Newspaper circulation lowest level since 1940... 5 key takeaways about the state of the news media in 2018
5
key takeaways about the state of the news media in 2018
Every
year since 2004, Pew Research Center has issued an assessment of the state
of the news media, tracking key audience and economic indicators for
a variety of sectors within the U.S. journalism industry. Here are some key
findings about the state of the industry in 2018:
1 U.S. newspaper circulation reached its
lowest level since 1940, the first year with available data. Total daily newspaper circulation (print and
digital combined) was an estimated 28.6 million for weekday and 30.8 million
for Sunday in 2018. Those numbers were down 8% and 9%, respectively, from the
previous year, according to the Center’s analysis of Alliance for Audited Media
data. Both figures are now below their lowest recorded levels, though weekday
circulation first passed this threshold in 2013.
Digital
circulation for daily newspapers is harder to track. It did rise in 2018,
though not enough to fully reverse the overall decline in circulation.
Revenue
from circulation was steady in 2018, but ad revenue for newspapers fell 13%,
according to an analysis of Securities and Exchange Commission filings. Though
some national publications have seen growth in revenue and
in digital subscriptions over
the past few years, the newspaper sector overall continues to face challenges.
2 Cable news was a
bright spot in another down year for the U.S. news media industry’s economic
fortunes. Revenue
rose 4% over the past year for Fox News, CNN and MSNBC combined,
according to estimates from Kagan, a media research group. That made cable news
one of the only sectors with a revenue increase in 2018.
Cable
news revenue has grown by roughly a third (36%) since 2015, with ad revenue up
58% over the same period. And unlike some other sectors that typically see
revenue declines in non-election years, cable news has been on a steady rise
since the 2016 election. Some of this revenue has flowed back into newsroom
spending, which has risen 22% since 2015. However, employment in cable TV
newsrooms has not risen,
according to Bureau of Labor Statistics data, and neither have wages.
3 Digital ad revenue has grown exponentially,
but a majority goes to Facebook and Google rather than to publishers. Revenue from ads placed on digital platforms – counting all
platforms, not just news sites – rose by 23% in 2018, and now makes up nearly
half (49%) of all ad revenue in the U.S., according to eMarketer estimates. And
when it comes to display ad revenue – a form of digital
advertising that include banners, videos and other advertisements that news
organizations and other websites typically run alongside their content – half
of all digital revenue went to just two tech companies: Facebook (40%) and
Google (12%). Overall digital ad revenue has tripled since 2011, the earliest
year tracked, while digital display revenue has grown by almost five times over
the same period.
This
growth in digital ad revenue has not been enough to make up for the decline in
traditional ad revenue for some sectors. About a third of newspaper ad revenue
(35%) now comes from digital, according to an analysis of SEC filings, but
total ad revenue continues to fall. And while the digital-native news sector is
on the rise – its newsroom workforce has nearly doubled over the past 10 years,
according to BLS data – this growth hasn’t replaced the loss of employment
at newspapers.
4 The audience for local TV news has steadily
declined. The
average audience fell in key time slots in 2018, down 10% for
morning news and 14% for late night and evening news, according to Comscore
StationView Essentials® data. (This data is based on live viewing on TV sets
and does not account for these stations’ websites or social media presences –
though some research indicates that most local TV news consumers
prefer the TV set to online forms.) This has been a
longstanding trend, with declines in 2017 and,
using a different data source, from 2007 to 2016.
Over-the-air
ad revenue for local TV did rise 12% in 2018, to $19.3 billion, according to a
Pew Research Center analysis of MEDIA Access Pro & BIA Advisory Services
data, but this is typical for a midterm election year and roughly equal to the
amount in 2014.
Local
TV’s audience decline was the steepest drop of any sector. Only cable news saw
its audience rise in 2018.
5 Traffic to news websites seems to have
leveled off. Unique
visitors to the websites of both newspapers and digital-native news sites showed no
growth between the fourth quarters of 2017 and 2018, the second year in which
there was no notable growth, according to Comscore, a cross-platform audience
measurement company. From 2014 to 2016, traffic rose steadily for both these
sectors in the fourth quarter.
Time
spent on these websites has declined as well: The average number of minutes per
visit for digital-native news sites is down 16% since 2016, falling from nearly
two and a half minutes to about two per visit. The decreases in website
audience and time spent per visit come as Americans increasingly say they
prefer social media as a pathway to news.
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