Mumbai: Indians seeking the latest on the UK’s vote to leave the European Union have helped BBC.com reach a record breaking spike in traffic. On the day the historic result became clear– June 24th, the BBC’s international news services were in demand as people around the world sought to understand what the next steps are and what it could mean for them.
Operating a dedicated url during the campaign at bbc.com/eureferendum and following up with bbc.com/brexit to bring audiences updates after the result, meant the global news platform has been able to provide a continuing wealth of content drawing on the BBC’s network of experienced correspondents particularly across politics, business and finance (such as EU referendum: Will India benefit from Brexit? and UK starts post-Brexit trade talks with India)
Globally BBC.com attracted more than 21million unique browsers and 114million page views on results day (Friday 24th June) alone – with 30million unique browsers and 170million page views across the weekend*.
In India alone, unique browsers increased by 170% with page views going up by 324%, when compared to the average daily amount in May 2016*. Page views per browser stood at 3.9 on the day of the result which was +56% compared to average daily figure in May 2016*. Even after the initial furore around the result had died down in India the daily average of unique browsers and page views was still 44% and 43% more respectively after 72hours, than the average daily traffic for May*.
Speaking about the spike in traffic, BBC Global News Ltd COO Naveen Jhunjhunwala said, “These record figures are testament to the effort of the BBC World News teams, as they have worked tirelessly to help our global audiences make sense of this historic and fast paced story. That so many people, not just in India but around the world, made BBC.com their go to place for impartial trusted, information and analysis on the decision by UK voters to leave the European Union is incredibly heartening.”
BBC World News and BBC.com, the BBC’s commercially funded international 24-hour English news platforms, are owned and operated by BBC Global News Ltd. BBC Advertising sells advertising and sponsorship solutions on behalf of the BBC’s worldwide commercial portfolio across broadcast, online and mobile platforms globally.
