News media advertisements are the most trusted

During the COVID-19 pandemic, Canadians have been starved for trusted news that they can rely on, and many have been turning to news media brands.

New data from Totum Research shows that one in four Canadians believe that newspapers have trustworthy information about the pandemic. Adding onto that, 33% have started reading more newspaper content since the start of the pandemic, and 43% intend to read as much after COVID-19 ends.

Along with content, ads in printed newspapers continue to be trusted more than any other traditional or digital format. More than half (52%) of Canadians trust ads in printed newspapers, exceeding TV programs (44%), radio programs (44%), and magazines (38%). For ads in digital formats, newspaper websites are once again shown to be the most trusted (39%), compared to TV websites (35%), radio websites (36%) and social networks, scoring the lowest at 21%.