Newspapers aren’t doing well, but they still represent one of the leading ways to reach audiences, online as well as in print. New data from ComScore Media Metrix, apparently released to coincide with Editor and Publisher’s Interactive Media Conference taking place in Las Vegas, showed that 57 percent of Internet users in the U.S. looked at a newspaper site in May at home or at work.
The New York Times is the leading online brand, thanks in part to its national footprint. Also receiving significant national traffic is USA Today, which is #4 among the newspaper groups; The Washington Post, which is #5; and The Wall Street Journal, which is #10. More in the realm of local pure plays are Tribune (#2), Advance (#3), McClatchy (#6), MediaNews Group (#7), The New York Daily News (#8) and Hearst Newspapers (#9).
ComScore also notes that the average CPM on online newspaper sites was $7, which is nearly three times the average CPM rate, which is $2.52.
Outside of top knowledge worker markets such as New York and Washington, we aren’t sure that 57 of 100 Internet users would say “sure” if we asked whether they read the online version of a newspaper in the last month (Anyone want to do my “train station platform” test?) But the statistics have been consistent, and suggest a possible second life for the newspaper industry.