Wall Street Journal reports increase in circulation

The Wall Street Journal, defying industry trends, increased individually paid subscriptions by 1.6 percent to 1,351,396 and overall circulation by 0.3 percent to 2,069,463 for the six months ended March 31.

The results continue a trend during the last four reporting periods that has seen individually paid subscriptions grow 12 percent.

The Journal’s strategy is to focus on growing home delivery subscribers while reducing other paid circulation. The Journal has a high number of individually paid circulation, with more than 50 percent more — or 500,000 more — than the next highest newspaper total as reported by ABC.

The Wall Street Journal Online also grew its subscriber base, increasing paid subscribers 11 percent year-over-year in 2008, rising to 1,035,085 subscribers from 931,000.

The Wall Street Journal Digital Network, which comprises WSJ.com, MarketWatch.com, Barron’s.com and AllThingsD.com also generated significant year-over-year growth in terms of both visitors and page views. Visitors to the Journal Digital Network increased 70 percent while page views increased 32 percent.

“Over the last few years when other publications have seen declining circulation, the Journal franchise has gone from strength to strength showing growth in circulation and improving quality,” said Paul Bascobert, chief marketing officer of The Journal, in a statement. “With the recent expansion to both the print and online editions of the Journal, we expect to build on this positive pattern of growth with new opportunities to serve our core audience while engaging new readers.”

During the six months ending March 31, 2008, as reported in the ABC March 2008 FAS-FAX, total average paid circulation for the Journal grew to 2,069,463 from 2,062,312.