What can State Baptist pubs can expect from a Web pay wall?

It depends, as with other publications. The American Press Institute and ITZBelden surveyed 2,400 U.S. newspaper executives. Only 51% think pay walls will work and they have clear ideas about how many paying online subscribers [.pdf] (presentation slides [.pdf]) to expect:

Respondents report a wide range of online subscription charges (from $1 to $27.50 a month), yet they report surprisingly uniform levels of uptake on subscriptions, typically 1 percent to 3 percent of print circulation -- regardless of price.

Even these survey results may be overly optimistic because, as Nieman Lab observes, "ITZ Publishing consults for Steve Brill’s pay-for-news firm Journalism Online, which just touted the results as an 'API study' without noting its business interest."

The study certainly does not suggest that that small publications can readily benefit from throwing pay walls between Web users and content with which they may already be dissatisfied.

Indeed, another recent survey found that just 5% of online users are willing to pay for content. Whereas "74 per cent of those surveyed said if their favourite news service started charging to access content online they would switch to a free alternative."

For nonprofit publications which actually have special value to their readers, there is a half-step with potential. The Texas Baptist Standard is almost trying it now and has some generalized, high-visibility support. Their E3 product offers enhanced content at a low price, and buried in their marketing points is:

Gratitude: Online news is free to you, but not free to produce. An E3 subscription expresses user-supported gratitude for the value of online news.

Marketing a truly enhanced version of a news product as a way to support the good work is a legitimate strategy. If the product is good enough. Simply put, the for-profit freemium model can probably be fruitfully adapted to nonprofit solicitation strategies.