80% of US Consumers Won’t Pay For Online News

Will they pay? Won’t they pay? The back and forth ping pong ball debate over whether or not US consumers will pay for online news continues to draw media attention.

Regardless of what side of the net you jump to in this debate, Forrester Research has just published some findings that on first glance seem overwhelmingly in favour of the “Won’t Pay” team.

Why won’t users pay for online news? Well, 20% say they would. So there are some conditions that will lead to “paid for” online news working. Whether that is enough or a meaningful amount in the aggregate remains to be seen. However, type of news, delivery of news, ease of payment etc… can all lead to people paying for online news. I know they have all worked on us at Kontexto. And for the 80% that say they won’t pay for online news, maybe they just have not had the right conditions yet to do so.

You can see more information on the report at this link below:

Publishers Need Multichannel Subscription Models

Posted under Analytics, News Publishing, Newspapers