The Sunday Times newspaper, one of South Africa's leading quality Sundays, is today launching an integrated web and daily edition of the paper.Speaking at the World Editor's Forum, in Cape Town, editor-in-chief Mondli Makhanya said the digital edition would be used to drive print sales of the paper.
The new website will have news, blog and podcast sub-sites with journalists working across both editions, Makhanya added, to ensure editorial quality.
"From day one we will be a fully integrated newspaper. They [journalists] all have been trained to be multi-media and multi-platform… we want to own the digital space to drive people to the print edition of the paper," he said.
South Africa was not well connected digitally, he added, and few South Africans had access to digital technology.
Instead, he said, the paper would try to take advantage of the country's high number of mobile phone users as a route to expanding the brand.
"We will be going heavily this way," he added.
The new daily print edition will be delivered at no additional charge to those of its existing 120,000 subscribers who live in metropolitan areas. A digital edition will also be available to subscribers.
The paper intends to woo advertisers with the offer that ads from the print edition will also be carried online.
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