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As reported in a WSJ article this week, Many Major Newspapers Post Circulation Declines, most of the top 10 newspapers posted lower newspaper circulations....
The most surprising one was the San Francisco Chronicle, that saw a decline of almost 16% which dropped them out of the top 10. The reason, according to the article, was not defections to the Internet. Wait, stop the presses - not the Internet? Nope. According to Patricia Hoyt, a Chronicle spokesperson, the newspaper stopped giving free weekday copies away to people who subscribed on the weekends and it cut back on sponsored copies.
Interesting isn't it? You see, I always battled with my marketing counterparts about spending any money on print advertising. In fact, I think I had myself thrown out of a few planning meetings because I was the guy that hated advertising in newspapers. My argument went something like this:
* It is static
* Mostly black and white
* No shelf life
* No sound
* No way to track results
* It is expensive
* When was the last time you (the marketer) responded to a print ad
* And in 8 years of managing online advertising campaigns, I have NEVER SEEN any impact on online results
That's right, true believers. I've never seen any print campaign impact my online results. I looked for visits on the Web site, logins to an account, trade volume, assets under management, click-thru rate, conversions into sales, sales per day, and EVERYTHING ELSE and never found one shred of evidence.
Now surprise, the newspapers are cutting back free subscriptions that inflated readership and allowed them to get more ad dollars. Look, you have to ask yourself why spend any money on newspaper advertising. Wouldn't you be better off running online ads on the digital versions of the newspapers? At least the ads would be pretty, trackable, and more cost-effective.
PardonMyFrench,
Eric
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Comments
Good issue to raise, Eric. Whether it is acknowledged by the nation's leading newspapers or not, most Americans get their news online and on cable all day long. Let's face it when newspapers like the NY Times have scandals like the Jayson Blair incident and the Judith Miller incident, it does little to cultivate an image of reliability and trustworthiness with the public. Also: many of our leading papers (New York, L.A., Washington, etc) have become so blatantly biased and so liberal, the spin they put on the day's events have many of us looking to other sources to get a more balanced view of the world. Until or unless they clean up their acts, newspapers are losing more and more relevancy every day!
Posted by: Claire Ratushny | 05.15.06
Thanks Claire and you raise a good point regarding bias. With greater use of the internet people have more choices for evaluating the news they receive. Every author puts their own spin on the news, so the best way to be informed is to read many different versions.
Eric
Posted by: Eric Frenchman | 05.15.06
Well there are also magazines which are colorfull and can be very targeted. I would also ask who is your target group, if you never saw print resulting in your online perormance. May be it is a younger internet savvy crowd? How about if you work in B2B do you think advertising in a relevant B2B magazine will help to make people aware of your website? Or if you target older crowd?
Posted by: Mr.R.-Roman | 05.15.06
Good questions Mr. R-Roman. I actually never had issues with magazine spending as long as it didn't take away from my online ads dollars. Plus, magazines have a shelf life.
Most of the advertising results I was referring to were for online brokerage customers and they typically are older. And, as you may have guessed were for B2C marketing.
Eric
Posted by: Eric Frenchman | 05.15.06