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September 23, 2009

Poll: News website users willing to pay under £10 pa for subscription

By oliverluft

The latest instalment of Paid Content’s poll into the attitude of news website readers toward paying for access has asked the big question: How much would you pay?

The answer: Very little. In fact, as close to zero as possible.

When asked the maximum amount they would be prepared to pay, respondents who read a free news site at least once a month gave us the lowest possible amount in each category – annual subscriptions under £10, a day pass costing under £0.25 and per-article fees of between 1p and 2p.

Those stats will make gloomy reading for all those hoping Rupert Murdoch’s plan to charge for content across all his newspaper websites would act as a call to arms for other publishers to follow suit.

Harris asked 1,188 people in the UK about their attitudes to paying for content. It’s results have been drip fed all week.

On Monday it was revealed that 74 per cent of those surveyed said if their favourite news service started charging to access content online they would switch to a free alternative. Just five per cent said they would pay to continue reading.

Yesterday it was revealed that those few readers that were willing to pay would prefer to subscribe annually than makemicro-payments.

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We asked users who read a news site at least once a month what their favoured option would be if they either chose to pay for their favourite site or were forced to pay by all news sites going pay-for…
–Per-article fees (ie. micro-payments) are the favourite option for 21 per cent.
–A day pass giving unlimited articles within a 24-hour period is favoured by 26 per cent.
–But a subscription of up to a year is the most desired model, supported by 54 per cent.

Email pged@pressgazette.co.uk to point out mistakes, provide story tips or send in a letter for publication on our "Letters Page" blog

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