Among the conditions for official announcements these are the most concretely measurable: how many news items you publish a day, and how many people come to your site. Both are tied to numerical thresholds that vary by category, and both are tracked not by estimate but with the Agency’s own measurement tool. This guide answers five questions with the article numbers of the Regulation on Official Announcements and Advertisements.
How many news items a day?
For online news sites Article 60 sets a minimum daily news count category by category.
| Category | Minimum news items per day |
|---|---|
| General Category | 120 |
| 1st Category | 50 |
| 2nd Category | 40 |
| 3rd Category | 25 |
| 4th Category | 20 |
| 5th Category | 15 |
The gap is striking: the General Category requires eight times the content of the 5th. The price of a nationwide quota location shows here too — 120 items a day alongside a roster of 32.
The second paragraph of the same article also intervenes in the form of the content: news items and columns must carry date and time information. The date and time at which a piece was first made available, together with subsequent update information, must be stated on the content in a way that does not change on each access. That provision looks in the same direction as the date-stamp obligation in Article 4 of Law No. 5187; a single technical arrangement satisfying both is enough.
How many items a month?
The Regulation sets no monthly content threshold; the threshold is daily. A monthly figure is derived from it: the daily number set for your category multiplied by the number of days in the month. In the 4th Category, for instance, 20 items a day is 600 items in a 30-day month.
The number alone is not enough
Article 23 also regulates the quality of the content. The principal requirements are:
- All text other than private announcements and advertising must be published in Turkish (content in other languages is permitted provided a Turkish translation exists)
- The content must be original and current, and concern political, economic, cultural, artistic, scientific, technological, social, entertainment and sporting subjects relating to the place of publication or quota location and its surroundings
- Service content such as broadcast schedules, duty pharmacies, economic tables and weather must be up to date; content such as crosswords and horoscopes must not be repeated
- Images must be relevant and proportionate to the news text
- Headlines must not distort the content, mislead, or create a contradiction with it
- Two thirds of a newspaper’s surface area, and the daily news count of an online news site, must consist of content of that quality
The item most often overlooked in that article is this: at least one sixth of the content must consist of news produced by the editorial staff shown on the roster, and those employing columnists must publish those columnists’ pieces on social subjects at least once every seven days. Filling the count with agency copy is therefore not enough; a defined proportion of the content must be your own newsroom’s work.
How much visitor traffic?
Article 61 sets two separate thresholds: unique visitors and page views. Both are daily and both must be met together.
| Category | Daily unique visitors | Daily page views |
|---|---|---|
| General Category | 250,000 | 750,000 |
| 1st Category | 25,000 | 75,000 |
| 2nd Category | 15,000 | 45,000 |
| 3rd Category | 10,000 | 30,000 |
| 4th Category | 5,000 | 15,000 |
| 5th Category | 1,500 | 4,500 |
The ratio in the table is constant across categories: page views are three times unique visitors. An average of three pages per visitor is therefore the target; traffic that reads one page and leaves will fall short on page views even if it meets the unique-visitor threshold.
The article adds three further conditions: at least 10% of the unique-visitor figures must consist of direct visitors, according to category and indicators; the daily average time on page must be at least 30 seconds in the 1st to 5th Categories and at least one minute in the General Category; and domestic traffic is what counts, with 10% of foreign-sourced traffic included for the General Category.
Read together, those three make the purpose clear: purchased or redirect-inflated traffic is of no use. The direct-visitor share measures brand recognition and the time on page measures whether the content is actually read.
How is traffic measured?
Measurement is not done with your own analytics tool but with the Agency’s. Under Article 61(6) online news sites are obliged to use BİK Analitik and to take the measures necessary for it to function.
The measurement itself is also audited. Under paragraph eight, the conformity of BİK Analitik’s measurement operations with the article is audited at least once every three years, at the Agency’s request, in accordance with the Turkish Auditing Standards, through an organisation determined by the Board of Directors from among independent audit organisations authorised by the Public Oversight Authority, and a report is submitted to the Agency.
What if fake traffic is found?
Article 63 deals with this under the heading of serious violation and keeps the scope wide. No traffic manipulation may be carried out by deliberate and fraudulent conduct or transactions, by any method known or to be developed in the future, aimed at obstructing, disrupting or rendering ineffective, in whole or in part, the Agency’s duty to distribute official announcements equally to periodicals meeting defined qualifications and conditions, or at unlawfully affecting announcement distribution quotas.
The third paragraph makes the sanction heavier: online news sites found to have engaged in deliberate and fraudulent conduct may not request the publication of official announcements with the same domain name or the same concession holder for two years from the date of notification of the decision terminating the right to publish.
What to do in the event of a cyber attack
Manipulation is not always the site’s own act. The second paragraph addresses that possibility: online news sites are obliged to notify the Information and Communication Technologies Authority in writing, immediately from the moment it occurs, of any situation giving the impression that manipulation has been carried out through cyber attacks by others, and to take the necessary technical measures. The Agency’s branch directorates must also be informed of the situation and of the measures taken without delay so that they can take precautions.
Conclusion
The content and traffic conditions are daily, not monthly; a missed day cannot be made up by a bulk upload. The news count rises from 15 a day in the 5th Category to 120 in the General. Two traffic thresholds are required together — unique visitors and three times that in page views — with a direct-traffic share (10%), a time on page (30 seconds, one minute in the General Category) and a domestic-source condition on top.
Staffing is covered in the minimum roster guide and the waiting period in the waiting period guide.