Last week, the New York Times joined the Wall Street Journal and the Financial Times in confirming something we’ve been preaching for a long time – people are still willing to pay a premium for high-quality news content! We were so excited to read this article from the Columbia Journalism Review, we just had to share it with our readers.

One quarter after establishing their metered paywall, the NYT saw its revenues go up for the first time in twelve quarters! They’ve discovered that up to 15% of their online audience are actually heavy users that are willing to pay for content.Additionally, their new digital deal has encouraged those wavering on renewing their subscriptions to move forward, seeing the value for their money.

If that’s not encouraging enough, the paywall also helped the newspaper’s ad revenues. Contrary to the public opinion that a paywall would slash digital ad revenues, digital advertising actually increased by 16%! Advertisers see the potential with this paywall, as these paid digital subscribers become sort of a premium class of customers whose reading habits they can analyze, which supports targeting and garners higher ad prices.

BCG did a study last year and discovered that large numbers users world-wide were in fact willing to pay for news content, and that the impact on a newspaper’s margins are significant. You can read more on their February 2009 study here.

Our publishers have long known the benefits in choosing a strong technology partner. They focus on doing what they do best – generating quality content, and they let us do what we do best – giving their subscribers what they want, wherever they want it, in print, online or on their mobile device/tablet of choice!

Here at NewspaperDirect, we’re feeling fantastic impacts as well.  With new tablets hitting the market, such as the iPad2, Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 and BlackBerry Playbook, more people than ever are discovering PressDisplay.com and its companion application PressReader and the great value they offer to readers.

It’s exciting to see that people are re-igniting their love of newspapers, and it gives us great pleasure to offer them access to all their favorite publications. As one loyal fan from Australia raves:

“Mighty impressed with PressReader App. For someone who enjoys reading quality newspapers it is pigs’ heaven! $1 a day for unlimited reading.” Neil, Australia

We’re thrilled that the word is spreading on what we’ve known all along, that newspapers aren’t dead and that people are willing to pay for quality news content. With a great app like PressReader, which can give users unlimited access to all their favorite publications worldwide, staying up to date with the news most relevant to you is easier and more convenient than ever!

Cheers!

-Kate

After 2 exciting and frenetic months of Facebook and Twitter liking, following and sharing, the PressReader “Win-An-iPad 2” contest came to an end on Friday, July 29^th, 2011.

When it was all said and done, 7 lucky participants won a brand new iPad 2 and year-long subscription to PressReader and PressDisplay.com.  Prizes were awarded once we reached 2,000, 3,000, 4,000 & 5,000 Facebook likes and contest entries and when we reached 4,000, 5,000 & 6,000 Twitter Followers and contest retweets.  For complete details on how the entire contest went down, please click here.

Our final winner, Theresa from Newfoundland was randomly selected on Wednesday July 27^th, 2011 once we hit the 5,000 “Like” mark on our PressReader by PressDisplay.com Facebook page. Here’s what an excited Theresa had to say:

This is so exciting!  The iPad 2 has been on my wish list even before it actually came out, I can’t believe I won one!  PLUS a year-long subscription to PressReader.  This is just fantastic, and I know a certain someone who is going to be very, very jealous .

Congratulations Theresa and a huge thank you to every single one of our contest participants for helping us reach each of our Facebook and Twitter milestones!

For all the latest news and PressReader happenings, make sure to continue following us on Facebook, Twitter and the PressDisplay Blog.  We’d also love to hold another contest so make sure to keep checking back and if you have specific ideas or suggestions on how the contest should work, we’d love to hear them!

Cheers,

Michael