By Erik Sass
mediapost.com
An average 74 million people visited a newspaper Web site each month in the third quarter of 2009, equaling just under 40% of all active U.S. Internet users, according to the Newspaper Association of America, citing research performed by Nielsen Online.
This is the most unique visitors recorded since the NAA and Nielsen began tracking newspaper Web site audiences in 2004; the previous record was 73.3 million in the first quarter of 2009.
Although year-over-year comparisons are difficult because of a big increase in Nielsen’s panel size in June, the active-reach figure appears to be remaining stable, as newspaper Web sites have hovered around 40% for the last two years.
Meanwhile, the actual number of unique visitors in the third quarter of 2009 represents an increase of about 8.5% over the third quarter of 2008, when they came in at around 68.2 million.
This growth is good news for newspapers, especially since it comes in an “off” news year — one without Olympics or closely contested elections. Last year, some analysts expressed concern that newspaper Web site numbers would remain depressed after reaching record highs in the run-up to the 2008 presidential election. But these fears have proven unfounded, as newspaper Web site audiences continue to grow. . . READ FULL STORY
