Commentary
Newspaper Blogs Are Instant "Letters To The Editor"
- by Jack Loechner , Staff Writer @mp_research, January 26, 2007
Nielsen//NetRatings finds that traditional publishers are adopting interactive forums like blogs, where web traffic to the blog pages of the top 10 online newspapers grew 210 percent year over year in December. The overall unique audience growth to these online newspapers was 9 percent year over year. Unique visitors to blog pages accounted for 13 percent of their December 2006 Web traffic, up 9 percentage points from 4 percent in December 2005.
Carolyn Creekmore, senior director of media analytics, Nielsen//NetRatings, said "...It makes perfect sense for online newspapers, where responding to a blog posting is like writing an instant letter to the editor."
Unique Audience For Top 10 Online Newspapers and their Blog Pages (U.S., Home and Work; UA x000) | |||
Audience Dec 2005 | Audience Dec 2006 | YOY Growth | |
Top 10 Online Newspapers | 27,371 | 29,940 | 9% |
Blog Pages within Online Newspapers | 1,217 | 3,776 | 210% |
Source: Nielsen//NetRatings, January 2007 | |||
The overall unique audience to the top 10 online newspapers skewed male, with 60 percent men and 40 percent women. Among newspaper blog pages, this skew intensified, with 66 percent men and 34 percent women. But both men and women are contributing to unique audience growth in this arena, with men increasing 226 percent and women increasing 183 percent year over year.
"(Though) men tend to be both early adopters of new technologies and avid consumers of news... women make up slightly more than half of the active Internet universe and we can expect them to play an increasingly significant role in blog consumption." said Creekmore
Gender Composition at Top 10 Online Newspapers and their Blog Pages (Dec. 2006; U.S., Home and Work) | |||
Gender | Newspapers | Blog Pages | YOY Growth at Blog Pages |
Male | 60% | 66% | 226% |
Female | 40% | 34% | 183% |
Source: Nielsen//NetRatings, January 2007 | |||
Top 10 Advertisers in December 2006 are based on data from AdRelevance, Nielsen//NetRatings' advertising research service.
Top 10 Advertisers by Estimated Spending(December 2006) | |||
Advertiser | Total Estimated Spending | Impressions (000) | |
1. | Experian Group Limited | $90,284,000 | 34,649,333 |
2. | AT&T Corp. | $39,857,400 | 10,535,951 |
3. | NexTag, Inc. | $32,120,900 | 15,221,834 |
4. | Verizon Communications, Inc. | $31,759,200 | 8,962,028 |
5. | Time Warner Inc. | $27,288,500 | 6,948,177 |
6. | Vonage Holdings Corp | $24,174,400 | 7,533,227 |
7. | Low Rate Source | $17,920,600 | 6,792,963 |
8. | Bank of America Corporation | $16,503,600 | 7,536,428 |
9. | Blockbuster Inc. | $16,056,700 | 7,309,783 |
10. | eBay, Inc. | $15,566,900 | 2,606,156 |
Source: Nielsen//NetRatings, January 2007 | |||
Note: An impression is counted as the number of times an ad is rendered for viewing.
Please visit here to see the complete press release.
Jack Loechner is the Editor of The Center for Media Research's daily Research Brief. You can reach him at jack@mediapost.com.