Corrected: USAT gains 800 subs to e-edition

VAIL, Colo. — USA Today has snapped up more than 800 subscribers to its e-edition, fewer than three weeks after its Aug. 3 launch.
“Our subscribers love it,” USA Today Retention Manager Linda Ford told newspaper executives attending the 2009 Roundtable on Strategic Marketing here. “The feedback is overwhelmingly positive.”
The e-edition, based on Olive Software’s digital conversion software, includes a Saturday-Sunday supplement, called Today Extra. Subscribers receive the digital edition each morning by 5:30. The e-editions are provided as a complement to existing home and business subscribers, and people can subscribe to just the digital edition, if desired. Currently, USA Today is charging $9.95 for four weeks of the e-edition.
Ford said readers are attracted to the e-edition because of convenience, lower costs and enhanced features such as interactive puzzles.
The e-edition continues to gain traction, she said, with 7,000 people sampling the version in the last week. “Almost every country has had some interaction with the e-edition,” she said.
Some 50 execs attended the three-day conference, sponsored by SmartFocus Astech.

Editor's note: This corrects an earlier posting that stated that USA Today had gained 40,000 new subscribers to its digital edition.