City Analyst Points to Boost for Newspapers Following EU Referendum
Print circulation and online traffic figures for UK news media surged in the wake of the EU referendum, as people turned to newspaper coverage for live updates, editorial analysis and informed opinion, leading to a City financial analyst to signal a referendum boost for newspapers.
Ian Whittaker, head of European media research at Liberum, said: “The EU Referendum should be positive for newspapers as businesses. In the short-term, it will have helped to boost circulation revenues given the huge public demand for in-depth news and analysis of the Brexit vote and its consequences; and in the medium to long-term, it will be taken as a demonstration of how much influence newspapers still have, which is a persuasive argument to use with advertisers.
“Media agencies already recognise that newspapers offer greater engagement with their readers than any other form of media.The result of the Brexit vote is likely to reinforce that perception as well as the view that the press can reach viewers in a way that social media and digital cannot. In that regard, it may persuade advertisers that print has more value than realised, especially given the questions being raised about online media at the moment.”
Following last week’s referendum and the resulting resignation of Prime Minister David Cameron, national newspapers saw large increases in circulation over the course of the weekend with an average uplift of seven per cent on expected sales of Saturday editions. The Times’ Saturday edition, for example, sold an additional 100,000 copies – up 18 per cent week on week – making it its biggest selling paper of the year.
The London Evening Standard hit the million mark for the first time on Friday with 1,056,522 copies picked up across the city. Estimates from Trinity Mirror suggest that the Saturday edition of the Mirror was up around five per cent and this would give the title its biggest Saturday number since the Grand National issue back in April and the publisher also saw rises in its Sunday titles.
And i reached an all-time high, reporting circulation peaks of 302,000 and 308,000 on Friday and Saturday last week respectively, with Saturday’s issue up 23 per cent year on year.
In Scotland, newspapers also reported strong lifts with the Scotsman up 17 per cent on Saturday and Scotland on Sunday up 18 per cent – the same rise experienced by the Sunday Herald. On Sunday, scotsman.com recorded a wise in web traffic of 51 per cent and on Friday experienced an 82 per cent rise.
The increased audience was also reflected by a swell in online traffic figures as people turned to newspapers’ content to stay up-to-date with rolling blogs and deeper analysis on the implications of Brexit.
The Guardian reported a record 17 million visitors on Friday and, across the industry, newsbrands attracted more than two million Facebook interactions on polling day and the morning of the referendum result day.
On social media, newsbrands were dominant on Twitter with the UK’s most tweeted Brexit story of the week being a Guardian column by Nick Cohen – also the fifth most tweeted story on any topic globally – which attracted 31,800 Tweets. This was followed by Boris Johnson’s first article following the referendum result, which was published by The Telegraph and attracted 30,340 tweets. Both articles attracted more tweets than the BBC’s story on the Prime Minister’s resignation announcement, according to NewsWhip.
Covering the story yesterday in a piece headed Newspaper sales jump up to 20% after Brexit vote drama, Campaign head of media Gideon Spanier wrote: “Newspapers have reported a huge spike in sales over the weekend because of the Brexit vote drama, with some titles such as The Times recording their highest circulation of the year.”
Rufus Olins, Newsworks chief executive, said: “Readers have always turned to newspapers at the time of big, national events and continue to do so.”
The unaudited print circulation figures were from a NMA survey of national titles published by members Guardian News & Media, dmg media, Trinity Mirror, News UK, Telegraph Media Group and Johnston Press.