A glimmer of hope for newspapers
News consumption in the United Kingdom rose by 20 percent in the past three years, according to new McKinsey research.1 Average consumption has risen to 72 minutes a day, compared with 60 minutes in 2006—an increase driven almost entirely by people under the age of 35 (Exhibit 1). Two-fifths of those in this age group said they felt the need to be the first to hear the news, compared with just 10 percent of people aged 55 to 64.
This need for immediacy is reflected in younger news consumers’ choice of media: they overwhelmingly prefer to get their news from television and the Internet (Exhibit 2). While television remains the most popular medium across all age groups, only the behavior of consumers 55 and older prevented the Internet from jumping from fourth in 2006 to become the second most popular news source today. Instead, the Internet is now in third place, just behind newspapers.
...One finding does suggest a potential revenue opportunity: newspapers have an important inherent advantage as they face the challenges of the digital age—trust. Consumers trust newspapers more than any other medium, and 66 percent describe newspaper advertising as “informative and confidence inspiring,” compared with only 44 percent for TV and 12 percent for the Web (Exhibit 3). This suggests that newspapers have further scope to go beyond news, to drive reader interest and advertising revenues at the same time. Leading newspapers have already created specialized pages and sections in areas such as entertainment, eating out, travel, automobiles, shopping, real estate, and personal finance. The combination of editorial content, ads, and selected commercial offers—while clearly separated—benefits advertisers and is of practical use to readers.
As said before: Journalism and news are not in crises - print-based newspapers´ business model is in crises and has to be changed.
