How to Calculate Readership

Most publishers and managing editors track their publication's circulation numbers as a measure of their organization's profitability. Still, a more accurate indicator of this could be the publication's overall readership. Those publications that can demonstrate that they have high readership numbers are more attractive to potential advertisers. You can calculate the overall readership for a controlled bulk publication by simply multiplying the average net circulation (which is determined by the average gross distribution minus returns) by the number of readers per copy. Calculating the readership for a home-delivery publication, however, is a bit more difficult.

• 1

  Round up your net circulation numbers and also determine the percentage of households that receive your publication, as well as the percentage of those who read it. Additionally, you will have to find the average number of readers per edition. To calculate the number of households that actually receive your publication multiply the net circulation by the percentage of households that receive the publication.

• 2

  Multiply this number (of the households who receive your publication) by the percentage of people who read it regularly.

• 3

  Calculate total readership by multiplying the number you came up with by the average number of readers per edition. This final figure represents the total number of readers per edition.