Everywhere I now go in Addis, our readers compliment us for our partnership with the Financial Times. I notice there is a particular sense of pride in them, for seeing a local brand of theirs that has managed to strike a partnership with such a reputable international brand, that is the FT.
Managing Editor, Addis Fortune
Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, is named ‘the political and diplomatic capital of Africa’. It hosts 92 embassies, two diplomatic missions, and headquarters of the African Union and United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA). It is also the only African capital to have accreditation to the AU bilateral agreement.
As a result, investment in business is strengthening and Addis Ababa is becoming home to an expanding number of affluent international expats.
Serving the East African business community
Addis Fortune is a widely recognised English-language newspaper in Ethiopia. For the past 15 years it has been serving the local business community with reliable, responsible reporting to promote development in Ethiopia, and economic integration regionally.
However as the region continues to prosper, so does the demand from local readers for more quality international content they can rely on to guide their business interests.
Tamrat Giorgis, Managing Editor of Addis Fortune acknowledges that meeting this request is challenging. He says “We are often confronted by our local readers who are dissatisfied with the limited content we provide weekly. The reality is that we can only do as much as we can with the resources we have at our disposal.”
He goes on to say, “We are a newspaper operating in a country where human capital that is competent reporting in the global media industry hardly exists. With painful limitations in our ability to produce in-house content to an ever increasing and demanding readership, finding high value content is very crucial.”
So in 2014, Addis Fortune turned to the Financial Times for help. Over 100 media organisations worldwide benefit from becoming a Financial Times Syndication partner. They supplement their own editorial with a broad selection of award-winning news, special reports, commentary and videos, to satisfy the growing demand from readers for relevant and engaging content from around the world.
The FT also offers a range of branding opportunities, licences to distribute via multiple channels, and rights to translate content into languages other than English.
Meeting local audience needs
For Addis Fortune, the value of republishing the FT’s journalism is clear.
By including a selection of the FT’s global news and business articles on its website and in its weekly print edition, it now offers a more robust level of highly sought-after content to meet its local audiences’ needs.
An additional benefit is the appeal drawn from a new readership base of international expats residing in Addis Ababa, which has caused overall demand for print copies to increase more than 20%.
When asked about how Addis Fortune now rivals against its competitors, Tamrat Giorgis confirms “That is where FT republishing comes handy. Two months after we launched the syndication of FT content, the response from our readers has been simply overwhelming.”
He goes on to say, “We witnessed the immediate dividend from the FT due to our vendors urging us to increase our circulation of copies. The increased level in demand was causing them to run short of printed copies out in the market. So true, we were quickly required to increase our printed circulation more than 20%.”
Besides the financial benefits of increased circulation, Tamrat Giorgis has witnessed how partnering with the FT is giving locals a new sense of success.
He concludes by saying, “Everywhere I now go in Addis, our readers compliment us for our partnership with the Financial Times. I notice there is a particular sense of pride in them, for seeing a local brand of theirs that has managed to strike a partnership with such a reputable international brand, that is the FT.”
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