Almost all newspapers have formulated their business models in a similar fashion during the last century. Their generated income has stemmed from providing either free or low cost news to its subscribers, while augmenting their income with advertisements from companies. Due to the fact that each newspaper has its’ own audience, companies can choose which newspaper their advertisement may have the most impact. Companies will choose an outlet that provides similar content, which would allow them to easily promote their message alongside that print paper. Advertising a business can sometimes effectively persuade and manipulate a reader. Especially when the advertisement is offering something they’ve wanted to consume. Seeing the advertisement can prompt the reader to believe the product or business itself has been successful, therefore creating new sources of revenue.
It is ideal that a company like VISA would choose to do a multipage spread advertisement in the Wall Street Journal rather than posting a small corner Ad in the Bronx Times Reporter. Why? Because those that are more inclined to read the Wall Street Journal would appeal more to a VISA rather than those reading the Bronx Times Reporter. As aforementioned, the most effective way to succeed in manipulated consumer behavior is to be aware of who the consumer is in the first place. It is more likely than not; that those who read the Wall Street Journal are corporate businessmen. But then we think about The Bronx Times Reporter and their readers, we could assume they’d be Bronx locals who are interested in knowing what is going around in the Bronx and what is new in the borough. The Bronx Times Reporter understands the audience they cater to. So, it would be beneficial for both the newspaper and an organization like Belmont District Management Association, organizers of the Bronx’s Feast of Saint Anthony, to have a front-page ad in that newspaper. A newspaper like El Diario would seek to get advertisements from companies who closely relate to the Hispanic community. Perhaps Goya would be their ideal candidate for a continual partnership? Overall, attracting things that would keep their targeted audience intrigued is the only way that newspapers can establish and grow their respective organizations.
The Wall Street Journal, as you may know, has a large emphasis on business and economic news. Their content partnerships consist of the following companies: MarketWatch, Barron’s, Smart Money, and All Things Digital. All of these go hand in hand with one another. It is apparent that the ads they would feature would correlate with the two themes of its paper. After doing research, I noticed the online ads versus the printed ads weren’t that different except for one thing. When I was on the Wall Street Journal website the ads were very disruptive and would just pop up in the middle of my screen while browsing the website. The ad happened to be a phone carrier ad, specifically T-Mobile. Which triggered the notion that the reason they may present those disruptive ads is to try and curate more money and manipulate the reader to pay for an online subscription without the ads. Therefore making it a win, win situation for them because either way they will be profiting from adding or removing advertisements. As for the print newspaper advertisements, I noticed if there was an ad related to the article, it would be featured near the article; very small but it didn’t take away from the content or the ad. Maybe the article may have encouraged the reader to consume that product now. For example, there was an ad featuring a new vacuum next to an article about a small business start up. I’m assuming since office spaces usually have carpet, it would be sensible to feature that ad.
In addition, I noticed the Wall Street Journal had almost four FULL pages of corporate advertisements ranging from Verizon, Apple (promotion for the new iPad), and went back to Verizon. The colors weren’t too loud and were easy on the eye, very clean cut. It’s beneficial that these companies would heavily advertise in this newspaper because those are the two necessities businessmen rely on to run a business: a computer and a phone. That is a perfect example of targeting the appropriate market. Those two technologies are their frequent form of communication and how they get things done. According to the Wall Street Journal Media Kit, the Eastern Edition Wall Street Journal, full-page non-contract rates for advertising can go for $943.99 per column inch rate and for a black & white full page can cost $118,942.74. (Grossing rates). As far as the contract volume rates for WSJ franchise net revenue contract, ranges from as low as $50,000 to $5,200,000 with the column and color cost varying. I’m sure we can put two and two together to see how they’re still running and funding themselves as a newspaper.
As for the classifieds section in the Wall Street Journal both digital and print featured a heavy load of Residential Real Estate and Commercial Real Estate as well as small businesses/ franchises for sale, legal notices and jobs ONLY requiring executive and management positions. There weren’t many goods beings sold, strictly just business. The appeal for these advertisements is solely providing opportunities to invest (so I like to believe). In this way, when an individual invests they’re more likely to make a profitable return whereas when an individual consumes, they’re just spending.
The Bronx Times Reporter is a local newspaper featuring all news happening in The Bronx; offered both online and in print. First when browsing through the website, I didn’t see much advertising. I saw maybe a 3-inch in length and 1 inch in width size ad featuring Con Edison and another one promoting DreamJobsNYC. Both seem relevant to the audience because almost everyone relies on electricity and gas as a necessity for their every day lives and people are always looking for job opportunities. Now, I took a look at the printed version of the newspaper and it was FLOODED with advertisements. The difference between this newspaper and the Wall Street Journal was that the advertisements did not correlate with the article next to it, which I found to be extremely distracting. The colors were loud, with warm hues and very flashy to say the least. I could immediately tell the layout for the newspapers were completely different; but I am aware it is because they are appealing to two different audiences. Most of the advertisements displayed were either of Car Dealerships, Loan opportunities, Portabella Election Day sale, Home installation/ Hardware Business with an attached coupon, Dental services etc… These were all local businesses in the Bronx. Some had full pages like the home installation hardware business. Then there were some that had half the page like the car dealership. But I am pretty sure there was almost an advertisement on every single page. When trying to find the rates they charged, I came across their Media Kit, which was included under the community news group in which The Bronx Times Reporter happens to be affiliated with. That group is a network of local newspapers throughout the city featuring the five boroughs. Although it didn’t feature the exact price, they did briefly mention this, “Mechanicals, artwork, layout or design of an ad concept created at Courier-Life, Publication, Inc. or Timesledger that is not published in any publication owned and/or operated by CNG and is used in other publications will be charged at the rate of $100.00 per man hour expended”. Therefore I am assuming their profitable income comes from designing the advertisements from these businesses rather than them being given a specific ad by a business to promote and have them pay for a spot. Granted that most of these businesses are locally owned and aren’t franchises or big corporations, they would try to save as much money as possible and keep things convenient.
