As the first national news brands to join The Ozone Project since its founding by News UK, The Telegraph, The Guardian and Reach plc, the Evening Standard and The Independent bring their engaged and valuable audiences into The Ozone Project environment, says The Ozone Project.
According to The Ozone Project, the addition of the Evening Standard and The Independent to Ozone's alliance will build greater audience depth and frequency to its current offering that already reaches over 99% of UK online adults every month. This new partnership will mean that 83% of Ozone's monthly audience will visit its sites every week (up by 1.9 million) and 48% on a daily basis (up 1.1 million).
This new partnership further enhances The Ozone Project’s mission to create a scaled, brand-safe and transparent advertiser-led offering that provides access to the trusted environments of the UK’s leading publishers. In addition to its founding news brands, recent alliances with Time Out Media, The Stylist Group and DC Thomson further expand the platform’s reach amongst audiences interested in entertainment, local news, culture and lifestyle.
Many major advertisers, says the organisation, have been reaching new audiences through Ozone's ecosystem, with some of the most recent including British Gas, HM Government, Lidl, Boots, Amazon, Pfizer and Nationwide.
Damon Reeve, CEO, The Ozone Project said: “We are delighted to welcome ESI Media to the Ozone family - not only as one of the UK’s biggest publishers, but as a shining example of the quality journalism fuelling our advertiser proposition. Ozone's purpose is to provide brands with greater choice in reaching the UK’s online population in the most trusted, safe and attentive environments, and we look forward to collaborating with ESI Media to build an even better future for digital advertising.”
Andy Morley, Chief Digital Revenue Officer at ESI Media, said: “We are immensely proud of our position as the UK’s largest quality newsbrand with The Independent and the award winning content of the standard.co.uk. In recent years we’ve seen a huge growth in readers across both of our flagship brands. In fact, The Independent has doubled the number of readers turning to it as a source of valuable, impartial, and progressive news since becoming digital only in 2016. As we further develop our digital channels across both the Evening Standard and The Independent, we’re excited to join The Ozone Project to make it even easier for brands to connect with our engaged audiences.”