The newspaper industry's trade group, the Newspaper Association of America, is at it again, announcing that it's going to spend $75 million for a fresh promotional campaign to convince people to read newspapers.
The good news is that they've dropped the inane and much-derided Monty Python-like Victorian imagery of last year's big newspaper promotional campaign, which only served to remind people of how mired in the past the industry had become. This year's campaign will be focus on "newspapers of the future" (if there is a future!). The bad news is that one of the slogans being used is almost as anachronistic as last year's campaign: "The Internet is the best thing to happen to newspapers since the paper boy." Um, what's a paper boy?
Presumably, this campaign will be roughly as visible as last years, which seemed to appear only in newspapers and in posters hung in newspaper lobbies—not exactly the best places to go trawling for new readers. What do you suppose the amount spent per new customer will be on a $75 million budget? It's got to be astronomical.
The newspaper industry would be much better served by spending the money on some true innovation. Seventy-five million dollars will buy a lot of investment in R&D, new Web innovations, smart hiring and other initiatives that will reach and acquire new customers in ways that this ridiculous ad campaign will not. That mythical paper boy of the ad campaign doesn't toss papers off his (or her--hello?) bike anymore. That kid is listening to an iPod, text-messaging friends and playing video games. The newspaper industry needs to find ways to reach out to that audience with relevant new products, not irrelevant, self-indulgent ad campaigns.
Ah yes, the brilliant strategy of trying to attract more aging print readers to the online edition.
Surely, that's how we're supposed to be doing it, right?
Posted by: Ryan | February 03, 2007 at 03:41 PM