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Sunday World becomes top of the pops as it avoids musical marketing
Sunday, August 24, 2008 By Catherine O’Mahony
An increased marketing spend has helped the Sunday World fend off overseas competitors and - for the second time - beat its Independent News & Media stablemate, the Sunday Independent, to the title of biggest selling Irish Sunday newspaper.

The tabloid paper, aimed at an under-40s readership, has added close to 20,000 sales in the past two years and is now selling an average of 292,124 copies each week. That compares with 283,024 copies for the Sunday Independent.

Mairead Kearns, advertising director for the Sunday World, said the paper had focused on building its female readership in recent months and had also invested more in marketing. The paper sponsored the recent TV3 documentary series Dirty Money, that was hosted by its crime reporter, Paul Williams.

‘‘We have a clear policy of avoiding CD giveaways,” she said. ‘‘We don’t want to be the country’s best listened-to newspaper. We focus on the stories and the reporters, and I think that’s why people come back to us.”

The numbers were released in the latest January to June report from the Audit Bureau of Circulations. In general, the report showed most Irish newspapers experienced lower, or little changed, sales in the first half of the year, with the worst hit being the Sunday Tribune, whose sales dropped by 4,475, to 65,717 copies.

The Sunday Independent took a lesser hit with a 1.7 per cent decline, or 4,918 copies. The Sunday Business Post’s sales were 1 per cent lower, or down 551 copies, at 55,971.

The Irish News of the World had a 1.7 per cent increase to 154,328 copies and the Irish Mail on Sunday was steady at 123,580 copies.

In the daily market, the progressively weakening Independent News & Media title, the Evening Herald, fell further to 46,028 copies, down 4.2 per cent. It’s thought to be the title most affected by the freesheets being distributed each day to Dublin commuters.

Of the daily broadsheets, the Irish Times alone held sales steady, at 118,259 copies. The Irish Independent and Irish Examiner suffered declines of 1 per cent and 3 per cent respectively.

The newest daily on the market, the mid-market Irish Daily Mail, had a bad first half, with sales slipping 6 per cent to 59,443 copies. However, the tabloid Irish Daily Star performed well, with sales up 3.2 per cent at 109,416. The Irish Sun was little changed at 103,673 copies.

The report offered a geographical breakdown of sales for the first time. This showed that the Irish Times, for example, has been averaging 4,000 sales overseas each day, while the Irish Independent sells close to 8,000 copies outside the island of Ireland. The Sunday Independent is selling more than 17,000 copies overseas, and the Sunday World is selling more than 16,000.

Media buyers have been keen to see these figures, as some see sales achieved outside Ireland as less valuable in commercial terms than those in Ireland. Overseas sales are largely made in Britain, to expatriates based there or people travelling for business, or in holiday destinations such as Spain or Portugal.

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