TNS Media Intelligence confirms its leading position in European News Monitoring by acquiring MediaMarket in the Republic of Ireland! 11.01.2008

MediaMarket scoops four awards! 22.11.2007

MediaMarket win top media monitoring contract! 20.11.2007

Political Analysis Highlights Media Influence 29.05.2007

MediaMarket Expands into Northern Ireland 19.01.2007

Media Market wins two gold awards at International Analysis Ceremony 22.11.2006

Media Market Launches Q Brand Media Analysis Report 10.05.2006

Ireland Brand 'Severely Damaged' in 'Rip Off' Media Analysis 23.04.2006

PR Conference Set to Analyse 'Best Practice in Changing Times' 04.04.2006

Media Market Secures AMEC Accreditation 10.04.2005

Annual PR Conference Set to Scrutinise 'Delivering Value' 01.04.2005

Smoking Ban Media Coverage Shows 29.04.2003


Political Analysis Highlights Media Influence
29.05.2007

MediaMarket, the Irish based media intelligence company, has published research around the political campaigns for each major party in the Irish election, relating to media performance over the last nine months and on the day before the voting polls opened, 23rd May 2007.

Results show that it was the Green Party and Fine Gael that produced the most positive media performance, in the national papers on Wednesday 23rd May, to sway the floating voter. Also, its findings for the last nine months found that the PD’s had been ‘punching above their weight’ in terms of Share of Voice (SoV), based on a prominent position in the media by its former leader Michael McDowell.

Media analysts at the company have been tracking each major political party from September 2006, comparing the share of editorial ink within the Irish press media. Every mention of the six parties and their leaders has been measured to establish who was garnering the most column inches up to, and during, the election campaigning. The company also carried out a qualitative analysis of the National daily papers published 24 hours before voting stations opened to establish which parties were conveying the most positive messages to persuade the undecided voter.

The Key findings from the report show:

  • The Greens and Fine Gael finished the election on a high in the national press securing the highest Media Performance Index of all six parties with 55/100 and 45/100 respectively

  • Sinn Fein and the PD’s registered the lowest Media Performance Index with 20/100 and 24/100

  • The Irish Independent and Irish Times came down on the side of Fine Gael when reporting on the issues in the days coverage – Fine Gael registered the most positive number of articles for the party in both publications

  • The PD’s had been ‘punching above their weight’ in terms of Share of Voice over the last nine month period. Sinn Fein also showed similar trending

  • Sinn Fein and the Green Party showed the largest increase in column inches in the nine months to election, eating into Fianna Fail’s leading SoV in the press

  • Michael McDowell garnered an extremely strong leadership Share of Voice for the period of January to May ’07, on par with Enda Kenny. Though it was Pat Rabbitte and Enda Kenny that most improved their position in the five-month lead up to the election.

Swaying the Floating Voter:

MediaMarket’s qualitative analysis of the national press published on the final day of campaigning showed that the current Government parties struggled to gain favour with print journalists. MediaMarket’s Media Performance Index showed poor results for Fianna Fail and the PD’s.


Head of Client Services at MediaMarket, Dan Halliwell commented: “The results show a strong media performance for the opposition parties. Driving this were the issues around health and the possible Sinn Fein coalition, which both Labour and Fine Gael used to their advantage in criticising Fianna Fail.”

Influence by publication showed how different newspapers reported for the day. The Irish Times and Irish Independent delivered low positive coverage for Fianna Fail with just 14% and 4% respectively. This was in comparison to 40% positive coverage in the Irish Times and 63% positive coverage in the Irish Independent registering for Fine Gael. The Greens registered very little coverage in the two broadsheets, but what did appear was positive or neutral in tonality. Labour fared well in the tabloids registering 64% positive coverage, whilst results show that PD’s were the main party to feel the wrath of the ‘red tops’ suffering 65% negative coverage.

SoV figures for the day showed no surprises with Fianna Fail dominating the press pages with 29% of election coverage, followed closely by Fine Gael, 25%. PR value, calculated by multiples of the Advertising Value Equivalent based on media performance, shows Fine Gael’s coverage achieved the most value with €272,794 for the day.

Party Share of Voice (SoV) Vs. Poll

MediaMarket plotted the fortunes of the parties according to the Sunday Business Post Red C poll against its own media SoV measurements to establish if editorial prominence was influencing the outcome of the polls taken from September ’06 through to the third week in May 07.

Results showed that PD’s were garnering far more coverage than would be expected based on its polling position. Sinn Fein showed a similar correlation and to a much lesser extent so did Labour.

Based on MediaMarket’s overall SoV results, it was Sinn Fein and the Green Party that saw their weight of editorial coverage steadily increase in the run up to the election stealing column inches from Fianna Fail, which lost 7% SoV comparing September ‘06 against the third week in May.

Leadership Share of Voice

Leadership SoV was plotted against the Irish Times TNS/MRBI leadership satisfaction poll. The findings show little correlation except that Bertie Ahern is conformed as leading both analyses. Michael McDowell’s performance in the leadership SoV analysis underlines the fact that the PD’s were reliant on his prominence within the media and this would indicate that he played a significant part in securing much of the publicity for his party. Enda Kenny and Pat Rabbitte both garnered an improving weight of editorial in the lead up to the election eating into the Taoiseach’s dominant Share of Voice position.

Halliwell concluded: “Overall results would point to the media playing a strong role in influencing the voter over the last nine months. We analyse the media for some of the strongest brands in the world, providing reports that help drive media campaigns and measure corporate reputation. The political arena is extremely competitive, especially around an election, and this exercise has been a strong endorsement of how powerful media evaluation and analysis can be”.