Frequency of Reading.

A loyal average issue readership of 48% of adults (82,000) is increased over the course of a week to over 68% of adults or 116,000 adults who will read a copy of the Evening Chronicle during a typical week. A 40% larger potential market for regular advertisers.

Quality of Reading.

The average reader spends an average time of 32 minutes reading the Evening Chronicle.

Two thirds (54,000) of Evening Chronicle readers read all/most of the general editorial and news pages and five out of six (68,000) read half or more — an indication of our readers strong links and interest in their community.

News about the reader's immediate area (91%)and news about Oldham (89%) are the two most important topics to our readers.

These are closely followed by what's on/entertainment information 73%, public notices 71%, crime reports 70%, job ads 64%, births, marriages and deaths 55%, school news 52%, local politics 51%, property advertisements 49% and sport 43%.

The level of satisfaction with the Evening Chronicle coverage of these topics amongst readers is overwhelming, with a figure of 94% satisfaction being recorded in one instance and figures in the high eighties to early nineties for our coverage of a majority of topics.

Advertising Results.

The Evening Chronicle is the preferred local media for three key criteria for both editorial and advertising purposes, local news, most useful and most trusted media.

When thinking about major buying decisions the people of Oldham refer to the Evening Chronicle first for information on buying property, second - hand cars, major purchases, (furniture, electrical goods etc.) home services, leisure/entertainment and jobs.

The overall results of the survey prove the confidence and trust that our readers have in our newspaper. These are important factors when advertisers are making decisions about spending their own advertising budgets.

If you are interested in further details of the readership survey's findings, or advertising in our newspaper and web-site, contact our Advertising Manager Jim Whittingham on 0161 633 2121 or by e-mail.

CHRONICLE FUTURE.

One of the key elements in the decision to launch this web-site, can be traced back to the findings of our readership survey.

A section of the questionnaire was devoted to our readers attitude to and access to personal computers and the Internet.

Throughout the population of Oldham as a whole, 20,000 people have access to a PC at work, 27,000 people have access at home and 16,000 have access at both home and work.

About 8,000 adults had accessed the internet during the seven days before being interviewed.

We felt that these figures, which will have increased dramatically since the survey was carried out in mid -1998 were justification to launch our own site for our immediate and long-term benefit.

Along with an overwhelming number of newspaper publishers, we are firmly committed to the joint benefits of electronic and traditional newspapers being the way forward for the industry in the new millennium.