City AM Joins Online Readership Survey

City AM, the morning business freesheet, has signed a 12 month contract with iCD Research for its online readership tracking survey, which covers the London and national newspaper markets.

City AM is the first title to join the survey, which is conducted entirely online and looks at free and paid for titles.

The business freesheet does not currently take part in the National Readership Survey.

The latest ABC figures, for June 2007, show that City AM had a total of almost 100,500 copies, down by around 600 copies month on month (see thelondonpaper Increases Lead Over London Lite).

The NRS has been intending to release figures for the two afternoon freesheets, thelondonpaper and the London Lite, last month, however, this has now been delayed until the June data release in September (see NRS Postpones Freesheet Figures).

Roger Pratt, managing director of the NRS, said of the delay: “The decision was taken because on close inspection of the data it was concluded that the estimates for both papers for the period December 2006 – May 2007 are at the moment based on an insufficiently complete sample as they cannot include responses to the self-completion questionnaire (SCQ).”

The iCD Readership Tracking survey provides customers with quarterly reports, enabling them to view long-term trends.

According to reports, iCD Research has also approached thelondonpaper and London Lite about inclusion in the survey.

Jens Torpe, CEO of City AM, said: “The strong audience access and high quality reporting make the Tracking Survey ideal for monitoring our reader volume and distribution as we continue to experience consistent growth.

“The survey will help us to ensure City AM‘s strategy of remaining the top free business daily for the City is continually achieved.”

iCD Research: www.icd-research.com