News and media consumption during and after the pandemic is an interesting topic.
Over the past twenty years the news media has suffered from steep drops in readership, subscriptions, and advertising dollars as the internet made information free.
At the same time, manipulative advocacy journalism, along with an ill-advised reliance on arbitrary social media sources, has led to growing mistrust of all media.
But something very interesting happened during the pandemic. People developed a hunger for solid, well-researched, and reliable news with clear provenance from trusted sources.
Global news consumption increased by 33% during the first half of 2020, with some countries seeing larger surges. For example, major media grew in the US by 41%, France by 45%, Malaysia by 55%, and Singapore by 87%.
In the UK the Financial Times doubled their web traffic and The Guardian saw a 50% increase in readership.
In Germany Süddeutsche Zeitung grew by 83% and Die Tageszeitung by 64%.
In Italy Il Sole 24 Ore grew by 109% and la Repubblica by 103%.
In the US, the Boston Globe grew 65%, the New York Times grew 55%, and the Wall Street Journal grew 46%.
People wanted legitimate information from professional news sources.
Maybe they had enough with the speculation and half-truths spread by trolls, basement dwellers, and other bad agents on social platforms.
Plus, many of these audience gains are expected to hold steady over the next year or so, followed by growing ad spending.
It might seem significant that even though 84% of Americans are on social media, its use is expected to slow.
However, that may have more to do with lost trust in how media companies use our data than dismay with the content that is on there. Remember, half of Gen Z say social media is their top source of news.
This reminds us that different generations consume news in different ways. The chart below shows the most preferred way to stay updated on news and current events, by age group.
Which means even though news media enjoyed a resurgence during the pandemic, it may have been only a slight delay to the inevitable.
There remains pressure on news organizations to create operating and business models that leverage social platforms.
As it is doing in many arenas, Gen Z may be reshaping the news and information landscape.
Sources for this post include LEWIS, Wahl Media, and Deloitte.