In an analysis of the Websites of the top 25 newspapers in the U.S., the New York Times made it to #1. The Los Angeles Times came in 2nd. The Washington Post is 5th.
24/7 Wall St. looked at the Websites, because as newspapers struggle to remain profitable, it’s their online versions that will be key to future revenue growth and profits.
Case in point: the NYT online ad revenue rose almost 26% in April. The NYT Company’s online revenue is now well over 10% of its total income, with a reported 49 million unique visitors in April logging on to its collection of Web properties.
24/7 Wall St. rated the sites “A” through “F” based on: 1) strength of content, 2) ease of use and navigation, 3) use of new web technology including comments sections, message boards, and multimedia, 4) lay-out 5) presence of a strong set of current advertisers, and 6) the size of their audiences based on measurements from the Compete Website visitor database for April.
Although they rank among the top 25 newspapers, The Wall Street Journal and USA Today were not included because they are national properties that have access to corporate budgets – something which the other Websites reviewed may not have.