If you’re involved in advertising at a local level you have to be interested in what is happening to newspapers as subscription and advertising revenues are declining. It’s been recently reported that The New York Times intends to charge (again) for online content. At the same time an Adweek/ Harris poll indicates that 77% of adults say they won’t pay anything for reading a newspaper online.
I’m like most people and would like to keep getting something for free so I’m going to answer a survey the way 77% of these people did. However, if I had to pay for local news, I would rather pay for online content than pay for a printed version of the local newspaper. I won’t pay for both.
From what I read, this is the year when newspapers take the leap and start to charge for online content. They’ll be different version of how they do it but giving away their content online just isn’t sustainable.
Local advertisers, like consumers, will also have two choices. Advertise online or in print. But in the case of advertisers, they’ll have to do both.
What this means to brand managers, who have a dealer network, is that it’s more important than ever to provide tools to your dealers to advertise online. Printed newspapers aren’t going to go completely away anytime soon but the need for digital tools is going to grow.