Job advertisements played the main role in the decline in newspaper advertising at the end of the year: according to the advertising statistics of the Swiss press, they fell by 33.1 percent by November, while the total number of advertising pages shrank by 11.8 percent. The free newspapers even lost 43.9 percent of their job advertisement pages. The Publicitas job index plummeted by 54.9 points to 121.6 points by October. Nevertheless, there is also some positive news to report: Unlike the global index, the job index has so far not fallen below the starting point (100) of 1994. And the fall has slowed considerably in recent months. The last time the index was this low - in June 1997 - the trough had been reached. In the months that followed, the curve soared to the dizzying heights of 338.2 points. (sm)

Wirtschaftspresse From January 30, 2004, the investor magazine Stocks is cooperating with the online bank Swissquote for six months.20,000 Swissquote customers will receive the magazine. New subscribers are also expected from the "Invest Game 2003". The magazine was sent to 16700 participants. Stocks has been published fortnightly instead of weekly since August. Since the relaunch, newsstand sales have increased by an average of 67 percent.

Newspaper pool A successful coup: NordOstCombi brings together 25 free titles independent of Publicitas Take the 22 free weeklies published by Zehnder in eastern Switzerland, combine them in the north with the Schaffhauser Bock and the Singener Wochenblatt (around Lake Constance) and in the Zurich lowlands with the Wochenspiegel - and you have NordOstCombi (NOC), the largest Swiss newspaper pool. The idea for this network came from Felix Walder, the former publishing director of Schaffhauser Nachrichten. But apparently it was a feat all of its own to put the 25 fleas in a sack. "The only reason this product didn't exist before was because everyone shied away from the effort of setting it up," wrote the NOC member Wochenspiegel, which is independent of Zehnder. The economic pressure of suffering weighed more heavily than the fact that the combi-discount makes individual titles bleed up to 50 percent.beyond the limit
The Kombi has now been on sale since September with a total circulation of 78,700 copies - until the end of the year with the "Three for two" introductory campaign. It consists of four expansion modules, with the fourth module building a bridge to Germany with the integration of the Singener Wochenblatt and, if required, establishing a connection to the ABC Südwest Verbund, the leading weekly newspaper pool in the state of Baden Württemberg (one million copies).
Bookings are made exclusively via Felix
Walder's company Wypag in Bülach (www.wypag.ch). This is already showing initial success: "In the start-up phase, representatives from the home/furnishings, dental, health, education/schools, exhibitions, jobs and real estate sectors have placed advertisements," says Walder - all new customers for the NOC titles.
Offers for 2.8 million
Although Walder, the proactive advertising salesman, does not want to give any sales figures for the first three months, he does announce that some major customers have made firm bookings for 2004 and that offers for around CHF 2.8 million have been written. "But that doesn't mean that all customers will actually book the NOC," adds the busy media professional. He reckons it will take around three years to build up the business, by which time he believes he will be able to achieve sales of five to seven million francs. Walder does not rule out the possibility of other members joining the NOC. He has already received the first inquiries, he says.
Felix Walder aims to achieve sales of up to seven million francs.
NordOstCombi: The whole of Eastern Switzerland in one go.
25 titles under one roofThe basic module NOC I consists of Kreuzlinger Nachrichten, Schaffhauser Bock, Thurgauer Nachrichten and Winterthurer Zeitung (141465 copies, 1/1 page vf: 10255 francs). NOC II adds Wiler Nachrichten and Wochenspiegel (214142 copies, 1/1 page vf: 14291 francs). NOC III, the most popular combination, expands NOC II with Aarauer Nachrichten, Aargauer Rundschau, Appenzeller Rundschau, Bodensee Nachrichten, Bündner Nachrichten, Rheinfelder Nachrichten, Luzerner Rundschau, Nachrichten für das Limmattal, Neue Oberaargauer Zeitung, Neue Oltener Zeitung, Oberthurgauer Nachrichten, Rheintaler Bote, Schwyzer Woche, St.Galler Nachrichten, St.Galler Oberland Nachrichten, Zuger Woche, Züri Nachrichten and Züri Rundschau (700014 copies, 1/1 page vf: 39958 francs). Finally, NOC IV complements NOC III with the Singener Wochenblatt (1/1 page vf: 47663 francs). (mk)
Markus Knöpfli

Media Award The deadline for entries for the 5th Worldmediafestival is 31 January 2004, and the competition for audiovisual communication is organized by the Hamburg communications agency Intermedia. The award ceremony will take place on May 11 and 12. Further information is available at www.worldmediafestival.org.

