There have been so many studies supporting the idea that brands are recognizing the change in consumer behavior and are reacting by moving ad dollars from traditional media to digital.
While this study from emarkter.com doesn’t break down national advertising vs. local advertising, the logic should be the same. If consumers are relying more on the internet to get product information, then local advertisers should be spending more dollars on the internet at the expense of less effective traditional advertising like printed newspapers.
The challenge for local retailers is that they don’t have the expertise they need to take advantage of the internet and there is no one from the internet who will walk into their store and help them move online.
A good brand must help their local retailers. First, by giving their best retailers the tools they need to create great landing pages, host those pages for them and track the results. Secondly, change the co-op rules to encourage the move from traditional to digital media. Right now most company’s co-op rules are stuck in the 90’s, the early 90’s.
A modern ad builder with a strong set of tools for taking advantage of digital media and up-to-date co-op rules are what’s needed now.