More advertisements despite slack
Advertising Market: For the first time, PrintOnline (POL) is not lowering its rates but is keeping them the same—because an increasing number of small ads were not generating higher revenues. In return, POL is offering more flexibility for so-called dealer ads.
Advertising market For the first time, PrintOnline (POL) is not lowering its rates, but keeping them the same - because more and more small advertisements were not generating higher revenues. At the beginning of 2003, PrintOnline (POL) has almost reached its target for the transmission of advertisements smaller than a quarter of a page (110,000 advertisements)," says POL Managing Director Kurt Obrist, and - to emphasize the importance of POL - he adds: "The volume of advertisements mediated by POL in 2003 corresponds to around 50 percent of all advertising pages reported in the VSW statistics. "5.5 percent under budget
The flip side of the coin: the non-profit company, in which Ringier, NZZ, Tamedia and Publicitas each hold a 25 percent stake, fell 5.5 percent short of its budget with a turnover of CHF 1.9 million. The reason: "The number of orders for small advertisements increased more than expected," says Obrist. POL had budgeted for a 25 percent share, but in the end it was a good 40 percent. As a result of the lower price category, this led to a reduction in revenue compared to the budget and the previous year (2002 revenue: just under CHF 2 million). For the first time, POL is therefore not reducing prices in 2004 - previously, rates were reduced every year. According to Obrist, the increase in small advertisements is partly due to the economic situation and partly to the fact that, thanks to the lower prices, POL is also being used more frequently by job advertisers.
POL will soon be launching POLAS, a new service for advertisers who want to make their ads regionally customizable (so-called dealer ads), for example. POLAS stands for PrintOnline Advertisement System. In future, this should make it possible to save a basic advertisement - with the CI of a car brand, for example - in the POL system in such a way that authorized garage owners can access it directly. They will then insert their individual text, a new title or their own address, select a different image if necessary and then place a booking order for their regional newspaper. "We will be launching POLAS this month and are currently still looking for pilot customers," says Obrist. The client will be charged for storing the data in the POL system and generating it, while the recipient will continue to pay for the individual order.
Avoid "smearing"
POL also wants to help improve the print quality of advertisements. A quality club is being initiated for this purpose, which data producers on the one hand and print shops on the other can join. The aim is to switch to the ISO standard PDF/X-3 for data transmission in the current year, which will avoid a "smear effect" in future, particularly in newspapers, according to Obrist. However, this would require software adaptations on the sender and, above all, the recipient side. For publishers of large newspapers, who are in the process of installing new printing presses anyway, the changeover to the international standard is not a problem. For smaller publishers, however, it is. This is why POL wants to provide all those publishers who would not be able to cope with a changeover with the appropriate tools.
PrintOnline boss Kurt Obrist
Markus Knöpfli
The flip side of the coin: the non-profit company, in which Ringier, NZZ, Tamedia and Publicitas each hold a 25 percent stake, fell 5.5 percent short of its budget with a turnover of CHF 1.9 million. The reason: "The number of orders for small advertisements increased more than expected," says Obrist. POL had budgeted for a 25 percent share, but in the end it was a good 40 percent. As a result of the lower price category, this led to a reduction in revenue compared to the budget and the previous year (2002 revenue: just under CHF 2 million). For the first time, POL is therefore not reducing prices in 2004 - previously, rates were reduced every year. According to Obrist, the increase in small advertisements is partly due to the economic situation and partly to the fact that, thanks to the lower prices, POL is also being used more frequently by job advertisers.
POL will soon be launching POLAS, a new service for advertisers who want to make their ads regionally customizable (so-called dealer ads), for example. POLAS stands for PrintOnline Advertisement System. In future, this should make it possible to save a basic advertisement - with the CI of a car brand, for example - in the POL system in such a way that authorized garage owners can access it directly. They will then insert their individual text, a new title or their own address, select a different image if necessary and then place a booking order for their regional newspaper. "We will be launching POLAS this month and are currently still looking for pilot customers," says Obrist. The client will be charged for storing the data in the POL system and generating it, while the recipient will continue to pay for the individual order.
Avoid "smearing"
POL also wants to help improve the print quality of advertisements. A quality club is being initiated for this purpose, which data producers on the one hand and print shops on the other can join. The aim is to switch to the ISO standard PDF/X-3 for data transmission in the current year, which will avoid a "smear effect" in future, particularly in newspapers, according to Obrist. However, this would require software adaptations on the sender and, above all, the recipient side. For publishers of large newspapers, who are in the process of installing new printing presses anyway, the changeover to the international standard is not a problem. For smaller publishers, however, it is. This is why POL wants to provide all those publishers who would not be able to cope with a changeover with the appropriate tools.
PrintOnline boss Kurt Obrist
Markus Knöpfli
