Newspaper publishers see record online gains offset digital growing pains
Newspapers’ attempts to convince advertisers to pay more for engaged readers in the face of ongoing print declines have been bolstered after the latest ABCs showed record digital gains for the likes of the Guardian, Trinity Mirror and The Independent.
Publishers are pivoting content around a broader breadth of online channels, spanning social media through to mobile, in the hope of pulling in new readers. It is taking advantage of readers’ shifts to the screen, paving the way for publishers to make enough from digital to make up for print losses.
Strategies now mainly fall into two camps; those that chase huge audiences and those that try to develop longer relationships with a smaller group of readers. Both approaches yielded strong returns in January, taking some publishers past significant milestones and well on the way to building and monetising digital audiences.
Trinity Mirror portfolio of digital titles smashed the 100 million barrier for the first time in January, according to the ABC audit. Monthly unique browsers across all combined national and regional sites reached 102,990,697 in January, up 27 per cent month-on-month and a 77 per cent increase from the same time last year.
The Mirror’ was the publisher’s chief beneficiary of the reader rush in January when was the most shared publisher in the UK with 17.5 million interactions, up from 1.5 million the previous year. Video traffic was behind much of the momentum with growth of video views on Mirror.co.uk increasing fivefold year-on-year.
Pete Picton, editorial director of Mirror Online, said: “January was a phenomenal month for all of our sites, reinforcing our dedication to, and success, in digital. Passing these milestones and seeing the impact of building a loyal and engaged audience through mobile, online and social media shows that a legacy newspaper brand can not only adapt to a digital age but be successful in doing so.
It is a similar story for the Guardian. The site, which relaunched last month, attracted more than 120 million monthly unique browsers for the first time in January. It tops the publisher’s previous of 114 million unique browsers from September.
Traffic jumped 14 per cent month-on-month and almost 35 per cent year-on-year, while monthly page views were also up by over 25 per cent year-on-year. Mobile traffic has also seen a significant increase of 98 per cent since January 2014.
David Pemsel, deputy chief executive of Guardian News & Media, said: “The Guardian continues to go from strength to strength and break new ground - all thanks to the unwavering quality and integrity of our journalism. Our reporting, comment and analysis is world-class and our investment in digital innovation has helped us develop the best possible platform to reach an increasing number of readers across the globe. It’s a fantastic start to the year.”
Meanwhile, The Independent saw global month unique browsers rise 52.5 million and climb 47 per cent to 20.2 million in the UK during January. For the first time The Independent also passed 200 million global page views, with 100 million page views coming from the UK.
Christian Broughton, digital editor of The Independent and i100, said: “These new record figures are testament to the excellent teams we now have in place on independent.co.uk and i100.co.uk. It’s an exciting time for us. We have a big combined platform now, and big ambitions. We’re expanding the editorial staff again over the year ahead, adding new specialisms and building on existing strengths.”
The Evening Standard’s site also benefited from the seasonal increase, passing the 5 million unique monthly users mark for the first time. Global monthly browsers soared 20.8 per cent from 6.3 million to 7.6 million, while the site also posted its highest ever global and UK page impressions. Worldwide views were 32.4 million in the period, up 21.2 per cent from the previous month and UK page impressions moved 23.3 per cent from 19.4 million to 24 million.
The digital gains will go some way to showing advertisers that newspaper brands have the global pulling power over readers to command big money. But increases in January are expected off the back of the festive lull and it is no secret that digital audiences across the industry are on the up. For publishers, the challenge still remains to turn the fast growing mobile channel into a valuable proposition that brands for which are going to pay a premium.
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