Online news readership overtakes national press

Daily online news readership has overtaken national newspapers for the key UK 15 to 44 age group, reports Spectrum Consulting.

The findings, based on a sample of 1,000 adults representative of the UK population, have been published in Spectrum Consulting's Online Buzz Report 2008.

They reveal that 45 per cent of the 15 to 44 age group read online news on a daily basis compared to just 38 per cent who read newspapers.

Commenting on the study, Spectrum Consulting's founder and director, Mark Westaby, said: "The findings have fundamental implications for marketing in the UK, for two very important reasons: first, they demonstrate that marketing can no longer rely on traditional media to reach key audiences; second, as the younger generation grows older, they will take with them a tsunami of change that will leave decades of advertising, PR and other marketing debris behind.

"These industries are simply going to have to change or they will die".

Nor does Westaby believe such changes are likely to be gradual.

He concluded: "People look at the figures and think this will take a long time; however, anybody who has read 'The Tipping Point' will appreciate that things can change very rapidly once a critical mass is reached.

"Our research findings show that online media have come from virtually nowhere to being the most important daily source of news for many people in just 10 years.

"I would not be at all surprised if this does not spread to cover most of the population within just five more years".

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