With spring 2018 already underway, let's look at how Daily Sabah did in March in its most read categories. Although these articles are usually published at the end of the month, the lack of space on last week's Readers Corner page postponed it to this week. On the other hand, the total number of articles in consideration is higher due to having five weeks' worth of top 10 lists instead of the usual four. Let's see if the higher count affected the number of categories in the running.
With the aftermath of Turkey's military operation in Afrin, the category Politics not only remained in first place, but also increased its ratio over other categories. With 25 news items, it matches the number of all other categories on the list combined. Only five of those articles were without a subcategory, while War on Terror clearly dominated the month with an impressive 13 news articles. Diplomacy followed with quite a gap - six entries, while EU Affairs only had a single news article in the top 10.
Second place belongs to Turkey - quite a leap compared to last month's fourth place, due to its eight entries. Although there were some new names, articles in subcategories were not represented all that much with Investigations, Ankara and İstanbul having a single entry apiece. The remaining five news articles were listed solely under Turkey.
In third is World, as it protected its standing from March. Its six entries had a subcategory as well. Europe and Middle East each had two entries, while Africa and Americas divided the remaining two among themselves.
Although Columns maintained its number of articles, its placement went down a bit. Nevertheless, its five entries are still impressive and second only to last month if you look at the past couple of months. Two of those articles belonged to Yahya Bostan, while İbrahim Kalın, İlnur Çevik and Ragıp Soylu each had a single article to their name.
Even though the Business category was lower both in ranking and number of entries, it still managed to show the flag thanks to three articles, and all of them had a subcategory as well. While the Energy subcategory had a single article, Defense got the remaining two entries.
Life was also present last month with two articles, and unsurprisingly, both of them belonged to the subcategory History, making it one of the most consistent presences in these monthly analyses.
After its reemergence in February, Opinion seems to be here to stay, and with its single Op-Ed piece, it did just that. Hopefully we will see the start of a trend here.
March shared many characteristics of February when it comes to reader preferences and top 10 lists. Politics and its subcategories of War on Terror and Opinion made a strong showing due to a culmination of daily developments in the region. And it seems that April might be more of the same, but we will see.