Press Release

NewsNow gets thumbs up from journalists

May 19th 2003

NewsNow.co.uk is seen as one of the best UK news portals according to research of journalists online habits carried out by research firm New Media Insight.

Of those polled 54 per cent had used NewsNow and of that group 80 per cent thought the service was good or very good. Many reported using the site a few times each day.

The comments given reflected the fact that despite the arrival of Google News many still find NewsNow more useful and more appropriate to their news searching needs.

Many recognised that NewsNow has almost double the number of news sources compared to other aggregator services. "As far as quantity goes, it's excellent," said Philip Hunter, a freelance technical journalist.

The ability for users to filter what they want from NewsNow.co.uk was praised by Sandra Higgison, News Editor for Contact Management Focus. "The key word search is useful; I prefer it to Google." This function allows users to gather clean, reliable information simply.

The provision of news monitoring is highly valued by journalists. "Couldn't get the paper out without them," said Mark Brown at The Guardian. Gareth Morgan, a journalist for VNU Newswire went further saying, "you're the main one, your web site is my home page."

Other services used by journalists include: Google, Ananova, Reuters, BBC, Guardian and Altavista.

The survey took place during April and May and consisted of 22 respondents on UK trade and national newspapers.

Research author, journalist Chris Wethered said: "NewsNow is well liked by most journalists who in general do not have access to paid-for news monitoring services. They are very Internet-savvy so it is a credit to NewsNow that many report it to be their favourite service."

Most journalists were unaware that NewsNow offers free newsfeeds to editorial teams of over four persons.

Comments from other journalists:

"I need to be able to trust in the source and its validity"

George Walter, Windows XP

"We featured an article in our magazine about NewsNow.co.uk, we like it a lot"

Sandra Higgison, News Editor, Content Management Focus

"Most aggregators seem to be a bit late in delivering news from US sites over UK"

John Garrat, Channel Business.

Contact Details

May 19th 2003, NewsNow Publishing Limited, London England

Background Information

NewsNow is Europe's pioneering Internet news monitoring agency and supplier of tailored, aggregated newsfeeds.

NewsNow's customers hail from the world's PR, marketing, communications and web design departments of SME, national and multinational businesses and charitable organisations.

These organisations use NewsNow to gather and monitor news relevant to their company, clients, competitors, market industry and sector. Their news feeds may be delivered to their inbox, to their intranet or extranet or alternatively to NewsNow's secure web archive interface.

NewsNow is one of only a few companies able to offer this kind of online monitoring. Its customers include Exxon, Rolls-Royce, AMD and Sony Computer Entertainment.

NewsNow Key Points

• Searches over 37,000+ sources in real time
• Monitors news in over 141 countries and 20 languages
• Searches most leading international, national and regional newspapers; consumer, trade and technical titles; government press pages; press releases; blogs, webzines, newsletters and leading underground and alternative publications
• Offers sophisticated positional and proximity matching - the ability to specify keywords and phrases and the relationships between them
• No expertise necessary - professional staff take care of your changing needs
• Sources added or removed on request
• 30 day news archive
• No per-article charges
• Fixed monthly fees
• Delivery by email alert, via secure web archive interface or to any intranet or website

NewsNow History

NewsNow was founded in 1997. It began as a news aggregation website (www.NewsNow.co.uk) that fast became the UK's leading news portal. Today the portal features over 2300 topics and attracts 118 million page impressions monthly.

In 1998 NewsNow began delivering tailored news feeds to customers' websites.

In 2001, the addition of a sophisticated custom search engine capable of full-text search enabled NewsNow to deliver high-quality but cost-effective tailored Internet news monitoring solutions to PR, marketing and communications professionals of SME, national and multinational businesses and charitable organisations.