The hottest-selling newspaper in Spanish-speaking world

A tabloid called Trome, with attention-getter headlines on the cover and enter-to-win prizes inside sells nearly 700,000 copies daily, according to a blog post on SmartPlanet.com. These sales are more than any of the papers sold by Trome’s parent, Grupo El Comercio, including the company’s flagship daily of the same name. The sales are also higher than Argentina’s top-selling Clarin, Mexico’s popular La Prensa, and significantly higher than Spain’s El País.

While the newspaper industry is battling through tough times with decreased circulation across the US and other developed countries, Trome records its highest sales because the newspaper speaks to Peruvians in the ‘C level’, referring to an aspiring middle-class on a scale of A to E in their language.

Furthermore, Trome addresses the aspirations of the upwardly mobile: Car dealerships promote easy financing, banks use prizes to lure a largely unbanked population to open checking accounts, schools advertise education for technical careers, etc. Popular segments include an advice column from a waitress, a character called “La Seño Maria.” The paper doesn’t show as much gore, or display as much skin, as other tabloids in the category.

The tabloid hooks readers with weekly prizes, scholarships, and other promotions. It is truly an effective combination of content, which includes news, entertainment, and lot of useful and emotional content mix. PwC projects newspaper circulation in Latin America will grow 10 percent through 2016 and is projected to grow the same in Asia Pacific markets. In Peru, total newspaper circulation rose to nearly 1.9 million in 2012 from 1.2 million in 2007, according to the Society of Journalism Businesses of Peru, or SEPP. Although there is a decline expected in the developed economies belonging to world’s top 10 newspaper markets: Italy, UK, Germany, South Korea, and Japan will see a contraction of up to 2.5 percent through 2017, and the US could face the worst retreat of more than 2.5 percent.

PwC says a core group of eight markets – China, Brazil, India, Russia, the Middle East and North Africa, Mexico, Indonesia, and Argentina – will make up 22 percent of total global entertainment and media revenue in 2017, up from 12 percent in 2008.

By: Savita V Jayaram