—roughly 10% of the total—provides a space for “horizontal connections.” Members “talk between themselves, they share memes, they share information on how to travel to Ukraine as some of our members share organizations that they can support in Ukraine, like different charities.”
The team maintains a policy of responding to every member inquiry. “We answer every letter we get if they have some issues or some questions,” Zakhar notes. Despite considering AI integration for frequently asked questions on the landing page, the publication has deliberately rejected automation for member communications. “I don’t think we would do AI with members,” Zakhar explains. “For us, that direct communication is very important, that they feel that there is a real person behind that inbox or Discord chat.”
The engagement extends beyond community managers. “We try to build those connections between members and different team members,” Zakhar says. The publication’s war crimes investigative unit offers exclusive documentary screenings for members. Journalists interact directly with members on Discord, answering questions and sharing recommendations.
Perhaps most tellingly, the staff knows many members by name. “When we do membership meetings, for example, once a week we have this reporting where we look at different new members, donations, and our team regularly refers to, ‘Oh, I know this is Steve,’ or ‘I know this is Carolyn.’ We know a lot of our members despite them being 22,000 right now.”
The Context of Crisis
The third element is less replicable but no less important: the publication is operating during wartime. “A lot of our members feel like we’ve lived through a lot of stuff with us,” Zakhar observes. “The fact that it’s all happening during the war, I think, is making that bond closer.”
The publication conducts regular surveys, asking members every six months whether they plan to continue their support. The responses, Zakhar jokes, have become predictable: “They say yes. We’re like, thank you.”
Membership as Community, Not Transaction
Zakhar draws a clear distinction between different revenue models. “If you try to divide different reader revenue models, I would roughly say there are probably three big buckets. There is a subscription where you pay for access to journalism—very straightforward, very simple, like New York Times style, Financial Times and so on. There are donations where people just give you money to support your work. And then you have something which is membership, which I think a lot of people find slightly confusing. What is it actually, membership? What does it actually mean?”
It’s a question he answers immediately: “For me, it’s very, actually it’s right in the name—membership. You are part of some sort of a club, some sort of a gathering. If you are a part of a gathering, you need to get a value for that. It’s not just about the support.”
This distinction has particular resonance for the Kyiv Independent’s geographically dispersed audience. “Our members are also not in one location. We have members from close to like a hundred countries. A lot of them, I don’t know, like 40% in the United States, and then like it’s 5%, 10% in Canada, the United Kingdom, Germany, and so on.”
The value of horizontal connections becomes clear in this context. “If you are based in like a small village somewhere in Colorado, probably all your friends are not as passionate about following Ukraine or the war in Ukraine as you are,” Zakhar explains. “You are interested in this topic, whether personally or professionally… but probably people around you are not following that closely as you do. So having the benefit of finding other people who do that I think is actually high.”
The results speak for themselves. Members have independently organized to rename streets in the United States from Russian to Ukrainian spellings. “We did a news item about it, but that was completely initiated by them—zero action on our behalf,” Zakhar notes. Another member wanted to donate a vehicle to the Ukrainian army and connected with a member who was procuring vehicles, completing the transaction through the Discord community.
The publication has formalized this community action through a monthly newsletter called “How to Help Ukraine,” which showcases charitable initiatives in Ukraine—made exclusive to members “to even facilitate that aspect of action and solutions inside the membership.” Each edition generates thousands of dollars in donations to featured organizations, creating what Zakhar describes as “curated, horizontal, trusted space.”
The Operational Model: Constant Innovation and Collaboration
Maintaining momentum without a paywall requires systematic creativity. The publication holds weekly membership meetings involving approximately 20 people from across the organization—marketing, product, editorial, video, social media, and communications teams. “It’s one of our biggest meetings in the company,” Zakhar notes.
The organization runs at least one major membership campaign annually, though 2024 saw two campaigns. During these drives, every employee receives a unique referral link, and the organization maintains a leaderboard tracking who brings in the most members. “We try to engage everyone and then ideas pop up from different directions,” Zakhar says.
The publication has also developed strategic partnerships with outlets including Denník N in Slovakia, Zetland in Denmark, Daily Maverick in South Africa, Mediapart in France, and The Guardian. “They work very differently in different cases,” Zakhar explains. “A lot of it is based on the idea of knowledge sharing. We share lessons from building our membership. They share lessons from building their stuff.”
The Guardian relationship has been particularly influential. “Guardian is a great example that you can build a very big independent journalistic organization that is supported by readers without having a paywall,” Zakhar says. “That really gives us a lot of hope.” The publications maintain monthly editor meetings that Zakhar characterizes as valuable “venting” sessions alongside strategic exchanges.
For the 20,000-member campaign in May, the Kyiv Independent identified the ten countries with the largest member bases and crafted customized messaging for each. “We calculated that we have the biggest amount from the United States, but if you count per capita, Denmark is actually at the first place. So we told this to Danish people. We told Swedes that they are in the second place to steer some competition.”
The publication partnered with a trusted outlet in each country, offering them opportunities to write about Ukraine or the Kyiv Independent and share campaign links. “For us it was less about maybe having a lot of members, more about that trust building,” Zakhar explains. “The more we can convince people that we are a good source of news, the better it is for us long term. And that validation is really very important for our strategy.”
Cultural Integration: Making Membership Central
Getting journalists to engage directly with audiences presents challenges for many newsrooms. The Kyiv Independent’s approach combines cultural reinforcement with organizational design. “I think part of it comes from the fact that we talk about membership all the time inside the company,” Zakhar says. “It’s a bit like a mantra. Every Monday we have a staff meeting. We have a community update. We have a membership growth update for the whole company, for everyone.”
