247WallSt.com ranked and graded the top 25 newspaper Web sites on organization, multimedia and more.
The newspaper Web sites that got a solid A were….
The New York Times. The reasons: Lots of online-only features, many of its best (print) reporters and writers are also bloggers, and editors’ willingness to link to other Web sites. 247WallSt.com acknowledge the resources behind NYTimes.com were probably a factor in the quality of the site.
The San Francsico Chronicle. The reasons: Good navigation and “well thought out use of interactive features.”
The Detroit Free Press got an A-, as did the Atlanta Journal Constitution.
Who got an F? No one. But the Sacramento Bee got a D- for limited multimedia features and disorganization. Other low grades (D) went to the (Newark, N.J.) Star-Ledger, The Dallas Morning News and the Chicago Tribune.
An explanation of the grading from 247WallSt.com:
The sites got ratings of “A” through “F” based on: 1) strength of content, 2) ease of use and navigation, 3) use of new web technology including comments sections, message boards, and multimedia, 4) lay-out 5) presence of a strong set of current advertisers, and 6) the size of their audiences based on measurements from the Compete website visitor database for April.
The most important conclusion from this review of online newspaper sites is how uneven the quality is from property to property. Some of the smaller papers which probably have modest resources have done an extremely good job of engaging readers, using the best tools of the internet, and putting up content which adds to the experience of the subscriber to the physical newspaper. Some of these sites are likely to draw multiple visits from the same person throughout the day, the Holy Grail of online content behavior. Other sites seem to be designed to keep readers away. There is clearly not much benchmarking going on in the online part of the newspaper industry, and with the increasing risk that more newspapers will fail, not using a standardized measurement of excellence for improvement is a real shame.
The “top 25” were determined by print circulation size. National newspapers, such as USA Today and The Wall Street Journal were not eligible.
I can (sort-of) understand taking out the “national” newspapers, but I’m starting to think that basing the “top 25” on print circulation numbers for any online-focused grades or awards makes less and less sense. There are other options, like ABC’s audience numbers (print and online), or Scarborough.
In part, the rationale is that the print product is still largely the financial basis for the online product. However, a site from a small newspaper could get a huge audience if the site is innovative, relevant and engaging to a broad audience.