What will we read at the dentist?
Jinfo Blog

22nd September 2009

By Diana Nutting

Item

Bucking the trend for charging for online content, The Reader’s Digest Association, (http://www.readersdigest.com) which applied for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in August is planning to expand its global online activities. According to the new general manager Jonathan Hills, Readers Digest was the Google News of the 1920s. The group is planning to replace a patchwork of international sites, each designed separately by local teams and carrying a different selection of content, with a single, coherent platform. These new sites, which will be in 22 languages will offer more content and more automation, aimed at a younger audience. Meanwhile, worldwide magazine ad pages are up 2% at the end of fiscal year 2009, which ended in June, and readersdigest.com hit a record for site traffic during the same month, at 2 million unique visitors, although the overall company lost 18.4% of its revenue last year, allegedly to competitors’ online content. More changes to come include a new name for RDA at some point. Currently Readers Digest has offices in 44 countries. it markets books, magazines, and music, video, and educational products reaching a customer base of 130 million and sold in 78 countries. It publishes 94 magazines, including 50 editions of Reader's Digest, the world's largest-circulation magazine, operates 65 branded websites generating 22 million unique visitors per month, and sells approximately 40 million books, music, and video products across the world every year.

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