Italy: Gazzetta dello Sport bucks circulation trends in 2007

Posted by Jean Yves Chainon on January 29, 2008 at 2:47 PM

In an email sent by deputy editor Gianni Valenti, he says “it’s been an extraordinary year for the La Gazzetta dello Sport”, the Italian pink-colored sports newspaper. The paper grew its year-on-year circulation by 0.44%, and as much as 5.8% for circulation in November 2007 compared to 2006 (see graphic), thanks to a successful transition towards more general news coverage.

This is significant success considering the structural crisis of daily newspapers in Italy.

The figures are even more positive if one considers that Italian readership was very high in 2006, in the wake of Italy’s victory in the football World Cup.

According to Valenti, this success is due in great part to La Gazzetta’s emphasis on describing ‘Other Worlds,’ a strategy that expanded coverage of news, trends and entertainment, while maintaining the paper centered on sports.

“In other words, the daily sports newspaper has extended to cover general information. But in a different way with the main aim of explaining, of making even the most complicated things simple – and with a very young angle.”

Traffic to the site has grown by nearly 50% between 2006 and 2007. Thanks to live coverage of events, series of video and films, and through forums and discussion boards, Gazzetta.it received 2.1 billion page views in 2007 (compared to 1.35 billion page views the previous year).

Source: Gianni Valenti, deputy editor La Gazzetta dello Sport