NewsBeat

February 2017 NewsBeat 9 PHOTO OF AN OLD DATSUN AD BY JOHN LLOYD USED UNDER A CREATIVE COMMONS LICENSE. public. Newspaper advertising is too expensive on a per capita basis. Print is not a creative way to convey a message in the digital age." The good news is that the ad team at the paper is well-prepared to acknowledge the concerns and calm them. In response to the first objection about readership, Lewis said, "It is true that in metro areas circulation is shrinking; however, we have found that in smaller markets that circulation has remained either level or is actually growing. I always cite Berkshire Hathaway's investment in small market papers to support this." Regarding return on investment, he said, "Per capita advertising cost depends solely on if you are reaching your target audience. If you are attempting to reach millennials in print, your ROI will be higher than if you are attempting to reach Boomers." Finally, to counter the assumption that print is somehow underwhelming as a creative platform, Lewis pointed out, "Creativeness in print can be overcome by utilizing print as a referral method to digital advertising, which I have seen to be very successful." Using Data and Targeted Marketing Data seems to drive so much of the publishing organization today, especially in the digital space. Today, data can glean so much more insight for advertisers, which they need to effectively target their ads, even if they don't yet know it. "Readership numbers have gotten less and less important over the years," Osterman said. "It seems that advertisers aren't quite as interested in them, even when they're presented with media audit information that dispels their own notions; so, we're frequently talking more about digital data than we are about readership or traditional metrics like that. "A lot of the time, the advertiser doesn't actually express that they want data. It's more about trying to entice them to want it," he added. Osterman offered data from Borrell Associates as an example. "We might suggest to the advertiser, 'You might not want to see the readership figures for the paper, but if I can help you understand what other businesses in your category are spending on various kinds of media, in this market, would that be interesting to you?' And it is," he said. "That is an extra value for the advertiser and insight that they would otherwise have to pay a lot of money for." The New Ad Sales Pro The conversations that advertising reps are having with ad buyers these days are far more sophisticated and consultative in nature than they were when print was the sole product to sell. The conception and creation of the advertising program is also far more creative and collaborative than before. "The more information and feedback that we receive from both current advertisers and those that aren't doing business with us, the better," Wiita said. "I'm a big fan of feedback, whether it's positive or negative, as it allows us to adapt and change to suit the needs of the market. I would say that most of the feedback we've received as to where clients who aren't spending with us are spending their budgets generally comes down to a lack of knowledge of the services we can provide. "More often than not, new clients are not familiar with the fact that we are not only a newspaper, but that we offer a full suite of digital solutions, produce a wide variety of niche publications, have an events department that produces large- scale and custom events, and operate an in- house ad agency. There is no better feeling than sitting down with a new client and walking them through the wide variety of ways that we can help them grow." At the Idaho Statesman, Osterman's team has adapted to a more consultative approach. "We follow a multi-step sales process, which is very much based on doing research and essentially interviewing the (Continued on following page)

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