One of the first aspects of business where recession has hit, are advertising budgets. And that makes it fun to watch how businesses are going to spend from now on to blow their trumpet and attract consumers. However, this seems to have really taken its tool on the media in general and the U.S. newspaper industry in particular.
According to the latest figures from the Newspaper Association of America, the total advertising revenues from both print and online modes, declined by 16.6 percent to $37.85 billion. That is a whooping $7.7 billion less than what the newspapers made from ads in the previous year. With classifieds down by a huge 29.7%. and online advertising down by 1.8%, many of the newspapers are cutting down on costs and shedding of employees to make up for the void.
While online advertising accounts for only 8.3% of the newspaper advertising market, even this small chunk is taking a hit (though not by as much as the print). The trend is all the disturbing when you consider that the loss margins were around 2.4 percent in the second quarter of 2008, which went up to 3 percent in the third quarter showing that the times are only getting tougher.
Just shows that in these times advertisers will be hard to rope in whether you are in the print, electronic or online media!
[via TechCrunch]
