Consumers are willing to pay about $5 per month to receive online news, but readers in the United States are less likely to pay up than their European counterparts, and a subscription model will not exactly be the newspaper industry's saving grace, according to a Monday report from the Boston Consulting Group (BCG).
BCG interviewed 5,000 people in nine countries to gauge their interest in paying for online news content. Consumers in Finland were most likely to pay for news at 66 percent, but readers in the United States and the U.K. were least likely at 48 percent.
Italians, meanwhile, were willing to pay up to $7 per month for their online news, while consumers in the U.S. and Australia were only willing to cough up about $3 per month.
BCG also talked to readers in Spain, Germany, France, and Norway.
Monetization of online news has made headlines recently as newspapers and other media outlets struggle to compete for a piece of the Internet advertising pie. News Corp. chairman Rupert Murdoch, who owns several newspapers in the U.S., Europe, and Australia, has championed a subscription-based service, and said recently that he will pull his publications from Google News once that subscription-based model is in place.
Google News says that its service is a way for Web sites to boost their profile and traffic, and points out that anyone who does not want to be included can opt out.
But what do U.S. consumers want to read about? Approximately 73 percent of U.S. respondents said they would pay for special, breaking, or investigative news while 72 percent would pay for community and local news, BCG found. About 61 percent would subscribe to real-time, breaking news.
Among all nine countries, people were most likely to pay for community-specific news at 67 percent, followed breaking and investigative news at 63 percent.
BCG interviewed 5,000 people in nine countries to gauge their interest in paying for online news content. Consumers in Finland were most likely to pay for news at 66 percent, but readers in the United States and the U.K. were least likely at 48 percent.
Italians, meanwhile, were willing to pay up to $7 per month for their online news, while consumers in the U.S. and Australia were only willing to cough up about $3 per month.
BCG also talked to readers in Spain, Germany, France, and Norway.
Monetization of online news has made headlines recently as newspapers and other media outlets struggle to compete for a piece of the Internet advertising pie. News Corp. chairman Rupert Murdoch, who owns several newspapers in the U.S., Europe, and Australia, has championed a subscription-based service, and said recently that he will pull his publications from Google News once that subscription-based model is in place.
Google News says that its service is a way for Web sites to boost their profile and traffic, and points out that anyone who does not want to be included can opt out.
But what do U.S. consumers want to read about? Approximately 73 percent of U.S. respondents said they would pay for special, breaking, or investigative news while 72 percent would pay for community and local news, BCG found. About 61 percent would subscribe to real-time, breaking news.
Among all nine countries, people were most likely to pay for community-specific news at 67 percent, followed breaking and investigative news at 63 percent.