APGHürlimann reading on a poster: Nice to see literature in public spaces - but in the middle of winter? Warming words on the Publicis campaign at www.werbewoche.ch/adratingPostShop
Yes, the AdRaters have decided and found an apt description for the campaign: "weak as a bag."
Top 29,07%
Flop 70,93%

Modesty is a virtue - and the new Swiss TV stations hope to get further than their predecessors with it: unlike Tele 24 and TV 3, they are not taking on the advertising market leader SRG, but are looking for alternative niches. U1 TV Station, a Swiss-German broadcaster with Austrian backers, only wants to generate a third of its revenue from traditional advertising. According to project manager Peter Kölbel, the majority of the budget is to be covered by "special forms and content utilization". The marketing agency Unimark was planning two infomercial programs on U1 that would have combined show elements with product placement and teleshopping. However, the exercise was called off in December because U1 did not meet Unimark's "requirements for TV programs". U1's other mainstay remains telephony: viewers are to actively participate in game shows via chargeable numbers. The Zurich local station ZüriPlus is also banking on this. However, managing director Peter Steinmann has come up with another innovative source of income: ZüriPlus pays TV production companies to broadcast their formats. On the one hand, the station acts as a showcase for the producers, while on the other hand they collect the sponsorship fees for their programs directly. In this way, ZüriPlus aims to cover its costs from the outset. Peter Kölbel, project manager of U1 TV Station.
(sm)

2003 was a good year for SRG researcher Matthias Steinmann, although the winds of change from Armin Walpen's executive floor blew against him within SRG, leaving him feeling a little sniffy in the first half of the year. But where Walpen's cold breeze did not reach, for example in the Telecontrol Group, the professor, who is about to retire, was back on top form. As Telecontrol CEO, this year he not only presented his latest invention, the Mediawatch, which measures radio, TV, cinema, posters and print, but also proved that he knows a thing or two about marketing. Although the device is not yet on the market, he already has the first large orders in his pocket (WW 43/03). But he is also selling more and more of the Telecontrol box abroad, which hardly sold in large quantities in the nineties. His biggest coup, however, was in terms of marketing himself: the job as head of radio and TV research, which he will soon be giving up here at home, he is taking up again in a similar form in Saudi Arabia - in an institute he is founding there. He is delighted. Also because Walpen's frost is guaranteed not to harm him there. Soon to continue his research in Saudi Arabia: Matthias Steinmann.
(mk)

E-commerce Internet provider T-Online is taking over the Scout24 group from Zug-based Beisheim Holding, for which the Deutsche Telekom subsidiary is paying around 180 million euros in cash. The purchase agreement is subject to antitrust approval and the carve-out of the companies Morgen & Morgen and GesundheitScout24, which are not strategically relevant for T-Online, from Scout24 AG. The latter expects sales of around EUR 70 million and a positive EBITDA in the single-digit millions in 2004.

Salaries In 2003, managers in the marketing/advertising/PR sector had to accept massive pay cuts. According to a survey by Jobpilot and 20 Minuten, the annual income of top managers fell by a steep 15.04 percent on average. Read on pages 8 and 9 to find out what else moved the industry this year.

Private TV Harald Schmidt's departure from Sat 1 is an image problem for Roger Schawinski, but not a catastrophe, believes Helmut Thoma, former boss and now consultant to competitor RTL.Schmidt is not capable of winning over more viewers, he said in an interview with SonntagsBlick. What Sat 1 urgently needs is a good serial program, especially a soap series. Thoma does not believe that there is anything to be gained from a news offensive. "You can only decorate a private channel with news at best".

The new communications agency of the Gottlieb Duttweiler Institute for Business and Society (GDI) is called Festland, and the St. Gallen advertising agency will be responsible for all of the GDI's corporate and product communications in future.

The advertising agency Rive Gauche has won the overall account of the Valais Cantonal Bank: the Geneva-based agency in the TBWA Switzerland network came out on top in a pitch. The new campaign will be launched in spring and will shape the bank's overall image over the next four years.