Australia’s major newspaper publishing companies have launched a $5 million marketing campaign in a bid to stem falling advertising revenues and circulation figures.
Fairfax Media, News Corp, APN News & Media and Seven West Media have joined forces to back the ‘Influential by Nature’ campaign that’s aimed at protecting print’s advertising revenue share and highlighting the medium's 'influence and engagement.'
The move follows a grim update earlier this year from investment banker Goldman Sachs that predicted print’s share of the Australian advertising market would collapse from about 20% to just 1.2% by 2025.
Michael Miller, APN chief executive and chairman of newspaper lobby group The Newspaper Works, which is running the campaign, dismissed Goldman’s prediction.
“I don’t subscribe to it,” Miller told Fairfax media. “It [Goldman’s prediction] makes a number of assumptions that the world of 2015 is going to be the world of 2025. I would anticipate that we are going to see very different newspapers, very different websites."
The campaign will re-state the unique power of a medium that consumers trust and believe, said Miller. “Newspaper media is inherently topical, current, relevant and local – these are all characteristics of influence. Every effective and meaningful campaign needs influencers to drive trust, belief and action and we need to remind advertisers of the impact newspaper media brands still have today among consumers. Other media and individuals still turn to newspaper media brands as a reference point for reinforcement and for key decision making.”
The campaign, which will appear in the publishers’ own print and digital outlets and across other business, trade and social media, will highlight examples of the influence of recent newspaper campaigns.
One case study explores how campaigning across newspaper media led to a 40 per cent reduction in violent assaults on Sydney streets. In a video interview with The Newspaper Works, St Vincent’s Hospital head of neurosurgery, Dr Timothy Steel, said a combination of influential journalism and political action had achieved a huge drop in violence on the streets of Kings Cross.
The campaign for safer streets that was run across mastheads including The Sydney Morning Herald and The Daily Telegraph was an example of how newspaper media can connect with readers on both emotional and rational levels to achieve real results, Miller said.
Reclaiming and re-stating the position of influence was a bid to push through the avalanche of messages that advertisers hear about how to market their brands, said Miller, providing an opportunity for the industry body to 'walk the talk' and for the four big publishers to work together on a positive campaign. "To see a message that all the publishers agree on is what has made putting this campaign together quite powerful; that unity has translated into confidence that it’s the right direction.”