What is the primary responsibility of newspapers?

[TomSportsHack]

Circulation may be increasing for some but how about the bottom line. A few years ago we decided to get the Sunday Enquirer. About 2 years ago we get a call from an Enquirer rep and she asks me if we would like to recieve the paper on a daily basis. When I informed her we were happy with the Sunday edition but wasn't really interested in anything else, she asks me if I would like to recieve the daily paper free. I said no, thinking this was nothing more than a ploy to get it free for a little while and then an extra charge would come in. She then tells me that is not the case, that just paying for the Sunday paper now gets you the paper all week, no charge. I accepted, and to this day have not paid anymore to get daily papers. Guess what circulation just went up.

 

Circulation is a small part of the revenue stream --- the smallest, in fact. The only reason circulation is important is because it directly affects advertising rates --- the higher the circulation, the higher the per-column-inch rate. It directly relates to the number of eyeballs believed to be reading the newspaper in question. All the Enquirer has done is essentially the same as sacrificing a dollar in an effort to make $100.

 

A lot of the problems my former industry has faced relates directly to falsified circulation claims. The Dallas Morning News, the Chicago Tribune, the Chicago Sun-Times and Newsday on Long Island all had to refund millions of dollars to advertisers once inflated circulation statistics were discovered, and those refunds have had many long-term effects --- most notably, hundreds of layoffs in two separate waves at the DMN and the Tribune Company's weakening to the point that it was bought out and taken private earlier this year.

 

http://www.slate.com/id/2105344/ (from August 2004)

[cshs81]

It's why print newspapers are going the way of the dinosaur and dodo bird.

 

Scribe - I would say you are incorrect on why newspapers, in most cities, are heading south as far as circulation goes.

 

They're heading south because of our ability to instantly get our news and not wait for a paper that has "news" that is old by the time we read it.

 

If the internet and cable news were not available, newspapers would be thriving just as they used to.

[cshs81]

All the Enquirer has done is essentially the same as sacrificing a dollar in an effort to make $100.

 

)

 

Exactly. Its like the old line of "give them the razor for free but sell them the blades."

[theguru]

I think another thing the Enquirer has done well is their on-line site is second to none. In other words, when they lose a reader of their newspaper, nine times out of ten they probably lose them to their on-line site, Cincinnati.com.

[Habib]

I think another thing the Enquirer has done well is their on-line site is second to none. In other words, when they lose a reader of their newspaper, nine times out of ten they probably lose them to their on-line site, Cincinnati.com.

 

That is very true. I'm on nky.com everyday. I think the blogs are a big plus too, I check Pat Crowley's, Jim Borgman's and the various sports blogs everyday, which is stuff you normally don't find in the print editions.

[h.s.sportsrbest]

I think another thing the Enquirer has done well is their on-line site is second to none. In other words, when they lose a reader of their newspaper, nine times out of ten they probably lose them to their on-line site, Cincinnati.com.

 

:thumb: :thumb:

 

You're a wise man.

 

 

The opposite is true in TV and Radio, where TV advertising is being cannibalized by TiVO and DVR's and Radio advertising is being drilled by several factors: Sirius, XM, teams negotiating to own the inventory and only paying a rights' fee to the station, and the general disorganization that is the Radio business.