Portals Emerge as Dominant Source for Online News

Posted on December 8, 1998

Almost half of online users now access news via search engines or directory Web sites, and 40 percent access news via online services, according to a new report highlighted today by Jupiter Communications during the opening address of the Jupiter Digital News Forum. Jupiter analysts encourage online news providers to focus more on users' utility consumption of online news and develop content around major and breaking stories rather than produce deep analysis.

The report, which highlighted results from a recent Jupiter/NFO survey questioning more than 2,200 online users about their online news consumption habits, revealed that online users are gravitating to the Web more than several other media to collect top headlines and breaking news, but are spending an average of less than 10 minutes per session. Twelve percent of those surveyed indicated that the Internet is where they go to collect breaking news versus nine percent that indicated they gravitate to the radio and two percent that identified newspapers. While the majority of consumers still choose broadcast and cable sources for breaking news, 39 and 37 percent respectively, there is clear evidence that consumers are now logging on for breaking news.

"With approximately 28 percent of the US population accessing the Internet either at their home, school, or office, the popularity of online news is not surprising," said Mark Mooradian, director of Jupiter's Consumer Content Strategies. "However, the fact that consumers read their online news in small blocks of time--usually less than 10 minutes--and choose sites that primarily aggregate headline-driven news, such as search engines or through online services, shows that many online users choose to use online news as a source for quick headlines and breaking news, not for deep analysis."

With the majority of traffic coming online for headlines and summaries, Jupiter recommends that mainstream news providers adjust their editorial resources devoted to producing deep analysis online, and instead focus on developing content around major and breaking stories.

The report also detailed that 61 percent of consumers indicated that they read national and international news online, followed by business news (39 percent) and then sports (34.4 percent). Entertainment-driven news (31.3 percent), local news (25.9 percent), and technology news (20.6 percent) rounded out the top categories. The research also shows that consumers' preference for collecting news on search engines and directory sites has also lead to another trend: Newswires, predominantly a service developed for news providers, are gaining more acceptance in the public eye. Since search engines pull stories straight from the "wires," news services such as Associated Press, Bloomberg, and Reuters are becoming more familiar to consumers.

This digital news research was presented in today's opening presentation of the Jupiter Digital News Forum in Atlanta, GA. Jupiter Communications is a new media research firm that helps companies make intelligent business decisions about consumer interactivity.