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Category: Programmatic
Hey Gannett, Why Buy More Papers?
As of this writing, it’s quite possible that Gannett has bought Tronc (a.k.a. Tribune Publishing.) As many media watchers know, Gannett has made a series of offers to Tronc this year. Based on a report from Politico Media today, the deal appears to be all but announced.
Whether you’re inside or outside the media business you may be wondering why exactly Gannett is in such a hurry to snap up Tronc, one of the country’s largest metro newspaper publishers. One thing is for sure, it’s not necessarily about publishing more print newspapers.
Newspapers and journalism have been in the midst of a great deal of industry upheaval and change for the past decade. The future of newspaper publishing isn’t about growing print circulation. Rather, the future is about digital (meaning video, really) content distribution to a valued audience of reliable news and content consumers. Metro newspaper publishers are aiming to deepen their relationships, and drive revenue, by providing their loyal news consumers with more content overall and more mobile-friendly content, to be precise.
Tronc owns the Chicago Tribune, the LA Times, the San Diego Union Tribune, the Orlando Sentinel, the South Florida Sun Sentinel and several other large metro papers. In other words Tronc has audiences in several top ten media markets. According to ComScore, Tronc’s online audience exceeds that of the Washington Post and nearly matches Disney. As you might expect, these are among the largest audiences on the web.
Gannett is already the largest newspaper publisher in the county. The purchase of Tronc, with it’s large online audiences, content distribution network and investments in video production, position Gannett to be a major player in the future of content, information and entertainment. A future that is, more or less, already here.
Post by Jim Jinks
Advertising is Dead
I’m sure on a Monday morning, at the beginning of a long week of anticipated sales and prospecting, the last thing anyone would want to read is that their industry is ”dead.” I’ll admit ”Advertising is Dead” is a strange title for a post, especially given that Mediabids is in the advertising business and our last blog post title happened to be ”6 great ads that prove print isn’t dead.” Obviously advertising isn’t dead but the way many people still think of advertising -meaning the way many of your clients still think of advertising- is very much dead. This is particularly true at the local SMB level where advertising for the purposes of reach (i.e. to get the word out or simply build awareness) is very much dead.
As we all know, digital has been disrupting the advertising business for many years now. To date, the greatest disruption has been to the newspaper and magazine business but lately the bigger story is the disruption in local TV and radio. SMBs have increasingly relied on digital advertising channels – first it was local search ads and now it’s search plus social media advertising. Why?
It’s not that fewer people can be reached by local TV and radio, quite the opposite.
It’s not that local TV and radio have lost all their considerable powers to influence an audience.
It’s not necessarily about the cost of creating TV and radio spots (although for some SMBs this may be an excuse they frequently give to media sales people.)
It’s also not even about the cost of buying local TV or radio time (although it’s not inexpensive.) If advertisers could better measure the impact of local TV and radio, the sticker price would be less of an issue. In other words, what advertisers don’t want to pay for is the unknowns.
Earlier this year, eMarketer announced that digital display ad spending would exceed search spending for the first time. In 2016, digital display ad spending is projected to increase 23% while search spending would grow another 10% this year. The reasons for the growth in digital display are several: the improvement in the user-experience online (or UX as the fancy people call it); the explosion in smart phone adoption; and perhaps most importantly, the ability to better qualify (and CONVERT) traffic and customers through the use of video, rich media and native advertising online.
As I said, advertising in terms of reach is dead. But advertising in terms of conversion, as the eMarketer article suggests, is booming. It’s all about conversion now, especially at the SMB level. Automakers, soft drinks and snack makers, national quick-serve chains and some retailers still need big reach to drive people into store locations. However, many SMBs are much more interested in the conversion of digital traffic to paying customers. This means a mix of media that allow SMBs to qualify callers and site visitors -such as digital display, search, email, social media and PRINT.
Yes, I subtly added print advertising to the list.
It’s true. Print advertising still has a big role to play in our increasingly digital first world, especially for the SMB market.
At Mediabids, our advertisers have conversion rates that are well into double digits (the average is about 40%.) So advertising, as we have long known it, is dead. But what advertisers want from their investment in advertising hasn’t changed much at all – they want to pay for customers at a cost-effective rate. This means that digital and print advertising is most relevant and still kicking.
Post by Jim Jinks
Open Letter to Media Buyers & Marketers
Is this picture of newspaper boxes kind of how you think of print? …dreary, old, outdated?
C’mon. Be honest. This is a safe space here.
