Simplifying technology decisions without limiting growth
This interview was originally published by The Signal, Vicky & Stewart were interviewed as part of the launch of The Signal, the tech-media newsletter.
By Piet van Niekerk and The Signal
We spoke with Vicky Macey, COO at Full Fat Things, and Stewart Robinson, who leads digital product and audience strategy, about how publishers navigate technology decisions, subscriptions, audience intelligence and platform lock-in.
The conversation focused on practical experience rather than theory, and on how simplifying technology choices can unlock growth rather than constrain it.
What Full Fat Things does
Full Fat Things positions itself not as a software vendor, but as a technical partner that helps publishers make complex technology decisions easier by connecting products, infrastructure and business outcomes.
Vicky Macey explains: “We’re a technical partner to make very complex software decisions very, very easy. We simplify the complex. We don’t just build products. We connect the product to all the infrastructure necessary, and we bridge the gap between the senior team, the CEO or MD, and the end user and the CTO.”
Rather than focusing on technical detail for its own sake, the emphasis is on outcomes.
“We don’t talk in highly technical terms with our customers,” Macey says. “We talk about their business and their outcomes, and how the technology facilitates those things, rather than blinding them with science.”
Why publishers overcomplicate technology
Both describe a recurring pattern in publishing. Organisations either try to build everything themselves, or buy too much software and struggle to make it work together.
“At one end you’ve got publishers who think they need to do everything themselves, because they believe they’re very special,” Stewart Robinson says. “At the other end, you’ve got smaller publishers who buy lots of software and try to Lego it together, often ending up with tools that are too big for them.”
The result is often cost, complexity and inflexibility.
“They get sold chunks of software that don’t plug together very nicely,” Robinson says. “The cost becomes an issue, and they struggle to respond when the business or audience changes.”
The aim, he argues, is to find a middle ground.
“Let’s not build everything yourself, but also let’s not buy crazy things you don’t need. Let’s find a middle ground that works for your business.”
Subscriptions, paywalls and revenue logic
Charging for content remains a sensitive topic for many publishers, particularly those long reliant on advertising and reach.
“Organisations get scared because they’ve got revenue at a certain level, and turning on subscriptions means some advertising views immediately go away,” Robinson says.
The challenge, he argues, is not whether to charge, but how to do it intelligently.
“People often don’t really understand what content should go behind a paywall, how pricing should work, or how data should inform those decisions.”
Rather than advocating a single model, Full Fat Things helps publishers think through trade-offs.
“There are ways of selectively letting people in,” Robinson says. “Flexible sampling, metering, layers of access. It’s no different from a trial subscription. You’re giving people a way to experience the brand.”
Audience intelligence versus raw data
A recurring theme in the conversation is the difference between collecting data and generating intelligence.
“Knowing that a section performed well isn’t the same as understanding why it performed well, who engaged with it, or what those readers have in common,” Robinson says.
Many publishers, he argues, stop at surface metrics.
“They stay too high level. They don’t connect content, behaviour and identity in a way that supports commercial decisions.”
A key enabler is taxonomy.
“Publishers rely on visible structures like sections and tags, but they ignore deeper classification,” Robinson says. “Hidden taxonomy, things like companies, sectors, job roles or themes, allows content and audiences to be analysed in far more useful ways.”
This is particularly important in B2B publishing.
“In B2B, you already know who the reader is,” Robinson adds. “Once they’re signed in, you can segment properly. Advertisers don’t buy traffic. They buy relevance.”
Avoiding lock-in and brittle platforms
Both speakers describe situations where platforms that initially helped publishers grow later became a constraint.
“Lock-in often happens when publishers buy tools that promise to do everything,” Macey says. “At first that feels efficient. Over time, those systems start dictating what the business can and can’t do.”
As platforms become embedded across editorial, sales and finance, change starts to feel risky.
“Even when people know a platform is limiting them, the risk of change feels too high,” Robinson says.
Their alternative is a component-based approach.
“Instead of one system doing everything, you build a stack where components can be swapped out or upgraded without breaking the whole thing,” Robinson explains.
For Macey, this shifts control back to the publisher.
“It lets publishers make decisions incrementally,” she says. “You don’t have to ask for a full replatform every time the market or the business changes.”
What changes after six to twelve months
When publishers simplify their stacks and connect systems properly, the first changes are often behavioural rather than purely technical.
“Decisions get faster. Teams stop guessing,” Robinson says. “They can see where revenue and audience insight actually come from.”
Sales teams gain confidence in defining and selling audiences, while product decisions become evidence-based rather than instinctive.
“Often the surprise is how much value they already had,” Macey adds. “It was locked inside their content and data.”
For both, the underlying principle remains consistent.
“Technology should make the business easier to run, not harder to understand,” Robinson says. “When that balance is right, growth becomes much more achievable.”