• by Michael Shields , October 12, 2004

Newspaper publishers have never been great marketers, but they need to learn quickly if they are to adapt to a challenging customer acquisition marketplace, where the Do-Not-Call registry has handcuffed what was many papers' most reliable tool for generating subscribers.

That's the assessment of a new study being bandied about by management consultancy firm Inforte. The study, conducted in conjunction with the Newspaper Association of America, is being presented to various vice-president-of-circulation-types at member NAA newspapers in an effort to help newspapers improve their marketing expertise.

"Newspapers are constantly looking at ways to improve acquisition," says Scott Stawski, vice president of media at Inforte. "But in the past one to three years, they have intensified their efforts."

Until recently, many newspapers relied on telemarketing for upwards of 40 percent of their new customer acquisitions. Now those figures are slipping precipitously, as millions sign up to disallow telemarketers following the passage of Do-Not-Call legislation signed by President Bush just over a year ago.

Papers must diversify and customize their marketing in order to adapt, says Stawski. "The underlying premise is go to market using customer segmentation," he says. "You need to have a very unique knowledge of your customer base, and use multiple channels to target them."

To identify which channels can be most effective, Inforte commissioned the help of over 50 newspapers of various sizes nationwide. They compiled their best practices in customer acquisition, creating case studies in categories ranging from sales crews to direct mail to kiosks.

For example, according to the study, The Fort Worth Star has demonstrated higher-than-industry-average success in motivating its 6,000 carriers to generate subscriptions using contests and other incentives. At the same time, The Athens Banner has found success with college-based sales crews, while The Baltimore Sun has worked directly with the Direct Marketing Association to master the use of direct mail.

According to Stawski, marketing has never been a traditional specialty for newspapers in the past, as many were family-owned and run primarily by journalists.

Newspapers have long collected boatloads of data on their subscribers, but this information is typically used only tactically, not strategically.

Now, with so many newspapers being owned by profit-driven corporations, papers must embrace such concepts as predictive modeling while examining which sales tactics work for which particular consumer segments--and which pay off with better customer retention.

Stawski says that over the last two years or so, big papers, such as The Boston Globe and The Orlando Sentinel, have begun investing in database infrastructure technology (something that not coincidentally, Inforte specializes in), and have hired specialists to implement these programs.

"This is the first study that looked at the inside and outside of the business," Stawski says. "We've had very good reaction. There are no big surprises here, but this study documents a clear path to improvement."