Tag: Nielsen survey

Some welcome good news on newspaper front…not for all

It is too early to put money on it, but there are signs New Zealand metropolitan newspaper readership may be stabilising.

The latest Nielsen survey shows most metropolitan newspapers have held their own year-on-year and some have actually improved their numbers. The outlier is the largest of our newspapers, The New Zealand Herald, which has dropped 10,000 readers to now stand at 503,000.

The most impressive performer is The Post. The capital’s daily has increased readership by almost as much as the Herald dropped – up over nine per cent from 93,000 to 112,000. Its Stuff stablemate, the Waikato Times has been even more impressive in percentage terms. Its readership grew by more than 12 per cent to stand at 55,000. The Press in Christchurch (90,000) and the Otago Daily Times (87,000) were relatively stable year-on-year, although both experienced small declines from the previous quarter.

The weekly coverage by all metro dailies is up 36,000 to 1.55 million.

In the Sunday market, the Herald on Sunday dropped 3000 year-on-year to stand at 308,000 readers. However, Stuff will be pleased with the Sunday Star Times which upped its numbers from 178,000 to 191,000 (a 7.3 per cent rise). Overall, therefore, the Sunday readership is also improving.

Remember, these are readers of the respective newspapers and does not include the digital audience that I will come to shortly. The Nielsen figures measure the number of people who read [Newspaper] in the issue period. They show there is yet life in print editions, although we must not get carried away by the smell of newsprint and printing ink. Continue reading “Some welcome good news on newspaper front…not for all” →

Readership: Numbers that didn’t make the news

Audience research is a wondrous thing. It makes me feel like a young child in a carnival. My head spins at the sight of all the swings and roundabouts.

The past fortnight has seen the release of two separate sets of readership research. Last week we received the quarterly survey by Nielsen, and a week earlier there was an annual snapshot from Roy Morgan.

The two cannot be directly compared because they relate to different measurement cycles and, doubtless, different methodology. The Roy Morgan survey also embraces online readership that is not captured by topline results of the other survey.

However, the consequence of wading through both surveys was a feeling that I spent too much time on the swings and had too many rides on the roundabout. I felt giddy.

The Roy Morgan survey of the year to June suggests that, although the New Zealand Herald and Waikato Times lost readers of their print editions (the former down 31,000 and the latter 12,000), The Post, The Press, and the Otago Daily Times gained readers. In the case of The Post it was an impressive 16,000 readers.

The Nielsen survey, however, paints a different picture. It suggests that all five metropolitans have suffered declining print readership over the past year.

In order to regain some sense of equilibrium, I temporarily put aside the Roy Morgan survey to concentrate on the Nielsen results. This was solely because I have a longer record of that research company’s audience figures. Continue reading “Readership: Numbers that didn’t make the news” →