Churn risk programme: preventing supporter churn

At the Guardian, reader support is essential to sustaining independent journalism that remains free and accessible to all. With no billionaire owner and a unique, reader-funded business model, more than 1.3 million supporters make it possible for us to protect our independence.

Protecting this model depends not only on bringing in new supporters, but on retaining existing ones by ensuring they continue to see the value and impact of their support. The Churn Risk Programme was created as a preventative, supporter-centred approach to retention, designed to identify early signs of disengagement and re-engage supporters in timely, relevant, and meaningful ways. What makes this programme distinctive is how technology was used to power creative personalisation at scale. Built on a churn risk propensity model, the programme uses first-party behavioural data to understand how supporter engagement changes over time. These insights are activated through Braze to deliver highly tailored messaging that adapts creative, tone, and calls to action based on each supporter’s behaviour, lifecycle stage, and relationship with the Guardian. In total, the programme delivered 93 distinct messaging variations across a multichannel CRM journey, ensuring communications felt personal, supportive, and relevant rather than generic or transactional. This was underpinned by a robust content management process that allowed templates to be updated and optimised sustainably, without increasing operational complexity. The Churn Risk Programme is now the bedrock of our CRM audience strategy, demonstrating how data, creative, and technology can work together to drive engagement, retention, and long-term sustainability for independent journalism.