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August 2000
Exploiting Internet Opportunities
The eventual ubiquity of the Internet in American homes poses many unique challenges - and opportunities -
for the newspaper industry. Balancing the questions of maintaining readership of the print product
and at the same time promoting a website confronts most newspapers today.
According to the averages of Belden market studies conducted in the past year, 45 percent of adults are
aware of their local newspaper's web site and an average of 14 percent have accessed the site, including
ten percent in the past 30 days. Newspaper web site users are disproportionately male (56%) and younger -
about one-third are younger than 35 and half are 35-54 years old.
Higher website awareness is not a guarantee of more traffic - yet. The variation in accessing newspaper
websites by market is much lower than the difference in website awareness. Markets where awareness of a
newspaper's website is lower have about the same percentage of adults accessing their website as those
where awareness of the site is much higher. However, as the Internet becomes more commonplace, those
papers with high website awareness will have an advantage in appealing to Internet newcomers searching
for news and information.
Other questions measure the extent print readers are online readers of the paper and vice versa.
When asked how accessing the local paper's website is affecting their readership of the print product,
we find the following results:
- Half say they use the newspaper's website for some types of information and use the newspaper
for other information. These users are slightly more male than female and they fit the age
profile of the average newspaper website visitor.
- About thirty percent say they use the paper's website in addition to reading the print copy.
This group is predominately male and has an average age profile.
- Fewer than twenty percent say they use the newspaper's website instead of reading the print version
of the paper. These visitors are evenly male and female and half are younger than 35.
Although the proportion of visitors to newspaper websites who say they are not reading the hard copy of
the paper is only about three percent of the adult population in the average market, it is a number that
is sure to grow. People reaching adulthood in the near future will have grown up with as much familiarity
with the Internet, as they have with television and radio, and for many, more familiarity than they have with newspapers.
Model Markets
Many newspapers are embracing Internet opportunities. The Orlando Sentinel has been very aggressive promoting
itself as the news and information "center" of Central Florida.
In 1998 the paper launched a campaign that targeted younger adults with the tagline "Online, Anytime."
The Sentinel has one of the highest site awareness ratings of any newspaper we measure and is constantly
monitoring what people are accessing on their site and their evaluation of it.
This reinforces a point we find often - well designed, targeted promotional efforts work!
The News & Observer in Raleigh, North Carolina, has aggressively helped advertisers develop their online
presence and currently hosts, updates and runs websites for more than 60 businesses, including the largest
shopping mall in the area.
Even in a technology-savvy market such as Raleigh, many business still require off-site assistance in
developing their Internet capabilities - who better than the News & Observer to facilitate?!!
By branching out into this area, the paper enhances its own website and forges closer ties with advertisers.
As a result, the News & Observer website is accessed in a typical month by a larger proportion of adults
in its market than any other single newspaper we have measured.
Newspapers today should focus not on the threat the Internet poses, but exploiting the information and commercial
opportunities that exist. As the Internet grows, newspapers should be aggressively promote themselves as having
the sites that are indispensable not just for daily news, but area information and local businesses, especially
e-commerce. The time to establish this niche in people's minds is not once Internet penetration has become almost
universal, but NOW, while many are just becoming Internet users or before they have become web-enabled.
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