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Survey: 75% of local households read Democrat
Published Sunday, June 21, 2009
NATCHEZ — More than three-quarters of local households report reading The Natchez Democrat in print or online each week, a new survey shows.
Pulse Research, Inc., a nationally recognized independent market research firm based in Portland, Ore., conducted the survey last month. The results were just released.
The survey showed 70.1 percent of the households surveyed reported reading The Democrat’s print edition within the past week.
Of local households with Internet access, 61 percent reported visiting natchezdemocrat.com during in the same period.
Print and online editions combined, The Democrat was read by 77.3 percent of households during the past week; in the past 24 hours, 74.7 percent of households reported reading either the print edition, the online edition or both.
“That’s an amazing statistic and one in which our team takes great pride,” Publisher Kevin Cooper said. “We look at our own numbers — print circulation and online stats — and get an idea of how many people read us, but this is the most detailed survey of readership we’ve had in more than a decade.”
Cooper said since printed editions can be shared among several readers, determining the actual readership audience must be determined from such a survey.
“Having a strong readership base is key to all that we do,” Cooper said. “We consider our readers as the ‘owners’ of our newspaper and Web sites. We depend on their readership and involvement.”
Survey results were gathered through telephone calls to local residents chosen by random.
The survey sample was weighted by known age and gender statistics to ensure the results closely reflected the community’s age and gender make-up.
John Marling, president of Pulse Research Inc., said the results of the survey indicate The Democrat’s audience is much stronger than normal.
“At 74.7 percent, The Natchez Democrat is above the norm,” Marling said, referring to the combined 24-hour audience statistic. “The Natchez Democrat and natchezdemocrat.com delivers the local market.”
Other statistics of note from the survey include:
4 Females make up the majority of the readers at 54 percent, to male readers at 46 percent.
4 Readers are split almost evenly among age categories with 31.1 percent being 18 to 34 years old, 33.2 percent in the 35 to 54 bracket and 35.7 percent were 55 and older. The average age of a reader is 47.
4 The average income level of readers is $47,887 with 54.5 percent reporting income of more than $30,000 annually.
Comments
Posted by double011 (anonymous) on June 21, 2009 at 5:23 p.m. (Suggest removal)
I must have meet the other 25% at lunch today it was the laugh of fathers day, These surveys are done in the daytime and to those who actually still have a home phone, funny really.
Posted by mistersippi (anonymous) on June 21, 2009 at 5:34 p.m. (Suggest removal)
Hoooooooooooonk Hooooooooooonk. Oh, is that the Democrat blowing it's own horn. There ain't no other choice for local news so I suppose they are right. I sure wish there was an alternative though.
Posted by speakup (anonymous) on June 22, 2009 at 3:41 a.m. (Suggest removal)
average income $47,000 plus dollars?
Posted by kcooper (Kevin Cooper) on June 22, 2009 at 10:48 a.m. (Suggest removal)
double011/mistersippi/speakup:
A few points here to answer some of your questions:
1). Calls were made between 5 and 9 p.m. Central time, Monday through Friday and between noon and 8 p.m. Central time on the weekends.
Because the "under 35" category is statistically under-represented on traditional phone surveys (because of a higher than average use of wireless phone only households in this group) the survey was weighted by age.
In other words, the survey company seeks to ensure their results are valid for all age groups, using U.S. Census data for our community as the age bracket basis.
That's the best way to factor out the "cell phone" effect. They did the same weighting for gender, too.
2). Yes, we are tooting our own horn a bit. We're proud of our newspaper and Web sites and are happy to have so many great readers (including the ones who are critical of our work).
3). On the $47,000 average income statistic, remember that that's "household" income (so in a two-income family, for example, that would represent both incomes combined).
I see now that our story doesn't clearly point out the "household" nature, but that's how the question was worded on the survey. We didn't intend for that to seem misleading.
Let me know if you have additional questions about the survey. I'll be happy to answer them if I can.
Thanks.
Kevin.
Posted by double011 (anonymous) on June 22, 2009 at 12:59 p.m. (Suggest removal)
Kevin,
Iwas handed some literature from one of your ad agents, on Fri of last week, whick stated complete diffrent figures, im looking at 86.5% on combined readers print,online and buyers guide, kevin my question to you do you actually think that 8 1/2 people out of 10 people read your paper, thats riduculous, as the same as I told my ad agent, the same as i would tell the local radio station and any other paper, or advertising agency. Facts are clear since you called me out, I will tell you 1) your a journalist who lives on propaganda and 2) I have a masters in marketing and own a very sucessful business in natchez, dont always believe these high priced marketing companys who justify the prices they charged you by BLOWING UP YOUR BALLOON, it did make a good story cause people all over town are talking about it, and about 98% of people are laughing about.
Posted by kcooper (Kevin Cooper) on June 22, 2009 at 3:03 p.m. (Suggest removal)
double011:
I'm sorry you doubt the survey's results as "propaganda" and "ridiculous."
