Pearse Doherty (Donegal South West, Sinn Fein)
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80. To ask the Minister for Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation the amount spent by his Department, since March 2011, on advertising its Action Plan for Jobs; and if he will provide, in tabular form, the detail of this expenditure, listing each place it was advertised and the cost. [17951/15]

Richard Bruton (Dublin North Central, Fine Gael)
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The Department does not advertise its annual Action Plan for Jobs, the first one of which was launched in February 2012, and each year since.

This year, in response to a well-recognised demand for more information on Government supports for SMEs, the Department decided to run an awareness campaign to address this deficit. Following a tender process in the Official Journal of the European Union, a successful tender was identified. This awareness campaign uses the web address as a landing page for those interested in using the Government's online SME tool which helps explain what supports one might qualify for. The campaign uses business representative groups like SFA, ISME and Chambers Ireland, as well as experienced and young entrepreneurs in the advertising to raise awareness of the supports available.

A total budget of €250,000 plus VAT for the awareness campaign has been provided for within the Department's existing resources. To date, €88,450 has been paid with both digital and radio advertisement selected as best value for money. Ads have, to date, been run on RTE Radio, Today FM, Newstalk, Media Central, Independent Digital, Irish Times web and RTE Online.

In the first three week phase of the campaign, almost 12,000 people visited the website and the numbers using the online SME tool doubled.