Mail Online aims to increase profits through display ads

"Display advertising in itself is about delivering eyeballs, and we've always believed that if you get the eyeballs then you can sell the inventory," Peter Williams, finance director at DMGT, told MediaWeek. "It is important to remember online does not require anything like the same [advertising] yields as the [print] newspaper does."

Along with traditional display advertising, the services such as Money Mail and increase in sponsored links on specific sections of the news site have begun to generate significant revenue as well.

The DMGT group saw an overall increase from the division's "pure play digital activities" by 16 percent that include an increase in display advertising by 15 percent, retail display advertising by 19 percent and digital advertising by 46 percent, along with a 3 percent decrease in classified advertising, MediaGuardian reported. The company said it had performed beyond its expectations in the quarter, with an increase in total underlying group revenue from its consumer and business-to-business operations by 6 percent year-on-year to £508 million for the period.

"Our significant exposure to non-UK markets leaves us well positioned to continue to deliver profitable organic growth over the longer term," Martin Morgan, chief executive of DMGT, told MediaGuardian.

By incorporating content from both The Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday, and by focusing on showbiz and celebrity news, the ad-supported news site is the only UK website to have exceeded 40 million unique visitors in the monthly ABC audit. Since relaunching after revamp of its operations in 2008, the website has been emphasising user-generated content and video, with plans for editorial content expansion as well.