From Comscore.com full story here

Nearly 50 Percent of Internet Users in Europe Visit Newspaper Sites

comScore Releases Overview of European Internet Usage for November 2011

LONDON, UK, 19 January 2012 - comScore, Inc. (NASDAQ: SCOR), a leader in measuring the digital world, today released an overview of Internet usage in Europe, showing that 379.4 million Europeans went online in November 2011 for an average of 27.8 hours per person. This release highlights Internet usage in 49 European markets aggregated into the European region and provides individual reporting on 18 markets. Amongst its findings, the study also showed that 47.8 percent of Europeans visit Newspaper sites, with a notable percentage of visits to the top 5 Newspaper sites preceded by a visit to Facebook.

Nearly 1 in 2 Europeans Visit Newspaper Sites
In November 2011, 181.5 million unique people in Europe visited Newspaper sites, an increase of 9 percent from the previous year. The Daily Mail continued to attract the largest audience at 20.1 million unique visitors, followed by the Guardian at 15.7 million unique visitors. Turkish newspapers Hürriyet and Milliyet and German newspaper Bild rounded out the top five Newspaper properties, with each attracting approximately 10 million unique visitors.

Marketers More Bullish Than Agencies on Traditional Media Spend

A greater proportion of marketers than agencies believe that spending on traditional media such as direct mail (25% vs. 17%), print (22% vs. 8%), and radio (18% vs. 3%) will increase this year as compared to 2011, with the proportions expecting spend to increase on TV relatively on par, according to a survey released in January 2012 by RSW/US. And although the survey shows that increases in digital media spending will outpace that of traditional media, marketers’ planned increases do not appear to match agency expectations: a higher proportion of agencies than marketers expect spending to increase in social media (89% vs. 63%), mobile (72% vs. 46%), SEO (66% vs. 48%), and banner advertising (55% vs. 30%).

According to December 2011 figures from Kantar Media, outdoor (3.2%), TV (3.2%), and radio (1.1%) led all media in Q3 2011 year-over-year ad spend gains, while internet and newspaper ad spending declined 2.9% and 3.7%, respectively.

 Mediabids' Newspaper Users -

Mediabids is considering exhibiting at the Multimedia Key Executives Conference in San Antonio from February 27th to 29th. This is the "mega" conference put on by LocalMedia Association, Inland and SNPA. Let us know if you are planning on attending. We are trying to get a read on how many of the newspaper people we work with will be attending.

Thanks!

 From the Reynolds Journalism Institute. Full story here

Newspaper readership remains strong in smaller cities and towns

CASR Research shows consistent trends

Readers in areas served by community newspapers continue to prefer the community newspaper as their primary source of local news and advertising according to the 2011 National Newspaper Association research survey. The survey, conducted by the Center for Advanced Social Research (CASR), a program of the Reynolds Journalism Institute, shows that readers prefer the printed copy to the online version, with 48 percent saying the never read the local news online.

Since 2005, NNA has done research on how people read and what they think about their local newspaper. Results have been consistent over the years, even as sample and community sizes have been adjusted slightly

Other highlights from the research include:

• 74% of people in communities with a newspaper circulation under 15,000 read a local newspaper each week.
• 74% of those readers, on average, share their papers with 2.33 persons
• They spent about 40 minutes reading their local newspapers
• 73% read most or all of their community newspapers
• 61% of readers read local news very often in their community newspapers, while 48% say they never read local news online (only 11 percent say they read local news very often online)
• Of those going online for local news, 52% found it on the local newspaper’s website, compared to 20% for sites such as Yahoo, MSN or Google, and 25% for the website of a local television station
• 40% read editorials or letters to the editor very often in their newspapers, while 64% never read editorials or letters to the editor online
• 80% think governments should be required to publish public notices in newspapers
• Of those with Internet access at home, 89% have broadband access

The local community newspaper is the primary source of information about the local community for 51.8 % of respondents compared to seeking information from friends and relatives (16%) and TV (13.2%). Readers are seven times more likely to get their news from their community newspapers than from the internet (7.4%). Fewer than 6% say their primary local news source is radio.

