• by June 2, 2004

Spin writer Tom Hespos raised an important issue yesterday in his column, "Why Google Won't Kill B2B Magazines (Just Yet)."

Tom riffed off of a report in Advertising Age that suggested Google's AdWords service is putting a damper on advertising in business-to-business print trade publications. The implication was that through AdWords, Google can deliver incredibly targeted and high qualified leads, prospects or customers, (or whatever you want to call them), to advertisers. Google's AdWords enables marketers to buy ad placements adjacent to search results generated from pre-determined keywords.

Hespos took issue with the idea that search engines are a dominant information source. He indicates that he starts his day by reading the online versions of trade publications that send newsletters via email (can we assume, Tom, that you are referring to MediaPost's MediaDailyNews, among others)? He says that after he "reads in," he uses search engines to conduct more refined research.

Interestingly, Business.com, an online B2B publisher whose investors include McGraw-Hill, Reed-Elsevier and Pearson, is itself a highly targeted resource for business professionals. It offers more than 50,000 business categories, and if someone can't find what they're looking for, Business.com shows Google results; the online venue has had a relationship with Google for four years, according to its CEO Jake Winebaum.

Winebaum says that trade publishers ought to partner with search engines to fuel growth, rather than hiding their heads in the sand. "People's information habits have changed pretty dramatically," and while there's been a recovery in some media, trade is not rebounding as quickly.

Also important, trade news and information is highly perishable and time- sensitive. "Anyone who is in business today is using the Internet to get information," Winebaum notes, adding, "The Internet has become the principal place to get trade information."

So will trade publishing go away, or is the sector just in a cyclical decline? "It's the delivery system that is going away," Winebaum projects. "Search is about demand fulfillment, content is about demand creation, the two go hand-in-hand, but it's not like one is going to replace the other. You have to read about something in order to search for it, the content is what informs you."

Right on.

Print as a delivery vehicle, particularly controlled circulation trade print is "brutally expensive" and the costs per lead are high, Winebaum adds. Trade intelligence is increasingly delivered online via email newsletters, blogs, and other interactive methods and publishers that don't get aggressive about being online are going to let rivals and business models that have yet to be determined gain a foothold.

Winebaum's advice? Work with search providers.