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Zachary Brousseau
Communications Manager
(703) 902-1698
zachary.brousseau@naa.org

November 01, 2005

OVER 47 MILLION PEOPLE VISITED A NEWSPAPER WEB SITE IN SEPTEMBER, REPRESENTING NEARLY A THIRD OF ALL INTERNET USERS



Vienna, Va. – Both the overall number and percentage of Internet users visiting newspaper Web sites hit all-time highs in September, according to a new report by Nielsen//NetRatings for the Newspaper Association of America. The data, which takes into account home and work Internet usage, shows that over 47.3 million people visited newspaper Web sites in September, the most in any month since NAA began tracking online usage in January 2004. That represents almost a third (31.9 percent) of all Internet users, and is up 15.8 percent from 40.9 million for the same period last year.

While the report does not track traffic to specific online content, the spike was most likely bolstered by the high level of interest in coverage of hurricanes Katrina and Rita

.“Newspapers are continuing to attract readers whether they’re reading the traditional printed newspaper, a newspaper Web site, a free daily paper or another newspaper niche product,” said NAA President and CEO John F. Sturm. “Not only is the overall audience growing for newspaper Web sites, but NAA studies have shown that they are often the leading local news sites in their markets. It’s clear that newspapers’ longstanding position of trust as part of the communities they serve has only strengthened, not weakened, in the Internet era.”For the year’s third quarter, the monthly unique audience averaged over 41.5 million, or 27.7 percent of all Web users. The time Internet users spend on newspaper sites also continues to rise as users’ visits averaged more than 38 minutes during the quarter.

Month Unique Audience Active Reach Percentage Page Views Time Per Person (mm:ss) Visits Per Person
Jul-05 36,629,290 24.4 1,499,998,064 38:52 6.88
Aug-05 40,620,431 27.0 1,649,028,864 37:39 6.66
Sep-05 47,378,321 31.9 1,925,737,160 37:52 7.41
Q3 Average 41,542,680 27.7 1,691,588,030 38:08 6.98

The NetRatings newspaper totalnewspaper total represents a de-duplicated visitor total taken from its combined home and work panel of Internet users. The target adult sample (16 years or older) has access from a non-shared PC at work and access from home (i.e. an individual who might read a national newspaper plus their local newspaper online is only counted once.) The NetRatings newspaper total represents the de-duplicated reach of hundreds of sites collectively.                 

NAA is a nonprofit organization representing the $59 billion newspaper industry and more than 2,000 newspapers in the U.S. and Canada. NAA members include daily newspapers, as well as non-dailies and other publications published throughout the world. Headquartered just outside Washington, D.C., in Vienna, Va., the Association focuses on six key strategic priorities that affect the newspaper industry collectively: marketing, public policy, diversity, industry development, newspaper operations and readership. Information about NAA and the industry also may be found at www.naa.org.                 

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