NNA President Reed Afinson, publisher or the Swift County (MN) Monitor-News in Benson, Minn., said the study demonstrates that citizens believe in newspapers.

“The survey shows a majority of respondents believe that the newspaper does a better job of providing background and depth on stories essential to citizens,” Anfinson said. “Further, the newspaper is more useful to them personally than any other news source. It not only highlights the strong bond between local communities and their newspapers, but demonstrates that people do value good journalism.”

 I wasn't sure who Millennials really were - so here is the Wikipedia definition:

Generation Y, also known as the Millennial Generation (or Millennials),^[1][2] Generation Next,^[3] Net Generation,^[4] Echo Boomers,^[5], describes the demographic cohort following Generation X. There are no precise dates for when the Millennial generation starts and ends, and commentators have used birth dates ranging somewhere from the mid-1970s^[6] to the mid 1990s, with some sources including as late as the early 2000's.

Great news for newspapers and direct mail but a little bit hard to believe. Full story from MarketingCharts.com here:

Most Millennials' Store Choices Influenced by Print Media

Direct mail (92%) and newspapers (91%) are the media most Millennials say affect their store choices, ahead of digital channels such as visiting a store website using a computer (84%) or receiving emails from retailers (78%), according to [download page] a December 2011 report from Nielsen. Data from “The Evolution of Circulars: From Print to Digital” indicates that when it comes to shopping, Millennials are more tech-savvy than Gen X adults, being more likely to have their store choices influenced by smartphones or mobile phones, social media sites, and retailer emails.

Printed Circulars Lead Overall

Printed circulars (direct mail, newspaper inserts, and in-store) lead the overall shopper popularity contest, with roughly 60% of consumers looking at them once a week. According to Nielsen, the only electronic vehicle demonstrating equivalent reach was retailer email. According to a study released in December 2011 by Epsilon Targeting, when it comes to learning about new products, American consumers also prefer direct mail: almost 3 in 5 report that they enjoy getting postal mail from brands about new products, compared to just 43% who say they enjoy getting emails from brands on new products.

Although high tech circular touchpoints do not enjoy extensive reach, they do see strong weekly usage: Nielsen data shows that social media (45%) and smartphone or mobile phone (39%) weekly use rates outstrip in-store vehicles such as print (38%), kiosk (24%), and TV (21%), with tablet devices also demonstrating healthy weekly usage (35%).

Digital preference rates are also strong when asking shoppers about the future: more than 70% of shoppers expressed a desire for basic digital delivery (store website using computer or retailer email) in the future, and about one-third wanted social media or smartphone applications. Nearly 90% wished to continue receiving paper at home or in-store.

Active Online Presence Critical

According to the report, 18% of internet users would not buy a personal care item without first consulting online, while 17% check online first before purchasing a food item. And although just 20% of store shoppers visit grocery/drug retailer sites, those 1 in 5 consumers who research online first spend approximately 30% more in the store.

Digital Efforts Lack Sophistication

Although most retailers use digital channels such as online circulars (93%), site product filters (81%), shopping lists and recipes (81%), and active Twitter feeds (78%), Nielsen analysis shows that many are not taking advantage of other, more sophisticated approaches. Indeed, only slightly more than 2 in 5 use approaches such as circular email subscription (44%), circular search ads (44%), and circular via Facebook (41%), while just 22% use circular item search ads. According to a Compete study released in June 2011, many online consumers now treat Facebook like a product circular: more than half (56.2%) say they visit the Facebook page of a retailer/consumer product company to keep up to date on sales and promotions, almost double the percentage who give the second-most-popular answer, learning about a specific retailer (29%).

About the Data: Nielsen’s findings are based on an extensive survey among an 11,000-shopper subset of the Nielsen Homescan panel.