SAGE Advice: Newspaper Ad Space Is a Bargain!

By: Leo J. Shapiro, Erik Shapiro and Steve Yahn Local newspaper ad space might be the biggest media-buy bargain going. This is because actual newspaper readership is probably much higher than that suggested by the newspaper audit numbers.

For example, in telephone surveys conducted by SAGE in metro Denver and metro Tucson -- both compact western metro areas -- eight in 10 respondents (83% in both Denver and Tucson) report reading a newspaper (print or online, whether paid for or not) in the seven days previous to the survey. This is in line with findings from our national poll, in which readership of local newspapers averages about 75%.

Although more than a quarter of the 425 respondents in Denver and 420 respondents in Tucson report reading a national paper (Wall Street Journal, USA Today, and/or The New York Times) in the past seven days (26% in Denver and 30% in Tucson), subtracting out national newspaper readership still leaves about eight in ten (80% in Denver and 79% in Tucson) reading a local paper in the past seven days.

That's a whole lot of eyeballs focused on local newspapers. Many never would have thought that from the audited circulation statistics.

Our survey, for example, finds that in the seven days that immediately preceded the survey interview about 835,200 residents of metro Denver have read a print edition of the Rocky Mountain News and about 667,200 residents have read a print edition of the Denver Post.

But the most recent newspaper audit numbers put the circulation of the Rocky Mountain News and Denver Post at only 255,675 and 255,935, respectively.

And our findings are conservative, since the circulation area of these two papers is larger than metro Denver. These figures imply that audit numbers might undercount actual readership considerably.

Moreover, we find that about 97,600 metro Denverites have read the Rocky Mountain News online (but not in print) in the past seven days, and about 57,600 have read the Denver Post online (but not in print).

This jolly holiday season, newspaper ad space is even more of a bargain in Denver and Tucson, where readership exceeds circulation, and where plans for holiday spending are sharply higher than they are in the nation generally.

One in three Denverites and Tucsonans we polled (31% and 32%, respectively) say they plan to spend more this holiday season than they did in 2005, while our October national survey found 23% planning to spend more this holiday season.


BOTTOM LINE

Newspaper advertisers would be wise to take advantage of the bargain in newspaper ad space before sellers of newspaper ad space become more adept at auditing actual newspaper readership.

And newspapers would be wise to take a hard look not only at how their reach or audiences compare to the reach of television and Internet media, but also at how useful advertisers find their readership statistics to be for crafting media schedules for reaching target markets efficiently.

Our talks with media buyers in media buying companies, advertising agencies, and retailers find them rating newspaper audience statistics to be inferior to audience statistics provided by television and Internet media for developing efficient schedules for reaching their target markets.

Despite their reputation for superior statistics they provide to advertisers, both television and Internet media are actively working toward improving the utility of their audience statistics to advertisers. Television is working toward rating commercials as well as programs. The Internet is engaged in improving the quality of their counts of clicks on advertising.

Newspaper ad sellers need to recognize that success in generating audiences is not commercially rewarding unless they can provide advertisers with believable, detailed information about the size of the audiences they create. Newspapers have a crying need for hard data on audiences that includes measures of pass-along, over-the-shoulder, and on-line newspaper reading.