New Revenue Ideas for Small Newspapers
Traditional print newspapers are hurting. In the first three months of 2011, advertising revenues fell for the 20th straight quarter, according to Steve Buttry, director of community engagement and social media for the Journal Register Co. Newspapers of all sizes could use an injection of revenue-generating inspiration to help make ends meet. The print medium should not resign itself to calling out "no mas" but rather invigorate itself with new strategies about how to stay solvent in the Internet Age.
Other People Are Reading
-
Graduation
-
High school graduation is special to a small town and also offers a small newspaper the opportunity to generate a chunk of money in a short time. Frank Scott, a weekly newspaper publisher in Dewitt, Arkansas, claims that graduation-related advertising brings in an extra $6,000 to $7,000 dollars. Scott prints senior photos taken for the yearbook, publishes these along with a list of students who won awards (almost everyone) and solicits ads from proud parents or other relatives.
Print Groupon
-
The online coupon service Groupon proved that people like the concept of a daily deal. While there's nothing new about clipping coupons printed in the newspaper, adopting a Groupon strategy where a single advertiser pays to be featured prominently in an issue could allow your small town newspaper to borrow an idea from the Internet and put it to profitable use in print. Consumer interest in this sort of approach has already been proven and could be implemented easily by the sales staff.
-
Life Stories
-
Obituaries are not normally thought of as a profit-center location in smaller papers. Publishers who offer the section more as a community service than anything else are overlooking the potential to offer a commissioned "life story" package to surviving friends and family members. Rather than a short column that attempts to summarize a person's life in a hundred words, have a reporter sit down with the people who knew the deceased best and craft an actual story on their life and times, dedicating several columns to each publication --- for a price, of course. Identify the page as sponsored to avoid creating the appearance that the feature is being presented as news.
Apps
-
In the Internet Age, a small newspaper must figure out how to deliver its content in different ways. Posting an online version of the print edition, accessed by paying a subscription, is a good start, but don't overlook the opportunities offered by accessing the cellphone and PDA market. It should be a fairly quick and inexpensive matter to hire a programmer to design an application that delivers local headlines to community members as they go through their day. When television, radios, and newspapers are out of reach, cellphones are almost always right there.
-
References
- Photo Credit Kim Carson/Stockbyte/Getty Images
