Media Healthcheck: November 2009
November saw the release of a forecast predicting that European online advertising spend will climb by more than 7% next year.
The Marketers’ Internet Ad Barometer expects online ad spend across Europe to buck the downward trend and increase by 7.6% year on year in 2010 despite the ongoing recession.
However, the IAB and PricewaterhouseCoopers found that in the US, online ad spend fell 5.4% in Q3 2009, to $5.5 billion.
However, the report found that online ad spend was up by 1.7% in the third quarter compared to the second quarter.
Sticking with the US, the Newspaper Association of America revealed that US newspaper advertising revenue was down 28% year on year in Q3 2009, falling from $10.1 billion to about $6.4 billion.
Online newspaper ad revenues fell 17%, from $750 million in Q3 2008 to $623 million this year.
With Rupert Murdoch intending to charge for access to News Corp’s newspaper properties and local UK publisher Johnston Press erecting paywalls this week, clearly one of the biggest challenges currently occupying newspapers is how to monetise their content online.
For those thinking about charging for content on a subscription basis, November brought some bad news.
A survey of 500 online readers of newspapers and magazines found that only 5% would be prepared to pay a monthly or yearly subscription.
The survey, carried out by Continental Research, revealed that while a large majority (63%) said they simply would not pay to read their favourite articles online, micropayments – not subscriptions – were the most popular payment mechanism.
However, a study from Boston Consulting Group found that global consumers are willing to pay for online news – especially from national and local newspapers.
The study – which surveyed 5,083 respondents from nine countries: the US (1,006 respondents), Germany (1,006), Australia (529), France (510), the UK (506), Spain (505), Italy (504), Norway (259), and Finland (258) – found that the amount people are willing to pay depends upon the country they live in and on the type of content that they deem most valuable.
The average monthly amount consumers are prepared to pay ranges from $3 in the US and Australia to $7 in Italy.