I appreciate your readership and willingness to express your opinion, even if it's based on your beliefs rather than more hard data.
The numbers in the article didn't include the statistics on the Miss-Lou Buyer's Guide (which the number you reference did).
Here's a link to a copy of the survey. It should be what your marketing representative provided to you.
http://av.bninews.com/natchez/images/Pul...
Of course 98 percent of the population are laughing about the article, then, perhaps the survey "underestimated" our audience? :-)
I hope you have a nice day and continued success in your business.
Thanks.
Kevin.
Posted by jlmorris (anonymous) on June 22, 2009 at 3:35 p.m. (Suggest removal)
http://av.bninews.com/natchez/images/Pul...
You cannot add the two numbers together for total readership because you would have 200% in the most ideal case.
Posted by kcooper (Kevin Cooper) on June 22, 2009 at 4:28 p.m. (Suggest removal)
jlmorris,
Thanks for correcting my link. I'd forgotten that no extra html is needed to make a link in our comments. :)
In answer to your comment, no raw percentages were added together. If we'd done that the numbers for combined readership would be off the chart as you point out.
The percentages for the print, online and combined numbers were calculated separately based on the actual number of people (not percentages) who reported reading us.
The print and online numbers simply came directly from the results of survey questions: Have you or anyone in your household read (The Natchez Democrat's print edition (one question) ... or natchezdemocrat.com (another question)) in the past week?
To calculate the combined print/online audience/readership, the company added the total number of print readers with the number of online readers who reported they did NOT also read the print edition, then did the math to arrive at the combined percentage.
That seems like a sound way of handling to me. However, if you see a hole in the logic, please let me know. I know you're very good at numbers (from seeing some of your past comments) so I'd appreciate the second set of eyes.
Let me know if I've muddied the water further. Trying to explain statistics with words can get confusing (for the writer and the reader). :)
thanks.
Kevin.
Posted by jlmorris (anonymous) on June 22, 2009 at 5:19 p.m. (Suggest removal)
Kevin, if the "company" had the number of paid subscribers for print and added only the non subscribing on-line readers and divided by the total households in your market area, then the percentage would be about right.
Posted by kcooper (Kevin Cooper) on June 22, 2009 at 6:04 p.m. (Suggest removal)
jlmorris,
That's essentially what they did, only instead of working from a print circulation number, they simply asked how many people read the print edition when they called them for the survey
That's actually a more accurate (and more independent) way of looking at the numbers because it takes into account important factors for which merely working from the print circulation figures cannot consider.
For example, in many cases more than one person may read a single print edition (for example an adult who reads the newspaper in the morning and passes it along to an aging parent, neighbor or other relative when they are finished reading it). That would be one printed newspaper, but two or more households.
A similar thing happens when a business gets a copy of the printed edition and multiple employees regularly read the lone copy.
For decades, newspapers (our included) have taken print circulation numbers and simply used "national" average readership numbers to derive household penetration estimates. Applying such national averages to our print circulation figures provides pretty accurate numbers, but this kind of survey takes a more direct, more local and presumably more accurate approach.
The only things that would make it inaccurate would be: 1). The company forged its data; 2). Survey respondents didn't tell the truth.
The company's only gain in providing bogus information would be the potential of repeat business. Since we've not done such a survey in 10 or more years and have no plans to do new updates of the survey routinely, that seems like a thin argument. Also, the company was paid in advance for performing the survey, so there was no money riding on the outcome of the results.
The interesting thing to consider here is that none of the people would gain anything by not telling the truth and these aren't "potential" readers like some broadcast folks may reference (as in our stations "can reach" X-number of people." These are actual, engaged readers who said, "Yes, I read that yesterday, this week, this month, etc."
Basically, the combined numbers were calculated by taking the number of people who reported reading the print edition and added it to the number of people who reported reading us online, but not in print, then working the math with the household figures.
Posted by jlmorris (anonymous) on June 22, 2009 at 6:29 p.m. (Suggest removal)
Well, if you are going to include "everybody" who read the print edition and those who only read the on-line edition, then the correct divisor would be all people in your market area except those to young to read.
Now the problem would be who is too young to read. I can remember back to the dawn of time that I either read the funny papers or had someone read it to me.
I question the younger readership numbers. The young folks that I know do not subscribe to any paper or read any paper on a regular basis.
I have tried to convince my kids and their friends that a newspaper should be a part of their daily routine. However, I seem to have lost that battle.
Posted by kcooper (Kevin Cooper) on June 22, 2009 at 7:39 p.m. (Suggest removal)
I agree that the age stats seem to defy conventional wisdom which is that print readers on average are older and online readers on average are much younger.
Interestingly, the survey results are almost identical, however, to the results we've gathered from online users who provide a year of birth when they register for full access to our Web site.
Many of our online users are in the 55+ category. It's roughly one-third for each of the categories listed above (in print and online).
The survey sought only 18+ age respondents.
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