As a media buyer, agency exec or client-side marketer, the way you think about print media has an enormous impact on the newspaper and magazine industry.
There was yet another sour report today about print revenues. First quarter 2016 newspaper and magazine revenues were down another 3.5-4.5% YOY.
I know many of you have moved on to digital and probably haven’t given much thought to print advertising for some time. I know and it’s not entirely your fault. After all, it’s tough to not follow the herd when the stakes and demands are so high. It’s also especially tough, when you may not know better.
By largely turning our backs on print (and instead pouring dollars into digital display) we’ve missed a huge opportunity to be heroes.
This chart shows close rates and the average length of calls for a few of our advertisers that deliver the highest call volumes. To be clear, the decimal point is in the correct place. All of our conversion rates start with TWO numbers before the decimal point.
By comparison, here’s the latest conversion rates for digital display ads.
If you’ve been spending time in digital media, these conversion rates are very familiar and may be the norm. From my perspective, these conversion rates are just north of ”why bother?”
Print advertising is a huge opportunity to deliver real results and value to your clients. If you haven’t already, perhaps it’s time to update your view of print media.
Sincerely,
Jim Jinks
Marketing Podcasts: Less Pain, More Gain.
If you’re a local media salesperson it’s important to not only know everything there is to know about what you’re selling but you also need to know what your customers may be thinking, in terms of their marketing options and ideas.
As professional marketers, it’s tough for us to keep up with all the new technology and marketing opportunities that arrive on the scene at an ever increasing pace. Imagine how your small business customers feel? In addition to running their business, they get bombarded by media salespeople in their local market as well as emails and online offers from all the social media and digital channels. The options, opportunities and trends are likely to be overwhelming to most small business owners and managers…or at least make them feel like it’s tough to keep up and make an informed decision on where to best invest marketing dollars.
One thing a local media salesperson can do is attempt to be THE authoritative voice for their small business customers. I know what you’re thinking. Who could possibly have the time to read marketing books or spend valuable prospecting time following ”thought-leaders” on social media or participating in webinars. I get it! Especially as a salesperson, your time is valuable and you’re judged by closing sales (not how smart you are about marketing.)
Recently I’ve been thinking, how can I get smarter about marketing without committing time I don’t really have in the first place? Then I thought…what about a podcast (or two?) There are very few podcasts that are household names. Check that, with the possible exception of Serial (https://serialpodcast.org/) there are no podcasts that are household names. So how or where to get started?
Admittedly, this wasn’t exactly scientific:
- I did a Google search of ”top marketing podcasts.”
- Based on seven different rankings from people that purportedly listened to all (or most) of the podcasts in the marketing podcast universe, there were five marketing podcasts that appeared in ALL of the rankings.
- If you’re looking to become a smarter marketer in less time (and be your customer’s marketing guru) then these would likely be a great place to start:
Social Media Marketing Podcast
Have a listen and please let us know what you think in the comments section below. I hope you find these enjoyable and valuable.
Post by Jim Jinks
Programmatic Print, Part 1 – An Overview
Today we bring you Part 1 in a series on Programmatic Print advertising.
For some time now, everyone in the industry has been talking about programmatic. Programmatic media is defined as the automated buying, selling, and optimized delivery of media. Its most commonly used to refer to buying online advertising through an ad exchange to target specific audiences.
Many of the newspapers we work with are now partnering with digital agencies to monetize their online platforms by offering programmatic online, or bringing digital people in house. We’ve seen these programs achieve varying degrees of success. Though it seems like an obvious complement to their print offerings, for many newspaper salespeople there is a vast divide and language barrier between their expertise and the world of digital advertising. But, they’re trying.
With this change, newspapers essentially become an agency themselves, particularly to local advertisers without the resources to hire an actual agency. If an advertiser’s local newspaper salesperson can offer digital programs (programmatic, in addition to display) to go along with their print advertising, they become their liaison into the world of online advertising. They are essentially designing and executing a key component of the advertiser’s marketing plan. As their first point of contact, the newspaper sales rep becomes their entry point into the online market. Whether or not this positioning is best for newspapers is still up for debate. But again, they’re trying.
But what about programmatic print? What if there was an opportunity to automate buying audience groups in print?
Some publications are already doing this – over a year ago, news broke that Time Inc. would begin selling ads across a programmatic platform. A private exchange grouping their publications and subscribers into audience groups.
But where is this now? We’ll continue to explore the evolution of programmatic print in posts to come in this series…
Post by Darcy Mauke.
The Print Observer - Newspaper & Magazine Advertising Insights 