The Post Publishing Public Company Limited

Our newspaper businesses

Major achievement in 2011 and outlook for 2012

Despite the heavy flooding that stalled the economy in the last quarter of 2011, the year was one of continued growth for our newspapers’ operating performances. From the low point in 2009 when the media and advertising sector was beset by the negative political and economic situation, our newspaper titles Bangkok Post, Post Today, Student Weekly recovered strongly in terms of both advertising and publication sales revenue in 2010 and this trend continued at a faster pace in the first nine months of 2011. Again, despite the flooding, our newspapers in 2011 still managed to show revenue growth over 2010.

Bangkok Post continued to maintain its position as the leader in the English language newspaper segment, both in terms of publication sales and readership. The Bangkok Post continues to strongly dominate the English language advertising market and also showed growth over 2011 in terms revenue, new clients and new advertising sectors. This has been achieved through the continued trust readers and advertisers have given to Bangkok Post for our news content and presentation, our premium readership group who represents Thailand’s highest income earners and the continuous pipeline of special publications and events to allow advertisers more opportunities to reach our readership group.

2011 saw the launch of the revamped features sections into one daily features section for Monday to Friday. Named “Life”, this news section was launched in January 2011. Since launch, the new section has received positive feedback from both readers and advertisers. Now readers can enjoy features and articles on travel, automobiles, information technology, entertainment, dining and the special features produced by our renowned feature writers everyday.

Post Today further cemented its position as the leading Thai business and economic newspaper in 2011. An indication of the successful positioning the newspaper has achieved as it entered its 9th year in 2011 has been its market share in terms of readers, advertising revenue growth and, most importantly, its establishment as a leading authority on economic, business and political news. Post Today also launched a monthly magazine special publication “Smart Finance” to offer personal financial advice information, investment news and features on luxury products to our readers. This new section has also attracted new advertising clients in sectors previously absent in Post Today, including personal banking services, insurance and wealth management as well as automobiles and luxury products.

Post Today has been successful in establishing its position in the growing sectors of the Thai economy. As well as being the leading advertising vehicle to reach Thailand’s management professionals whose interest in business and economic news continues to grow, Post Today, through its new content and sections, has expanded to also become the media for Thailand’s small to medium size business owners. Most recently, through its in depth coverage of government financial, economic and social policies, Post Today has also gained a strong readership base among government and public agencies. This has allowed the newspaper to become the leading recipient of banking, financial, state enterprise and government agency advertising in the business newspaper market.

Our daily newspapers, Bangkok Post and Post Today, and our weekly English language newspaper for students, Student Weekly, have strong leading positions in their respective markets and 2011 saw further strengthening of these positions. In order to continue to expand and reach new readership and advertising groups, in October 2011 Post Publishing launched M2F, a freedistributed Thai language newspaper in Bangkok. The fast-expanding Bangkok urban professional population combined with its fast-changing lifestyle and increasing sophistication make this group a key target for mass and consumer products advertising. This group of 2.5 million professionals are used to free information available online and are not current buyers of newspapers.

M2F – standing for Monday to Friday – is a compact size newspaper produced and distributed five days per week through over 250 distribution points in central Bangkok. Key distribution points include BTS SkyTrain and MRTA Subway stations, major offices, other mass transit junctions and destinations, shopping malls and selected attraction spots for this target group. With a daily audited print run of 400,000 copies, M2F is the largest newspaper in Bangkok. The 24-page newspaper offers readers a fast and concise roundup of news – human interest, international, general, entertainment, sports, politics, economics – interesting and relevant to modern urban professionals. The newspaper also provides a working and lifestyle section that caters to information needs on eating and dining, travel, office life, careers and jobs, and fashion. In addition, everyday readers can update the latest news, gossip and information on celebrities and stars from the Thai and international entertainment industry.

Since its launch, M2F has received higher and faster than expected positive results in readership, content satisfaction and reader feedback on advertising and promotions. Hong Kong ABC has been engaged to audit and verify the printing and distribution of the daily 400,000 copies, using internationally accepted audit methodology for auditing free newspapers. The first audited result will be announced in May 2012 and this will further strengthened M2F’s positioning for advertisers wanting to reach this desirable readership group. Post Publishing, through M2F, will be able to expand into this new mass market for readers and advertising which our previously-existing publications did not target. M2F will be the fastest-growing revenue contributor for the group in 2012 and a major contributor to group profits over the next five years.

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