La Porte Biz Blog

I have been receiving a lot of feedback on the state of the local newspaper and it is not positive.  There seems to be a negative view of the direction and reach of the paper.  Most people and business told me that the lack of local news is their main reason for getting the paper..  With the lack of local news, they feel it is not worth the time or money.

With most of use getting our word and national news from the internet or the cable news channels, you would think that the local newspaper would capitalize on being us the local news in print and on their websites.  Yet, this is not being done.

As a business owner this means that the investment in advertising in the local newspaper is not getting the return you deserve.  With decreasing subscriptions and higher advertising rates, business owners need to be more "targeted" when placing newspaper advertising.  Also, be more demanding as to the service and return provided by the local newspaper.  Sometimes the local newspapers tend to forget that they work for you and not the other way around.

If you have any thought, questions etc., please post them here or drop me an e-mail at eaglemediapub@gmail.com

Have a GREAT Week!

As some of you may know, I worked for the local newspaper for almost 4 years. I was “downsized” along with over 30 others at the end of October. The reasoning was due to cost cutting measures. Which looking at the state of newspapers, I do understand. Yet, I have don't understand the logic behind cutting cost at the expense of your subscribers and your business clients.

I decided to take a survey of 100 residences and 30 businesses in La Porte. The results are somewhat surprising, but not unexpected from the comments I received.

Of the 100 residences, 32 subscribed to the paper. 12 of the 68 non-subscribers had canceled or did not renew the paper in the last 6 months. This is a loss of over 24% in 6 months! Of the 32 subscribers 7 of them plan on not renewing the paper, when it comes time to renew. That is a loss of just over 21%. Which means that in a one year period, the paper could lose 38% of it's subscribes.

Of the 30 local businesses, 16 subscribe to the paper and 14 do not. Of the 14 that do not receive the paper, 4 of them canceled the paper in the last 6 months, a 20% loss.. Of the 16 subscribers, 3 (18.75%) do not plan on renewing the paper. Which could me a loss of 35% in a years time of business subscribers. Now some of the businesses do receive the paper at home also, and they are undecided on if they plan on renewing the paper for home use.

The reasons I received on why they do not get or why they dropped the paper, ranged from mild to harsh. One of the main reason was the paper has taken a step back in look and coverage. I was even told that there is more local news in the sister paper for Michigan City. The new format was a sticking point with the majority of people. They felt it was smaller, harder to read, and they didn't like the multiple sections.

When asked about the paper's website, 35% of the people surveyed did say they visited it in the last month. The comments on that where just as negative. Too bland, no good content, cannot access all of the classifieds, and it isn't updated over the weekends.

The results of the survey and the comments make you question the commitment of the local paper to serving the community and the local businesses. With the state of the local economy, local businesses need to demand that their advertising gets results!

Do you have any comments, questions or suggestions on this subject? E-mail them to me and we can address them in a future issue.

Have a GREAT Week!

An interesting situation happened the other day that validates my earlier blog post about websites and yellow pages. I was visiting one of my clients, a local restaurant, and as I was talking with the owner a young lady came in to pick up an order for her office. When she was given the total she was surprised. The owner came over and went over the order item by item. Then the young lady said, “You mean the prices you have in the yellow pages are wrong?” You see the owner had place an menu page in one of the local yellow page directories 3 years ago. She didn't renew it after it ran the first time.

The owner explained that the directory that the menu was in was 3 years old and gave the young lady a current menu. So you can see, that even 3 year old telephone directories are even being used and can affect your business. With 3 directories in our market, we have trouble knowing which directory is most used (of course the rep of each book will tell you theirs' is most used) and even if your customers and potential customers are using a current directory. This lends to the idea that with a website you are able to keep your customers and potential customers current on you business.

On that same visit, I was presented with an example of poor customer service. The business owner had some issues with a bill for advertising from the local newspaper, In late February she had asked me for my advice on how to handle the situation and I told her to call or write the company with her concerns. She had mentioned that she had talked with her sales rep and the rep never followed up on the problem. So she sent a letter to them in mid March. Yet she still hadn't received any communication from the company. I did ask her if she had received a bill for the advertising for April, as the company has been billing her for the advertising and interest, and she told me that she had received a bill, yet. Still she doesn't know what the status of her account is, because the company has yet to communicate with her that the problem was taken of or to let her know that her letter was receive and they are looking into the situation

What this tells us about customer service is that communication with your customers and follow up are the most important activities in the process. By not communicating and following up with the business owner the company has told her that her problem is not important to them and her business is not important to them. With generating repeat and new business getting tougher, we all must take very customer service issue seriously, by communication and following up with our customers.

If you have any comments to this post, please feel free to do so.

Have a GREAT Week!

After spending over 15 years in the Yellow Page industry, with an independent yellow page publisher (some of you may remember U. S. Directories, the Red, White & Blue phone book), I feel that they aren't the force they use to be in marketing your business. Like the newspapers, the industry hasn't kept up with the Internet. Seeing the lack of creativity in that industry in regards to the Internet and the lack of a good web product, as a local search engine they still cater to the national companies while putting local business search results at the back of the line.

Here are a few advantages of having your own website and cutting your yellow pages budget to increase your marketing results.

1. A Nielsen Online study for February 2008, shows that there are over 150,470,00 active internet household users in the U. S.

2. Search engine use is dominated more by such sites as Google, Yahoo, and MSN, over the yellow page sites.

3. Cost is lower. A full page, full color yellow page ad can cost you over $10,000. per year.

   That is for one directory in our market, we have 3! A basic presence web site ( 3 to 5 pages), can cost you approximately $1200. to start. After that, depending on your updating and web

   maintenance package, you could average $500. to $2000. per year. That's for 3 to 5 pages!

4. Updates to keep up with your changes in business and market, with the yellow pages you are stuck with what is in print and on the web for 1 year. With a web site you can change it to meet you business needs.

5. As a marketing tool the web gives you more of a chance to educate and inform your customers and potential customers. With yellow pages you are limited to the space you can afford.

These are just a few of the advantages of a web site over yellow pages advertising. I am not suggesting that you drop out of the yellow pages, just look at realigning your advertising and marketing budget to either build or improve your website. If you are interested in learning more, please give me a call or drop me an e-mail.

Please feel free to post your thoughts on this subject. Next time we will discuss newspaper advertising and the web.

Have a GREAT week!

To help the entire La Porte business community, let's share our thoughts on the following questions. Please e-mail your responses to eaglemediapub@gmail.com. We will share the best thoughts here and even some of the concerns. I will keep your name and business name private.

1- What is type of actions are you taking to "weather" the current economic downturn?

2- Have you cut, increased or realigned your advertising budget? If you have realigned your budget, what are you doing differently than last year?

3- Have you adjusted your hours?

4- Have you cut staff?

5- What are your biggest concerns for your business in 2008?