European Media Freedom Act (EMFA)

We are committed to ensuring that advertising buying decisions made by the Department of Culture, Communications and Sport are based on transparent, objective, proportionate and non-discriminatory criteria.

The procedures we have in place to support this are:

• Advertising campaigns are planned based on a strategic brief that identifies the communication goals we want to achieve and the audiences we are seeking to reach.
• We work closely with a specialist media planning and buying agency to determine appropriate advertising channels and spend to meet our goals and reach our audiences, subject to the budget and resources available.
• Key performance indicators are set for each campaign based on the campaign’s objectives and requirements and we report against these indicators to support future advertising decisions.

The criteria that we take into consideration in awarding advertising are:

• Media consumption data and ability to reach target audiences
• Value for money
• Appropriate geographical spread
• Statutory requirements in relation to public notices
• Statutory requirements in relation to Irish language advertising

We seek to ensure that, where possible, our overall expenditure on advertising is distributed to a wide variety of media, depending on the specific requirements of each campaign.