Now considering The Bronx Times Reporter is a weekly publication and only costs about 75 cents, it makes sense that they carry a lot of advertisements to generate their publication. It is unfortunate for the reader who may not enjoy reading the paper while flashy advertisements are in their peripheral vision; but it helps the newspaper, the businesses and informs the consumer.
Going back to The Bronx Times Reporter online, as far as the classifieds section goes, it mainly featured jobs, apartments for rent, attorney services, selling of clothing articles, home improvement services, and financial services. In comparison to the Wall Street Journal I noted the difference between the two was that these advertisements encouraged the reader to consume as oppose to invest. A lot of the advertisements were practically saying, “buy me” without any sight of profitable returns, just a better home, or a better looking “you”.
El Diario is a newspaper that has become a source for news and information, offered both online and print, for Hispanics in the New York Tri-state area. The distribution of this ethnic newspaper is daily rather than weekly like The Bronx Times Reporter. Its classified advertising section consisted of Automative, Employment, Real Estate, and Legal and Mortgage Ads, similar to both the Wall Street Journal and The Bronx Times Reporter. Majority of these ads are in Spanish and for the ones online there are a few that were in both English and Spanish. The advertising throughout the online webpage and printed-paper seemed as if it was more family oriented. I saw advertisements on the side of the page that were small and squared with minimal flashiness, bigger than those featured on The Bronx Times Reporter site. They displayed information about medicare, car companies, and children services awareness. However, when I went back to the website, there was an ad once again interrupting me, mid-browse! Just like that of the Wall Street Journal online. The ad popped up showing the NBA Tip Off sponsored by KIA. At least it disappeared within seconds unlike other online publications where you have to withstand viewing the advertisements for about 15 seconds until you are given the option to close it. Aside from that, the printed newspaper featured small advertisements throughout the paper. Some small ads even made the front page, which was usually place toward the bottom or top of the paper. The one that I saw was offering services for accidents happening during construction. As I continued to flip through the pages I notice there were inserts of advertisements, which displayed either a sale going on in Macy’s or a sweepstakes for a Latino magazine. I wasn’t sure if the bigger businesses associated with this newspaper used this form of advertisements in order to really attract the reader. It made sense that they’d use a creative layout that would make the reader more inclined to grasp it and consume whatever they were offering. As I continued towards the middle pages, I notice that the advertisements that took half the page or just a single corner column were in black and white. However, if it was a complete full-page, there was some color usually in blue red and white hues. I saw full pages of Latino restaurants and candidates of the election, which just passed. They mostly were advertising services and products popular within the race and Hispanic community.
El Diario’s media kit featured on the ImpreMedia Group site showed they were really well aware and informative as to how the broke down the Hispanics in their market. Those analytics allowed them to choose what would exactly appeal and target the Hispanic Average Household, which probably explains the family oriented advertising. Just like both of the previous newspapers analyzed, this media kit featured the layout of what type of ad placement they provide, but they did not include the rates.
All in all, the culture of each newspaper easily differentiated which one was the mainstream newspaper and those that were the ethnic newspapers. The Wall Street Journal was business, technology, and economic news, appealing to the upper class and business-oriented individuals. Their advertising was bold, clean-cut, précised and plain. The Bronx Times Reporter’s culture was more for smaller businesses, lower and middle class individuals seeking services, local job opportunities, selling of merchandise, and promotion of local events with a heavy sense of a “community” feel. Those advertisements represented the Bronx culture indefinitely being that the colors they chose were vibrant. At last, El Diario had a more sophisticated but family oriented culture where they advertised things that targeted an ethnic group that being the average Hispanic household. In conclusion, the more advertisements you will see in a publication, the more profits they are probably able to make. However, with digital media taking over, print media is slowly dying out. But in the end that can leave room for potential growth opportunities for these newspapers in gaining more online subscribers who would prefer news easily accessible and customizable (no ads).
Bronx Times: Classifieds. (2014). Retrieved October 31, 2014, from http://www.bxtimes.com/sections/classifieds/
CNG Media Kit. (2014). Retrieved November 1, 2014, from http://www.cnglocal.com/cng-media-kit.pdf
Clasificados en Nueva York | ElDiarioNY.com. (2014). Retrieved November 6, 2014, from http://clasificados.eldiariony.com
Eastern Edition General Rate Card. (2014). Retrieved November 1, 2014, from http://www.wsjmediakit.com/downloads/2014_General_Rate_Card.pdf?141106114039
El Diario Media Kit. (2012). Retrieved November 3, 2014, from http://www.impremedia.net/eldiario/files/El_Diario_Media_kit_2012.pdf
Wall Street Journal Classifieds. (2014). Retrieved November 2, 2014, from https://classifieds.wsj.com
1 comment
Thanks for posting! Look for feedback soon via email