{"id":101712,"date":"2020-10-30T22:12:50","date_gmt":"2020-10-30T19:12:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/en.buradabiliyorum.com\/drudge-report-traffic-plunges-as-content-turns-against-trump\/"},"modified":"2020-10-30T22:12:50","modified_gmt":"2020-10-30T19:12:50","slug":"drudge-report-traffic-plunges-as-content-turns-against-trump","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/drudge-report-traffic-plunges-as-content-turns-against-trump\/","title":{"rendered":"#Drudge Report traffic plunges as content turns against Trump"},"content":{"rendered":"

“#Drudge Report traffic plunges as content turns against Trump<\/strong>”
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\n The Drudge Report posted a 45 percent decline in web traffic in September as the site alienated its core readers by turning against President Trump ahead of the 2020 presidential election.<\/p>\n

The data \u2014 derived from comScore, which tracks the industry \u2014 were released in a report by TheRighting, a website that analyzes traffic to right-leaning websites. TheRighting told The Post that the Drudge Report had 1,291,000 unique visitors in September, according to data supplied by comScore, down from 2,340,000 in the same month a year ago.<\/p>\n

September\u2019s eye-popping decline marks the ninth month in a row that the political news<\/a> aggregation website run by reclusive founder Matt Drudge has seen traffic fall, TheRighting said<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The plunge comes at a time when demand for political news has been soaring on both sides of the aisle leading up to a highly charged presidential election. And experts say it\u2019s directly tied to the Drudge Report\u2019s sudden and unexpected switch earlier this year from a conservative-leaning news outlet to one that\u2019s decidedly anti-Trump.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s catastrophic what has happ<\/a>ened to his web traffic,\u201d said Matt Lysiak, author of \u201cThe Drudge Revolution.\u201d \u201cHe\u2019s on a fast track to irrelevance.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lysiak says some of the Drudge Report\u2019s suffering can be traced to competition from social media<\/a> services like Twitter. \u201cBut what accelerated his decline is when he shifted to the left and turned on Trump and lost many of his core readers. By any criteria, this shift was a complete disaster for him,\u201d Lysiak said.<\/p>\n

\u201cLiberals are never going to love Drudge, even if he\u2019s not linking to stories about Hunter Biden and Joe Biden,\u201d Lysiak said of the website that made its name in the 1990s by being the first outlet to report on the brewing Monica Lewinsky scandal. \u201cThey\u2019ll always remember what happened with Bill Clinton.\u201d<\/p>\n

Drudge had been an ardent promoter of Donald Trump in the run-up to the 2016 election and was reportedly invited to the White House in 2017. But the site and its founder have drawn criticism from readers, including the president, for linking to largely negative stories about the president in recent months.<\/p>\n

Stories topping the Drudge Report on Friday included a link to a Washington Post article<\/a> about Trump\u2019s public musings over a potential loss to Joe Biden and a Pennlive.com story<\/a> about growing regional delays in the US Postal Service\u2019s delivery times.<\/p>\n

\u201cCongratulations Dan. You, Breitbart and others have decimated the business at Drudge,\u201d the president tweeted<\/a> earlier this month. \u201cIt\u2019s gone the way of the @NBA, ratings down 70%. People want the TRUTH! Drudge Report sold out, suffered a massive \u2018nervous breakdown\u2019. Happening @FoxNews also???\u201d<\/p>\n

The \u201cDan\u201d whom Trump congratulated appears to be Dan Bongino, founder of fast-growing Bongino.com, which saw its unique visitor traffic surge 780 percent in September, according to TheRighting.<\/p>\n

Drudge, who has become a topic of conversation among media and Wall Street circles in recent months due to rumors that he\u2019s seeking a minority investor, did not return calls seeking comment.<\/p>\n

Growing appetites for political news, meanwhile, have helped traffic to Fox News\u2019 website grow 9 percent in September compared to a year ago, with 104.1 million unique visitors, The Righting said. That lags behind CNN, which pulled 144.5 million unique visitors, up 11 percent, but beats the New York Times brands\u2019 95.1 million unique visitors in September, up 3 percent compared to the same month a year ago, and the Washington Post with 91.6 million unique visitors, also up 3 percent from a year ago, TheRighting said.<\/p>\n

Other right-leaning news sites that have benefited this election cycle are the Washington Examiner, which pulled 15.9 million unique visitors, up 11 percent, and The Blaze, which attracted 12.3 million unique visitors, up 106 percent, according to TheRighting.<\/p>\n

The fastest-growing sites in September were Bongino.com, up 780 percent to 2.6 million unique visitors, according to TheRighting; The Gateway Pundit, up 456 percent to 5.7 million, and CNS News, up 417 percent to 3.9 million unique visitors.<\/p>\n

\u201cStrong audience growth for most conservative websites continues to be driven by a heated news environment that shows no signs of cooling off,\u201d said Howard Polskin, president and chief curator at TheRighting, whose tagline is \u201cAlerting liberal audiences to today\u2019s headlines from the right.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cNotable stories in September 2020 included the escalation of the pandemic, the dramatic revelations in Bob Woodward\u2019s latest book on President Trump, the fireworks that characterized the first Trump-Biden debate, the death of Ruth Bader Ginsburg, the contentious nomination of Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court and the explosive story in the New York Times about Trump\u2019s tax returns,\u201d Polskin said. \u201cThese stories played like a reality show and kept audiences thoroughly engaged throughout the month as they kept turning to news media to learn the latest unfolding developments.\u201d<\/p>\n

Down last month was right-wing conspiracy site InfoWars, founded by Alex Jones, which saw traffic fall 1 percent for the fifth month in a row, The Righting said. The Daily Caller also saw traffic drop 9 percent for the month as it recorded its second monthly decline in a row.<\/p>\n

Bongino, meanwhile, is soaring despite concerns over the reliability of its content. \u201cBongino.com regularly promotes unsubstantiated conspiracy theories and misstates facts, often using anonymous sources to back up claims that have no other evidence,\u201d said News Guard, which gives it a red warning label in terms of reliability.\n <\/p><\/div>\n