EXCLUSIVE: Traffic at Top Newspaper Web Sites Declines in November

By: Jennifer Saba The difficult comparisons of the November 2008 presidential news cycle meant that more than half of the top 30 newspaper Web sites lost unique users in November 2009.

USAToday.com, NYTimes.com and the LA Times lost more than 20% of its unique users in November 2009 year-over-year. The Washington Post and Wall Street Journal eked out gains up 2% and 6% respectively.

Newsday went behind a pay wall in late October -- unique users for that month were 2.2 million. In November, Newsday had 1.7 million uniques.

The top newspaper Web site on the list that has the most sessions per user? That would be the Atlanta Journal-Constitution at 5.43.

Also please note that Nielsen Online, which provided the custom data for E&P, expanded its panels in June 2009, which could affect year-over-year trending.

Below is the custom list of top 30 newspaper Web sites for November ranked by uniques with the average number of sessions per user and year-over-year comparisons. Please note that several factors including news events can cause swings in traffic.

For the October list go here

NYTimes.com -- 16,635,000 -- 4.00 -- (-20%)
washingtonpost.com -- 11,321,000 -- 2.98 -- 2%
LA Times -- 8,852,000 -- 2.63 -- (-21%)
USATODAY.com -- 8,309,000 -- 3.84 -- (-20%)
Wall Street Journal Online -- 7,843,000 -- 2.96 -- 6%

Daily News Online Edition -- 7,109,000 -- 2.19 -- 21%
New York Post -- 4,934,000 -- 2.92 -- 10%
Chicago Tribune -- 4,690,000 -- 3.40 -- (-4%)
Boston.com -- 4,312,000 -- 4.61 -- (-21%)
SFGate.com/San Francisco Chronicle -- 3,777,000 -- 2.88 -- (-13%)

Politico -- 3,686,000 -- 3.25 -- (-11%)
TBO.com -- 3,026,000 -- 1.97 -- 354%
Atlanta Journal-Constitution -- 2,622,000 -- 5.43 -- (-7%)
Chicago Sun-Times -- 2,597,000 -- 2.90 -- (-3%)
NJ.com -- 2,498,000 -- 3.13 -- 6%

DallasNews.com - The Dallas Morning News -- 2,347,000 -- 2.88 -- (-13%)
Seattle Times Company Online Network -- 2,128,000 -- 3.53 -- 18%
MercuryNews.com -- 1,827,000 -- 2.19 -- 23%
The Houston Chronicle -- 1,825,000 -- 3.83 -- (-37%)
Baltimore Sun -- 1,812,000 -- 2.61 -- 23%

Philly.com -- 1,809,000 -- 3.84 -- 42%
Newsday -- 1,776,000 -- 2.52 -- (-45%)
Orlando Sentinel -- 1,769,000 -- 2.44 -- 11%
The Washington Times -- 1,763,000 -- 2.17 -- 28%
MiamiHerald.com -- 1,751,000 -- 2.63 -- (-22%)

tampabay.com -- 1,724,000 -- 2.11 -- 49%
The Denver Post -- 1,678,000 -- 2.69 -- 56%
Azcentral.com -- 1,668,000 -- 4.37 -- (-23%)
Star Tribune -- 1,663,000 -- 4.05 -- (-53%)
KansasCity.com -- 1,614,000 -- 3.33 -- (-13%)