Associated Newspapers’ online revenue for the three months to January 2 was 73 percent higher than in the same period a year earlier, DMGT says in its interim update on Wednesday.
That’s a rebound for 2009’s horror quarter, during the worst of the economy-induced advertising downturn. We already knew from the annual report that online income grew 33 percent through 2010, as Mail Online’s audience took off.
But the stark story is that print saw nothing like this rebound…
— Print display ad revenue bubbled up by less than online, by four percent.
— But all other categories, as a whole, finished lower than in 2009.
DMGT has an excuse: ” Advertising growth in the quarter was hampered by the impact of the poor weather in December.”
Revenues from Associated’s digital-only operations – the former AND – which are mostly classifieds site, came up by 11 percent, as recruitment and property ads returned.
But, in DMGT’s regional Northcliffe Media division, digital revenue turned “marginally lower” than last year, on a 21 percent fall in job ads. Clearly, the economy is biting harder in local communities than in central London.
CEO Martin Morgan says: “As far as local papers are concerned we are not interested putting fresh capital into the sector. We are open to any worthwhile approaches concerning consolidation.”
Update: DMGT just added a tech startup entrepreneur to its board as a non-exec director. He is Menlo Park-based Dominique Trempont, a board member at RealNetworks (NSDQ: RNWK), the On24 webcaster and the Finisar fibre service.