Archant’s flagship website EDP24 recorded a record 5.2m page views views in May, helped by Norwich City’s Wembley appearance, the Radio 1 Big Weekend and the death of local eccentric Marigold.
Page views for the Eastern Daily Press website were up 37pc on 2014 and readers were up 30pc breaking the 1m barrier for the second time this year.
The sister Norwich Evening News website also enjoyed a month of high traffic with monthly page views up 43pc and readers up 50pc on last year.
Norfolk’s Digital Content Manager, Peter Raven, said: “Major events such as Norwich City’s glorious triumph over Ipswich Town in the play-off semi-finals, followed by victory at Wembley against Middlesbrough, and Radio 1’s Big Weekend at Earlham Park in Norwich helped boost digital figures.
“However, the top story on EDP24, with 44,000 page views, was the death of Marigold.
Popular Norwich eccentric Marigold, whose real name was Alvin Braithwaite, was renowned for directing traffic on the inner ring road while wearing rubber gloves.
Added Peter: “The city took him to its heart with tributes flooding in after his death was confirmed on the website.”
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And has this amazing success resulted in any profit for the website or simply just taken even more readers away from buying the paper?
The digital folk always seem keen to broadcast how many people have clicked on to their websites, but rather less enthusiastic about revealing actual cash profits!
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I remember first encountering Marigold as I drove into Norwich for my interview at Eastern Counties Newspapers (now Archant) in 1987. A great character, who was once seen never forgotten. RIP Marigold.
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Observer50 they are quick to shout about how many people have looked at their website due to a temporary blip where three sizeable news stories happened at the same time but are rather less keen to mention how many thousands have walked away from their tired daily papers.
There’s a conflict of interest internally with the digital team desperately trying to push push traffic to the Archant sites offering free news in the vain hope that it might attract commercial revenues ( it hasn’t and won’t) whist the print side are desperately trying to keep hold of the ever declining number of people buying their papers. two sides at odds with each other and with two very different aims pulling in opposite directions within the same company, one to get as many people to look at the on line content for free, the other trying to get people to pay for it,it’s what’s known as a ‘lose-lose situation’
Be interesting to see the next set of figures to see how many of those that came during this blip actually came back again.
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Pity the website is such a mess.
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Hit the nail on the head Word Furnace Man. Two factions, supposedly within the same, at odds with each other. So much for the One Archant mantra.
In the middle of it are the dedicated band of journos trying to maintain standards despite low pay, unrealistic workloads and gossamer-thin staffing levels.
Cover price rises are imposed with alarming regularity in a misguided attempt to offset the loss of income from falling circulation, leading to, guess what, further circulation falls.
Meanwhile the Digital is King ideology is spouted at every turn. Web hit spikes look good on paper but not on the balance sheet. They don’t translate into revenue. Advertisers don’t spend anywhere near the amount of money on digital that they do on print. Here print is still king.
Meanwhile Mustard TV stumbles along painfully, largely ignored by Norfolk viewers and advertisers. Surely the time has come to reveal the true cost of this wayward venture.
Time to cut your losses on this one Archant – you had a go, and tested the water – but Mustard isn’t going forward. Was it before its tie? Maybe. One thing is for sure, it’s time isn’t now.
Re-invest in quality editorial and boots on the ground. Put some investment where it can really pay dividends before it’s too late.
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Both word furnace man and Archant lifer are correct however print is only king on paper, continuous huge losses reported by ABC for the whole Archant newspaper portfolio clearly shows a collapsed market for the dire printed output with copy sales and ad revenues at record lows. Yet despite this the tie less wonders are still desperately trying to claw back lost readers and advertisers with no acceptance that they’ve moved on and won’t be back,and no amount of editors tub thumping or trying to ingratiate themselves will make any difference.
There are other and better competitors thriving in the market locally who have captured markets, businesses, readers and revenues all over the patch, most staffed by ex Archant people with papers, magazines and on line alternatives succeeding in what was traditionally archants homeland. Now due to complacency, falling standards and poor service others have stolen the business.
As for mustard TV I can only assume they’ve allowed an agreed lifespan before a decision is made on its future or it would have closed a long time ago,otherwise why would you continue with no audience, dreadful wannabe TV presenters,weak content and no commercial ad revenues? It’s a laughing stock in the county and must be a huge financial drain on the company’s rapidly diminishing coffers. And yes ‘lifer’ ‘ One Archant’ is a phrase not a belief within the company due to too many self serving yes man managers only interested in covering their own or their departments backs as opposed to working together with proper joined up cross departmental approaches that might have a positive impact.
Sadly most of us are forced to use HTFP to air our views and frustrations. as there is no platform or facility to do so within the company, maybe if there was and the yes man culture was not a way of life , things might start to improve.
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You’re right about mustard TV Archant lifer but they wouldn’t reinvest in people, it’s all about cost savings and more trimming to the bone so you won’t see the return of increased staff numbers.
The practice of department heads surrounding themselves with easy to manage green horns and Yes men is what’s got us in the awful state in the first place.indeed some people across editorial and advertising have made a career out of nodding and agreeing with their bosses rather than questioning and speaking up so the ill conceived and ridiculous policies and plans get put through unchallenged.
with regards to archants digital offering,they’ve spent years trying all manner of schemes,incentives and ‘packages’ trying to monetlise the sites but can’t, I know of reps who move ad budget across from print to web just to hit a target and presumably get a bonus ( remember those?) and in most cases accepted by their bosses as it allows them to hit their budgets and get paid a bonus too!
so let’s not get too carried away by temporary spikes until we see sustainable and consistent growth in audience numbers over a longer period of time than just one weekend.
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Good point Prospector. It is sad that most of us are forced to use HTFP to air our frustrations.
But it is the only outlet. Time was when Archant Norfolk had an annual staff survey, when Barry Dennis was MD and at he would address the staff on the results in an open and transparent way. At least you felt you had someone taking an interest. Nowadays anyone who raises any issues is perceived as a negative moaner. Much easier to pretend everything in the garden is rosy. So people just keep their heads down and allow themselves to be dumped on for fear of having their cards marked. This leads to a siege mentality. This is a very unhealthy culture, which leads to low morale. The culture needs to change. Senior managers need to talk to the workforce and try to understand them. Only then can things begin to improve. Then try spreading a little happiness, it goes a long way.
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