The message is unambiguous. “The amount of times that we told the whole team that this is how we pay your salaries, this is how we exist, this is how we grow is so many times.”
The publication also benefits from its youth. “A lot of people came to the Kyiv Independent when we already had this as a central model. So for them, it’s much easier to accept the culture when you’re new to it versus when you have old habits and you have to change your culture.” The organization deliberately hired competitively “so that they can have a chance to start from scratch. And we want that scratch to be very member-centric as much as possible.”
Beyond Access: Tangible Benefits and Authentic Connection
The publication offers benefits that reflect both its mission and its members’ interests. Ukrainian language lessons, while serving a specific subset of members, exemplify the approach. “It’s not for everyone,” Zakhar acknowledges, “but we also noticed that a lot of potential members who may be not gonna go to those lessons, they like the idea of having the ability. When we did like a letter telling them that it’s one of the benefits, we saw a really good conversion rate on that.”
The speaking club format also reinforces horizontal connections, creating another space for members to interact.
More significantly, the publication has begun leveraging member support for specific projects. In early 2024, when USAID funding ceased for multiple Ukrainian media outlets, the Kyiv Independent launched a fundraiser among its community to support three regional publications. “In essentially three days, we raised like $66,000 for them. And I was incredibly surprised by how quickly they acted on it.”
This experience revealed untapped capacity. “Maybe one of the biggest surprises of this year is that our members, despite us sometimes feeling like we overwhelm them with a lot of stuff, they are actually so eager to do more.”
The publication has since run targeted campaigns for a mental health program for staff—covering a mountain retreat and therapy sessions—and for purchasing a dedicated vehicle for frontline coverage, complete with drone jamming equipment. Both campaigns exceeded expectations. “I think we often underestimated the level of support and action that they are ready for,” Zakhar reflects.
Transparency as Strategy
Zakhar identifies one transferable principle that transcends the publication’s unique wartime context: “I think a lot of media underestimate the value of telling your own story transparently and not in one moment, but actually getting them through the story with you.”
The Kyiv Independent became part of the story it was covering. “Suddenly as the war started, it was also the war for us in our own country. We also became a story ourselves. There could have been different ways how we reacted to that. And we decided that this is an incredible opportunity to build that trust.”
The organization consistently shares its operational story—how decisions are made, how the team adapts to blackouts, the challenges of wartime journalism. “Getting our readers to know our reporters by name and knowing something about them—like that I know they have a cat—things like that really help with trust.”
Zakhar sees this transparency as a response to the broader crisis facing news organizations. “I think a lot of media underestimate this. In this crisis of trust to news publications, which we are experiencing around the world, in the United States in particular, more of that is what actually we need. That’s why they go to creators and bloggers—because they give them way more authentic feel. So how do we give them the authentic feel and keep our standards of journalism at the same time? That’s what we try to figure out. But I think my gut feeling tells me that the answer is probably in that direction.”
Discover how the Kyiv Independent’s experience and lessons learned can help publishers refine their strategies in the subscription economy. Become a member of Médias Pionniers WhatsApp to unlock this article!
Let’s be realistic. The Kyiv Independent was born from extraordinary circumstances and remains an exception. Not every outlet has a running local story with the global reach and urgency of the war in Ukraine. That said, any news publisher worth their salt would benefit from prioritizing community, investing in relationship infrastructure, maintaining editorial quality, embracing transparency, and framing the reader relationship as participation rather than transaction.
As the subscription economy matures and consumer appetite for paywalls faces increasing headwinds, the membership model offers an alternative path that doesn’t involve rolling over and being devoured by AI content. The Kyiv Independent demonstrates that investment in community infrastructure, consistent delivery of journalistic value, and willingness to share the organization’s story authentically, publications can build sustainable reader revenue without erecting walls around their content.
As publishers reimagine their relationship with readers, from content gatekeepers to community managers, the membership model presents a viable alternative, or a parallel option to traditional subscription strategies.
Do you have feedback on this article? Would you like to propose another publication for us to analyse? Get in touch at contact@upgrademedia.fr
Discover : The Kyiv Independent
À propos d’Upgrade Media : Upgrade Media est une agence créative, de conseils en stratégie, un centre de formation et de réflexion sur la transformation des médias.
◾️ Nous travaillons pour les médias et les entreprises communicantes, afin d’accélérer leurs transformations numériques, faire évoluer leurs organisations, leurs produits print et numériques, et aussi développer l’agilité des équipes.
◾️ Découvrez Upgrade Media et son Think Tank, à l’origine de l’événement Médias Pionniers, un rendez-vous incontournable pour explorer la transformation des médias par l’innovation, les échanges internationaux et les initiatives concrètes portées par les acteurs du changement.
◾️ Nous espérons que cet article et nos autres contenus vous inspireront !
Restez informé·e de toutes nos actualités en vous inscrivant à notre Newsletter par e-mail ou via Linkedin.
Merci pour votre lecture.
- How explainers are redrawing the attention map (and what the the Reuters report doesn’t tell us)
- Building community, not just putting up paywalls: The Kyiv Independent’s Membership Strategy
- A president in prison; but what does Sarkozy’s fate tell us about social strategy and French Media
- The Silly Season. Is the joke on us?
- Are you going to be replaced by a robot? More immediately, is that fear already loose in your newsroom?
