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Marketing the News
JOUR 350
The News and Media Business
Week 5
Competing with TV
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“marketing” approach to news first seen in late 1970s
more reader-friendly content
 a/k/a “disco” journalism
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USA Today revolutionized newspaper design in 1982
Full color, extensive use of graphics
 Shorter stories, bite-sized “factoids”
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Selling audiences to advertisers
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newspapers traditionally relied on circulation data
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readership demographics
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age, income, occupation, etc.
broadcast audiences harder to define
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used phone surveys, ie. A.C. Nielsen
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but gathered much more useful information
ie. spending habits
Readership surveys
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circulation dip made newspapers compete
began surveying readers, non-readers
 to determine what content would sell
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“Market-driven” journalism began
giving readers what they said they wanted
 not what editors thought they should know
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circulation rose in U.S.
from 60.7 million in 1975
 to 62.8 million in 1990
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Newspaper Readership Project
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Started in 1977 by alphabet soup
ANPA, ASNE, NAB, etc.
 conducted 70 research studies
 held 10 conferences
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Suddenly marketing consultants were everywhere
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Presstime estimated their numbers in the hundreds
Targeting the “Me Generation”
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Consultants urged editors to appeal to a younger readership
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that wanted help in coping with life
Urged more people items, celebrity coverage to attract readers
Briefer news coverage, summary boxes
Light features
 How-to sections
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Survey research often problematic
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Answers aren’t always accurate
Focus groups brought consumers together
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Focus groups emerge
For more in-depth discussion, comparison
Allowed market researchers to get deeper into the public mind
Utilized increasingly sophisticated marketing methods
What do readers want?
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More upbeat stories – less bad news
More “escape” stories, light features
Shorter stories – quick reads
Led to the rise of “news you can use”
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In-depth reporting declined
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ie. focus on the self
Style prevailed over substance
Case study: USA Today
Created by Gannett chain in 1982
Targeted national readership
Focus on sports
a killer weather map
Short stories became known as “News McNuggets”
Case study: Vancouver Province

Converted to tabloid format in 1983
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after much market testing
Martin Goldfarb and Associates surveys in 1981
papers “cold, impersonal, aloof, [and] mercenary”
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consultant Leonard Kubas found 63% of Vancouverites considered them
identical
Going tabloid
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Southam had market-tested a tabloid in 1981 as a third newspaper
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called Pacific Post
showed a tab would be a hit with readers
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but there would not be enough advertising revenue for it as a third paper

would appeal to a different readership than the Sun
as the second paper, however, it would be more attractive to advertisers
Further test-marketing
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80-page mockup of tabloid Pacific Post produced in March, 1983
550 members of focus groups tested for their reaction -- proved
positive
Pitched tab to Southam board April 22
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approved unanimously
called “the most exhaustive analysis of market position and future
options ever undertaken by a Canadian newspaper”
The “Breezy Tab”
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relaunch accompanied by a $500,000 ad campaign
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1,000 TV commercials
1,600 radio spots
extensive market-testing had come up with a slogan: “All the News!
Convenient too!”
Sun called it “the first Canadian newspaper to be designed from the start by
marketing studies”
The Little Newspaper That Grew
1 98 3
1 98 5
1 98 7
1 98 9
1 99 0
1 99 1
1 99 5
2 00 0
Sun
243,419
248,472
239,237
230,782
220,141
210,917
206,027
200,420
Province
148,928
175,078
183,018
189,028
190,949
189,124
159,815
166,746
The ’90s – a decade of desperation
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advertisers began deserting newspapers
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traditional newspaper advertisers failed
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ie. department stores (Woodward’s, Eaton’s)
big-box retailers emerged in their place
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used new promotion strategies (direct mail)
ie. Walmart
1990 recession saw first drop in ad revenue in 20 years
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dropped 5% in 1991 – biggest dip in 50 years!
The end of newspapers?
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competition from cable TV news grew
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drained readership
the Internet threatened advertising base
classified ads
 ie. cars, homes, autos
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some predicted newspapers would die out
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and be replaced by online news, advertising
Going the “audience quality” route
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survey research focused more on buying traits of readers
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called “psychographics”
to prove they could deliver more desirable consumers than radio
and TV
began constructing audience profiles
based on psychological traits of readers
 as determined by survey research
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Case study: The Vancouver Sun
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paid polling firm Angus Reid $100,000 in early ’90s
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to conduct a sophisticated survey of readers
classified into psychographic categories:
“literate acquisitors” (21 percent)
 “middle-class joiners”
 “home bodies”
 “post-literate hedonists”
 “insular forlorn” (11 percent)
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Case study: Orange County Register
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Has taken the reader-oriented approach furthest
Includes reader-written features
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Reader-friendly beats
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Columns on dreams, favorite vacations
Shopping malls
“car culture”
also has an innovative organizational structure
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“flat” hierarchical structure
called “newsroom without walls”