Sun Online, the web site of the UK’s most widely read newspaper, this week claimed it is the country's most popular newspaper site, following a new readership audit.

Figures from ABC Electronic, the online wing of the UK’s independent Audit Bureau of Circulations, showed that Sun Online had 3,004,487 unique users during August 2003, compared with 1,347,878 just 16 months earlier.

However, although Sun Online claims to be the UK’s most popular newspaper web site in terms of page impressions, its figures for unique users are less than half that of Guardian Unlimited, the web site of the UK broadsheet newspaper.

ABCE figures for Guardian Unlimited during September 2003 show 7,452,758 unique users, compared with 3,004,487 for Sun Online during August 2003.

Statistics for unique users are regarded as a more reliable method of evaluating web traffic as they indicate the number of individual readers. The term ‘page impressions’ describes the total number of pages visited by users.

The Sun newspaper has a daily circulation of more than 3.5 million with content that includes celebrity gossip, sports coverage and page 3.

"Sun Online is a big success because it provides a fantastic mix of content," said Danny Rogers, promotions editor for Sun Online.

Part of its success, according Mr Rogers, is the multimedia content of video, web chats and weekly news emails.

"The web site attracts a new, younger audience - and we know that the success online drives up sales of the newspaper."

Web advertising has also increased on Sun Online, which it says is due to the inventive design of its adverts and the success of its advertorials.

See also:
http://www.thesun.co.uk
http://www.abce.org.uk
http://www.journalism.co.uk/news/story646.html
Tags: Click tag to find related articles; click icon for feed

Free daily newsletter

If you like our news and feature articles, you can sign up to receive our free daily (Mon-Fri) email newsletter (mobile friendly).

Related articles