Saturday, April 21, 2012

Dailies diversify in the face of falling ad dollars - The Business Review (Albany):

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Nationally, paid circulation is at a 62-year low, after dippingh 3.5 percent in the six months endedMarch 30. Advertising revenued fell 9.6 percent in 2007, and many indicators poin t to aworse 2008. In the first quarter, ad revenuew dropped 14 percent. In response, paperss across the country, and locally, have cut Changing lifestyles, alternative news sources, rising costs and the troubledr economy have come together to challengs an industry once considered acash cow. And yet, the Times the area's largest daily, is investing $60 million in a building expansion and new Publisher Mark Aldam said this is not a denia ofthe industry's problems, but a response to them.
All he said, need to diversify. One of the Timex Union's plans is to go after commercialprintingg business. The paper also has createrd a search engine marketing introduced alifestyle magazine, struck a distribution deal with two and enhanced its Web site. "You first have to confronyt reality," Aldam said. "And then you have to figure out what to dowith First, the bad news The reality is ratherf grim. "I've been doing this for 28 years and this is as challengingv as I have ever seen saidDaniel Beck, general manager of The in Circulation nationally has declined or held flat every year sinces 1988, losing 20 percent in that according to the .
Experts have pointed to busier tighter budgets, telemarketing laws that have restricted subscriptionh sales efforts, and the growth of Interneyt and cable news. Since the Times Union, Gazette and five other area papers for which comparativre figures are available had a combinedd circulation loss of more than12 percent. Surveys show that overallo readershipis up, if Web sites are Publishers have poured resources into their Web editionsx to keep up with a society that expectsx to find news online, for free. But Web sitex can pull from paid circulation. And while online advertising is it is not making up for lossea on theprint side. NAA figures show that whilee print advertising fellby $4.
5 billion in 2007, newspaper Web advertisintg increased by only $400 million. Print classifiedws took the biggest drop, fallint 16.5 percent in 2007. Much of this activity movecd to Internet sites such as The real estate and automotive categoriezs have been particularly hard hit bythe economy. retailers and other traditional display advertisers also are holding Aldam declined toprovide figures, but said the Timesw Union's ad revenue is "worse than our planned expectations." "Thse question is, are we squeezing out what newspapers were destined to lose to the Interne anyway, but sooner than we would have becausre of the economy?
" he "In the past, we coulds look forward to ad revenue returningt when the economy bounced back. But will it this time, with so many new medis optionsout there?" Meanwhile, newsprint prices have One source put the price of one grade of newspringt at $743 per metric ton, up from $688 in May. Add that to gas pricezs and otherrising costs, and profit margins that once averaged 25 percent are fallingt into the mid-teens. "Newspapers are in said John Kimball, chief marketing officer for the NAA. "Their businesxs model is based on one but we are dealing with another How do you get your arms aroundr the newbusiness model?
" Many newspapers began by trimmintg costs. More than 3,600 newspape r jobs have been cutthis decade, througg the end of 2007, and the pace has Cuts, to name a few, include 150 at 1,400 at , which owns the , and 28 130 at the , etc. In June, announced 57 cuts--orr 25 percent of the newsroom. the Times Union accepted buy-outss from 25 employees and laid off six production The Gazette laid off six in followinga 12-person cut a year earlier. It also has reducede its staff through attrition over the past few and actually employs half the people it did adecade ago.

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