Special posting: Google PrintAds

We don't usually blog this frequently, but yesterday's announcement that Google PrintAds is now available merited special attention.

PrintAds is just like it sounds, Google driven ads, that appear in print, instead of online. Although PrintAds has been around since November 2006, to select high volume advertisers, it is now available to all Google Adwords advertisers.

This means you can now place ads in 225 'quality' newspapers in the U.S., using geography, circulation, ad size, section (local, business, sports), and of course day of week. One thing you won't be able to do yet is place the ad on a contextual basis, or by keyword. Contextual refers to ads that are placed next to articles that are related (eg. condo ad next to article on condo living).

There is even a bid component to it, in that the newspaper can reject the ad or come back with a counteroffer.

This is newsworthy because Google as you may know, already has radio inventory, and you can see how their ad network is now evolving into a total advertising network. The fact that 98% of the newspapers that piloted the PrintAds system have chosen to stay in the network tells us that the newspapers see value in this.

This is a breakthrough as far as mentality. Newspapers have been fighting online adverting for awhile now (and losing). It's far better for them to embrace change and benefit from it, then to keep believing that motorized carriages will never replace the horse and buggy.

The best part of this is advertisers are reporting an increase in sales and inquiries of around 20%. So if the ads are priced right, it can have ROI that may approximate online.

Online advertising rates: Rip-off or Deal of the Century?

Just read an interesting article from MediaBrains, one of our online advertising networks, titled 'Online advertising rates: Rip-off or Deal of the Century?'. Basically, it suggests that advertisers have a perception that because online doesn't have printing, paper and distribution costs, it should cost a fraction of traditional advertising. It then argues that online ads should cost the same or even more, because the hard costs are replaced by different costs, such as web designers, search engine optimization, web analytics, real-time reports, spam compliance, servers etc.

Our take on this is that it falls in the category of Deal of the Century. Consider the facts:
- online ad spending is 10% of a typical marketing budget, but has 46% impact (based on time online)
- it reaches buyers with a level of efficiency and measurability that is unmatched
- growth ranges between 30-40% (showing that it works)
- it gets interested buyers to your website better than any other method (more clicks per dollar).

Imagine, advertising that helps brand you, tells you if its working, gets you direct response, and can almost instantly be distributed to a targeted market. It's almost too good to be true. To us, that makes it a steal of a deal.

U.S. online advertising spend will reach $152.3 billion in 2007, according to the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB). A significant increase from 2006, so besides the market growth, there has been increases in online advertising rates. Google's rates alone have increased 30% on average with no drop off in demand. It seems the market agrees that it is a steal of a deal.

MediaBrains sums it up with 'The moral of the story is, don’t expect online advertising rates to decline. Rather, make sure you’re getting the best possible results from your efforts. Embrace the medium that opened a new channel for reaching prospects and forever changed marketing as we know it.'

We couldn't agree more. Instead of comparing the costs, compare the effectiveness.