Below is publisher reaction from The Guardian, Indpendent.co.uk and Mirror.co.uk:
The Guardian
The Guardian is reporting a strong April performance across both print and digital platforms, according to ABC figures out today. The Observer also recorded a robust month - outperforming the quality Sunday market with a 5.3% month-on-month increase in sold copy.
“April's figures show what the Guardian is all about - world-class journalism that makes a big impact and is expertly executed across both digital and print. Our investigative journalism set the global news agenda and the consequences continue to be felt in numerous governments and institutions. I’m delighted that such groundbreaking and innovative journalism has attracted a huge number of readers.” - Katharine Viner, editor-in-chief, Guardian News and Media.
The boost in Guardian print sales (up 2.9%) month-on-month, comes as the Guardian spearheaded the exposé of the Panama Papers - the biggest leak in history. It’s one of the strongest results for purely sold copy in the quality market and shows that despite a price rise, there is still demand for a premium print product. It is also likely that Independent readers are now choosing to pick up the Guardian for their print fix of news, analysis and features. Particularly strong sales this month were recorded for Panama Papers reporting, coverage of Prince’s death, the Ken Livingstone fall out and the late Victoria Wood.
Highlights for The Observer’s April sales include Observer Food Monthly specials on Chinese and Spring recipes.
Guardian 169,424 2.9% up month on month, up 4,794 copies
Down 3.8% or 6733 copies year-on-year
The Observer 194,054 5.3% up month-on-month, 9802 copies
Down 1.2% year-on-year, 2366 copies
The digital performance for April was also a significantly strong month with over 155 million monthly unique browsers - the highest volume since November’s record of 158.5m. It was, however, a record month for daily average unique browsers at 9.29m. Unlike November’s traffic which was driven largely by the external news of the Paris attacks, April’s news agenda was dominated by Guardian instigated stories including the Panama Papers investigation and Jon Ronson’s interview with Monica Lewinsky, (part of ‘The Web We Want’ series), which attracted readers from all over the world.
Digital abc figures:
Monthly unique browsers
including off-platform: 155,057,531 (up 0.02% MoM)
Daily average unique browsers
including off-platform: 9,296,081 (up 5.33% MoM)
Monthly page impressions
including off-platform: 960,576,751 (down 0.2% MoM)
Independent.co.uk
ESI Media’s Independent.co.uk has broken traffic records in its first digital-only month.
For Independent.co.uk in April 2016, the average UK daily unique browsers hit a record of over 1.4m (up 37% YOY) and 3.2m globally (up 41% YOY). UK page views hit a record with 120m page impressions (up 25% YOY), with nearly 240m globally (up 37% YOY). 41.1m users accessed the Independent via a mobile device during April, generating 130m page views.
This continued growth follows significant investment across the newsbrand, with the digital business doubling in size, including over 40 journalists joining the editorial team. Global bureaux are also due to open in Asia, the Middle East and Europe, and the US team has already benefited, with extra roles being introduced to the New York office.
The Independent’s new subscription app – The Independent’s Daily Edition – is performing strongly, with subscriber numbers exceeding those of the former print edition.
Christian Broughton, Editor, Independent said: “These results are a great reflection of the talent, passion and brilliance of our journalists, and the loyalty of our readership. Our move to digital-only publishing gives the team a much sharper focus on the platforms of the future. To have taken such a game-changing step and delivered growth immediately represents a huge achievement from the entire team, and should give our industry great hope for the future.”
Mirror.co.uk
Mirror.co.uk attracted 76.2m unique browsers in April, a year-on-year surge of 24%.
Pete Picton, Editorial Director of Mirror Online, said: “Live breaking news was one of the biggest drivers of traffic once again, with more than six million unique browsers visiting us after the tragic death of Prince. Four of the top ten best performing stories of the month were about the star’s amazing life and career, showing the importance of reacting to a huge news story with quality breakout content.
“The renewed vigour in our Politics reporting continues - more than four million unique browsers logged onto our Politics stories. One of the top performers was a piece on the bad news the government sneaked out while people were watching the Queen's Birthday - a fantastic article true to the Mirror’s values of uncovering injustice and championing fairness.
“Our coverage helped us retain the majority of the traffic from our record-breaking month in March, with only a slight drop of 4%.”
