News Corp Australia passes 500,000 paid digital subscribers
News Corp says it has passed the 500,000 paid digital subscribers milestone in Australia.
News Corp Australia’s executive chairman Michael Miller announced passing the milestone in an email to staff.
In the company’s global quarterly results last week, chief executive Robert Thomson revealed the company had reached 493,000 digital subscribers by the end of March.
News Corp Australia boss Michael Miller said the milestone being passed meant “more and more people are willing to pay more for our trusted, quality journalism”
The quarterly results reported News Corp’s News and Information arm grew circulation and subscription revenue by 1% globally over the previous year to $538m. The Australian figures were not broken out, but the company noted subscriber growth at The Wall Street Journal and Australia titles were responsible for the slight gain.
The milestone comes eight years after News Corp turned on its paywall for The Australian, a move it extended to its tabloid mastheads the following year.
Last year, News Corp Australia’s COO, Damien Eales told Mumbrella the company was seeing success with paywalls for its local publications, saying: “We are finding that people are increasingly willing to pay for a subscription that includes exclusive content about their local council, their local business community, local development applications, local personalities and much more.”
Miller’s note to staff:
I am delighted to announce that our mastheads have hit the milestone 500,000 mark in digital subscribers. This is an important achievement for us all to celebrate as it shows more and more people are willing to pay more for our trusted, quality journalism.
Reaching 500,000 digital subscribers is a world-class achievement and my thanks to everyone who has played a role in achieving this goal. Growing our digital subscribers is made possible by the many teams behind our mastheads. Whether crafting stories, or supporting our online presence in marketing, digital and product, or editorial direction, your contributions have proven invaluable. My thanks to all of you.
Not only is 500,000 a significant number, it is also serves to reinforce that growing our digital audience is how we will continue to grow our business. We are a company with a rich, proud history in compelling storytelling and today, we continue to tell the stories which inform, entertain and educate Australia in the most trusted and innovative ways. This is the premium content that resonates with our expanding audiences and is what will drive our long-term success.
I look forward to reaching one million digital subscriptions with you.
Or to put it another way, their reach has drastically declined?
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No it hasn’t at all. It’s as large as ever. 500k of our audience pays for their digital news. What stats are you referring to? Please look at Emma or Neilson before making media decisions.
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I see your point, but please don’t mention Emma as a metric of credibility.
Emma is News marking its own homework.
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Its no mean feat. valuable eyeballs willing to pay to be tracked. If I had need of it I’d pay to get these ABC’s
Dunno if it pays for the big paper bill but they’re remorselessly shopping their content.
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Sounds like they’ve had a good conversion rate from the many subscribers who recently lost their free “legacy” digital access (as I did).
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“In the company’s global quarterly results…”
500k globally or in Australia?
How can these figures be substantiated?
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Pay walls always reduce reach. We know that but do the figures reflect that?
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