Metro struggles with its online content

Is it not rather ironic that Metro International announces that it will not breakeven in 2008 and its third quarter results show losses 69% bigger.

And it's all down to its online operations.

Paid content reports that

So strong in print, Metro International seems unable to find a coherent online money-making proposition and so far this year has lost a total €3.97 million (£3.08 million) from its seven websites in Sweden, the Netherlands, Denmark, Hungary, Chile, France and Spain. We now can’t rule out site closures: Metro says it’s “actively engaged in a strategic review of its websites to ensure that the product continues to deliver growth

It's web traffic has seen rises but it is unbale to,in its own words

to exploit the sales opportunities for online at a lower cost”.

As Roy Greenslade points out though,

Karen Wall, assistant managing director of Metro in the UK, focussed on good old print, arguing that the free newspaper model was growing