Newspaper Innovation

Polish publisher Agora today published a German edition of their Polish free daily Metro in Berlin.

The paper has a circulation of 30,000 and is meant to promote tourism to Poland and to give Polish advertisers the opportunity to reach potential customers unavailable to them in other ways.

Thus edition is already the third German publication, in September 2009 and June 2010 Agora also published German editions.

The first edition was awarded with the first prize in the “Marketing Solutions for Advertising Clients” category at the INMA Awards 2010 competition (see previous post).

The Vienna city council is spending around €15m in a year on advertising in three Austrian newspapers. Austrian paid market leader Kronen Zeitung is getting most from the city, but other paid papers lag behind free newspaper Heute and paid/free paper Österreich.

Österreich has 313,000 readers in Vienna, Kronen Zeitung is leading with 536,000 readers while Heute has 512,000 readers.

In January and February – weak months for advertising – Kronen received €730,000, Heute €690,000 and Österreich €440,000.

Vienna is in fact ruled by socialist party SPÖ, the total PR budget of the city councils “Presse- und Informationsdienst” is €47 million. Estimates from other parties is that to total budget of the city is actually at least twice as high because also power plants, public transport and housing projects owned by the city spend millions on advertising.

According to an article on the website of Austrian magazine Profil, the city council gets in return a very positive journalistic approach. The Vienna opposition does not hesitate to call it propaganda at the expense of taxpayers.

After free daily Le Matin Bleu merged with competitor 20 Minutes in the French speaking part of Switzerland, paid paper Le Matin saw the number of ads increase.

In the beginning also 20 Minutes profited from the closure, but as the paper increased its rates in 2010, advertising dropped. The high price of the ads in 20 Minutes also made some advertisers move over to the paid title.

A third reason for the increased ad revenue of Le Matin is the fact that the paper now sells its own ads, instead of selling through Publicitas. (Persoenlich)

Metro Canada will launch a 8 week nationwide brand awareness campaign in October of this year. The campaign will have a budget of Can $ 2.9 million (€2.2 million).

The paper is read by 1.3 million Canadians daily, according to NADbank 2009 statistics. (MarketingMag)

The paper celebrated its tenth anniversary two weeks ago; it was launched in Toronto on June 29, 2000. There are now seven editions with a total circulation of 800,000.

Usually Metro Holland only publishes on weekdays (and in ‘green’), but as Holland plays Spain in the Worldcup finals this Sunday, the paper distributed a special (orange) Saturday edition with a circulation of 400,000.

The front page and back pages were sponsored by mobile telecom provider Lyca (click on picture for better view). Also Heineken, ING bank, Clinique and the Duisenberg School of Finance had a page of special ‘Orange’ advertising.

Metro New York has launched a 40,000-circulation edition on Thursdays for Queens.

Local advertisers can in that way have an ad in Metro at lower rates.

Full story at free-daily.com. (also source for picture)

Metro is operated as a franchise in the USA.

Toronto free evening newspaper t.o.night started an advertising campaign on radio, TV and billboards. The TV ads and billboards (see below) can also be viewed in action on the t.o.night website.

The Polish Metro (by Agora) received an INMA (News Media Marketing Association) award for their one-time German language Berlin edition (see previous post).

The first prize was awarded on April 28 in the “Marketing Solutions for Advertising Clients” category.

The goal of the issue, published in September 2009, was to acquaint the Germans with Polish culture and most interesting tourist spots and encourage them to visit Poland more often.

Metro UK (Associated Newspapers) will distribute an 8-page glossy gatefold in 200,000 copies of its London edition. The issue promotes the new ITV1 HD Channel.

Everyday 50,000 copies of the glossy gatefold will inserted into Metro from 19 to 22 April at different London stations this week. (Marketing Week)

To promote the new Playboy issue, the Dutch edition of Metro this morning was handed out by female distributors, dressed as Playboy bunnies.

The Amsterdam Metro edition had a full page ad for the new Playboy on the back cover and an interview with the Playmate of the month inside.

(sorry for the bad quality of the picture, but with this kind of light, the mobile phone cannot do better than this.)