Web Sites Stealing Ad Dollars from Newspapers

More bad news for newspapers. Google and Yahoo are reporting impressive gains in their advertising revenues... gains that appear to be coming at the expense of national newspaper advertising. While Yahoo reported a 50% increase in ad revenue over last year, Dow Jones' ad revenues fell nearly 11%, and The New York Times' revenues rose an anemic 0.8%.

The overall percentage of advertising dollars going into newspaper advertising is slipping, while Internet and cable TV advertising is growing. One reason behind this growth in online advertising is the ability to measure click-through results and target ads to specific demographics. This way, advertisers get metrics and can direct their messages to the desired markets to save money. Newspapers, for their part, are fighting back with inserts that can be tailored to specific ZIP codes. Yet this may benefit smaller regional newspapers rather than the big-city dailies.

Source: The New York Times