ComCorp, Inc. Articles

Increase Online Newspaper Ad Results To Decrease on Print Ads

Newspapers take advantage of internet technology that captures a wider audience. As a result, there is a corresponding change in advertising expenditures for online spending and print ads compared to previous years. According to Newspaper Association of America (NAA), there has been a decline in the revenues for print ad to “cyclical swings in the US economy, as well as the structural changes in the business of the major advertisers.” This is due to a corresponding increase in online ad among newspaper websites in the second quarter compared to last year of the same period.

The sum of ad expenditures among newspaper companies were 11.3 billion US dollar in the second quarter. This figure is an 8.6 percent decrease from 2006. Meanwhile the print ads expenditure is 10.2 percent lower from the previous year which totals 10.5 billion. This shows that expenditures for ad may have decline but the classification of the print ads against online ads varies.

Among the components of print ads, the most in-demand classified advertising decreased to 16.4 percent to 3.4 Billion US Dollar. This resulted from further decrease in the following categories: real estate down to 20.7 percent; recruitment declined at 18.5 percent; automotive dropped at 19.3 percent and all other classified down at 1.8 percent. Likewise, there is a decline in retail ad to 6.4 percent to 5.2 billion US dollar as well as national decline of 7.9 percent to 1.8 billion US dollar, all on the second quarter counting. This shows that print ads has declined its popularity compared to online advertisement.

Meanwhile there was an increase in newspaper websites ad spending to 19.3 percent to 796 million US dollar in the second quarter as well. Such increase was the 13th consecutive growth to double digit since NAA started reporting in 2004 about online ad spending. Online advertising among newspapers accounted for 7 percent of the total ad spending for newspapers in 2007 while it was accounted at 5.4 percent only in 2006. This means that there was an increase in percentage for online spending for current years. Newspaper websites are well-accepted online and advertisers take advantage of such opportunities of a number of markets being covered through this media.

According to NAA President and CEO John F. Sturm, “Newspaper websites continue to have a positive impact on the industries revenue stream during a time of transition. As newspapers transform themselves into multimedia platforms offering diverse portfolio of print and digital products, publishers continue to deliver…content that makes newspapers the most trusted sources of news and information.” He further added that advertisers recognized that websites for newspapers are the ideal media for reaching users online given the most appealing demographics.

As a result, a separate news indicated that large national newspapers that go into online ad are enjoying an increased audience after the rise of internet. Local and traditional newspaper resources lag behind against online newspaper website. According to DM News report, the audience loss was not only experienced by newspapers that employ traditional print ads but also to other traditional news providers such as broadcast and cables.