I recently had a person tell me he stayed away from newspaper advertising because “This indicates newspapers are on a downward slide and don’t get viewed like they used too.” Ouch!
As someone in the business, that was tough to hear. Luckily, my friends, that isn’t a precise assessment. Newspapers remain an electric house in advertising. Not to say that internet marketing and other technologically driven marketing hasn’t changed just how we spend our advertising budget. However, many marketing plans are seriously lacking by leaving out newspaper advertising all together.
With hundreds of television channels, tens and thousands of magazines and an incredible number of sites, channel proliferation has definitely changed just how advertisements are presented. With the endless number of “opt-out” solutions to viewers, including, DVRs, commercial-free satellite radio, pool result national “do not call” lists, web firewalls and blockers, etc., getting the advertisements viewed has turned into a bigger challenge than ever before. Newspapers however remain an “opt in” medium, a place where consumers actively seek out advertisements as opposed to avoid them. Newspaper advertising remains a destination not a distraction. In fact, newspapers were the final place consumers would choose to get rid of advertising, according to Yankelovich Research, 2004.
In accordance with NAA’s (Newspaper Associate of America) Business Analysis & Research Department, 48% of adults read a newspaper on the average weekday. That number increases to 54% on the average Sunday. In fact in a MORI study of “How America Shops & Spends,” newspaper ads ranked highest as the kind of ad that consumers anticipate reading. When is the final time you heard someone claim that in regards to a Pop-Up ad?
Not merely do consumers actively search for and anticipate ads in the newspaper, they actually trust them more. Due to the established history of newspapers, people have a tendency to trust newspapers a lot more than any advertising medium. Gaining the trust of a newspapers’ audience can produce awesome results, especially given the quality of the audience.
No other media can deliver the prospects that a newspaper can. Newspaper readership increases as both household income and education levels increase. In accordance with Scarborough Research, 2007 Release 2 (Top 50 Market Report), newspaper readership is greatest in occupations with more job responsibility, such as for example Management, Business, and Financial Operations.
Newspapers provide experience of people that advertisers want to achieve; individuals with higher incomes, higher education and those who are ready to buy. Newspapers are constantly impacting buying decisions and product usage. They’ve proved to remain steady in a changing world, and have earned their status while the premier medium for advertisers.