Newspaper Advertising Deal from Schmeg.com

   

Newspaper Advertising - A Better Buy than Ever

• Newspapers have evolved into multiple media products - print, Web, and broadcast. A better buy than ever, they're especially cost effective for smaller businesses with limited ad budgets. This article tells you why this is so.

The world of newspaper advertising has changed considerably in the last five years, and will continue to evolve into ever more interactive and engaging elements, primarily online. As an entrepreneur or business manager whose responsibility is the marketing of your firm and the sale of its products and services, pay heed to how newspapers are changing to meet consumer and advertiser needs.

Most newspapers are online, offering news and ad content that is searchable, customizable and interactive. Reporters maintain their own blogs, through which they communicate with readers. Many newspapers and groups now have separate citizen media products, where photos and articles are contributed and uploaded by local residents.

Even line ads (once commonly referred to as Want Ads) can now be placed and paid for from the newspaper's site 24/7, with photos, a virtual tour of properties, the ability to email the seller, make a bid, buy it and pay for it online, make a computer call to the seller or chat live.

For an entrepreneur or business manager who needs to advertise, newspapers are the medium of choice. Small mom and pops, home businesses and retailers and service firms that cater to the local community are especially benefited by these changes.

If you are a family-owned dry cleaner in Denver, for example, you may have declined to advertise in the Denver Post in the past because it was too expensive, and because you knew that people 30 miles on the other side of the city weren't about to drive to your store to leave off their dry cleaning. Now, though, Denver Newspaper Agency, the overseer of the Denver Post and Rocky Mountain News, has a product called Your Hub, a citizen media Web and print publication, which allows you to choose to advertise only in your neighborhood. Not only is the cost considerably lower than in the past, but you can also post your own articles and photos at no charge, and can engage others in conversation.

Dozens of newspapers have video products. You can now place an ad in the Reno Gazette, for example, for rental properties, and it will appear as an online video on the local cable TV station as part of its 30 minute weekend Rental TV show..

For those businesses who actually want to expand the reach of their advertising message, newspapers can deliver this as well. Shoppers (Pennysaver, American Classifieds / Thrifty Nickel etc.), free papers and paid daily newspapers are putting their heads and their ads together and coming up with networked buys. If you live and own a business in Sonoma County California, for example, placing a classified ad in the local Index-Tribune will get you coverage in the Santa Rosa Press-Democrat too.

Newspapers are not just print ads anymore. For a business - especially a young, small and growing business - the local newspaper can be a great buy and one of the most effective advertising tools you have. Check it out.