Ueli Custer, media expert and specialist journalist, on the efforts of the St.Galler Tagblatt Medien to gain a foothold in Thurgau.WW With the Mittelthurgauer Tagblatt and now the "Tagblatt," the SGT tried to fill the gap left by some titles that had been merged away. But despite great editorial efforts, it is not making any headway - why?Ueli Custer: That is hardly surprising. New titles that compete against established ones always have an extremely hard time. People who subscribe to a newspaper usually remain loyal to it. This is true even in the case of mergers: If the merged product offers a significantly different product than the merged title, most of the subscribers of the merged title will leave. Here, the experience of the Zürichsee-Zeitung in Sihltal speaks volumes. The integration of the Sihltaler into the Zürichsee-Zeitung resulted in the loss of the majority of Sihltaler subscribers, because they had subscribed to the local paper only as a second newspaper.
Is the situation of the "Tagblatt" also complicated by the fact that it is a foreigner from outside the canton?
It may be a stranger to Central Thurgau, but it has had its base in Upper Thurgau for decades, where it took on local titles at the time.
Or has marketing been neglected?
I don't know the marketing measures that have been taken, but I assume that a great deal of money will have to be invested if a certain degree of success is to be achieved. On the one hand, it's a question of large amounts compared to the subscription income, and on the other hand, it's a very long-term strategy over 10 to 20 years at best.
The situation in Solothurn is different from that in Thurgau: there the
Espace Media did not step into a gap that had suddenly appeared, but ventured
a new launch. The Solothurn Tagblatt is said to have around 2500 subscribers after 14 months. Compared to the Tagblatt in Thurgau, that's a success. Why the difference?
Espace Media obviously put up the big bucks and achieved the comparatively big success with extremely elaborate marketing measures such as six-month free subscriptions, cheap flights, early delivery and free death notices.
What share of circulation do dual subscribers actually account for in areas where two similar titles are competing for the same audience? Are there any empirical values from the last 30 years of newspaper mergers?
No, there are no public data on this. And if there were, they would not be transferable, as each market is structured differently.
Ueli CusterUeli Custer is one of the luminaries of media journalism. He acquired his skills as advertising manager at Calida, media planner, long-standing editor-in-chief of the trade journal Media Trend Journal and head of the Media Institute of the Swiss Press Association. Since 1998, he has worked as a specialist journalist, consultant to media companies, co-editor of PrintMarkt/WerbeMarkt-Studien, managing director of Interessengemeinschaft elektronische Medien and editorial supervisor of the media planning portal www.mediasearch.ch.
Interview: Markus Knöpfli

For the third time, the Tages-Anzeiger (TA) is using SMS response to attract new subscribers, and from next week, posters will be placed on streetcars and buses in the Zurich economic area inviting people to order a trial subscription via an 079 number. Compared to previous campaigns with dispensers and order cards, the SMS response rate was up to three times higher, writes the advertising agency Frei & Glaus. The conversion rate from trial to permanent subscriptions remained the same. Frei & Glaus is responsible for the campaign together with the interactive agency Newinternet.

Business magazines The stock market crisis has left a deep hole in the circulation of the investor magazine Stocks. Nevertheless, publisher Ralph Büchi is far from thinking of giving up. WW It must be very painful to have an investor magazine like Stocks on the market now. Can you put your tears into words?Ralph Büchi No one would have imagined that the negative development could last so long. But we remain convinced that Zurich and Geneva will remain important financial centers in the future. And it is equally certain that Switzerland will remain an investor country par excellence - with above-average private investor commitment. That is why, despite the current uncomfortable situation on the stock market, we are convinced that there is room for a weekly investor magazine like Stocks in this market.
But when it comes to selling off stocks, the despair on the stock market has certainly already left deep marks. The certification in spring is hardly likely to be a joyful event...
Sure, Stocks is clearly feeling the pinch. We will certify 18 percent lower this month than last year. The paid circulation is currently a good 21,000 copies. Nevertheless, I consider this result to be surprisingly good. It shows that there is still a core of investors who rely on a stock market magazine like Stocks, even in the face of such turbulent developments.
Sales at newsstands must look particularly dismal, which already accounted for just under 10 percent of circulation last year.
Newsstand sales will also certainly be below the 2002 figures. But with this result, Stocks is in good company with all other business titles. The losses hurt us less financially, because it's no secret that you don't earn much from newsstand copies. But interest at the newsstand is an important indicator of how well or badly a title is standing in the wind.
The newsstand buyers are not the hard core of investors. For the future success of such a magazine, it is above all important to be able to keep the core readers - and we have them with our subscribers.
Last week, the stock market closed below the psychological mark of 4,000 points, its lowest level in more than six years - meaning that confidence in equities is likely to be broken for a long time to come.
Most experts believe that we are very likely to see a massive upward correction in the next twelve months, albeit not with the excessive valuations of the nineties. It would probably be a bad decision to completely detach the invested funds from the stock markets now. In that case, there would be hardly any chance to accumulate these funds again. From a long-term yield perspective, there is no investment alternative to equities.
But at least among retail investors, we have to assume that confidence in equities has already fallen below the "point of no return."
I don't believe in a point of no return. What we are experiencing is a very strong, but also cleansing storm. After all, it is not primarily confidence in stocks that has disappeared, but rather confidence in many corporate leaders and various companies. But companies and managers are in the process of rebuilding that trust. Those who succeed in doing so will be rewarded by the financial markets.
And what if the distrust is more lasting than you suspect?
New investment products, such as structured financial products, aim to minimize risk for investors. Every day, such new creations come onto the market, allowing investors to put together their own personal risk profile. The fact is that investing money has also become more complicated as a result. But this is even an advantage for Stocks, because now more than ever investors need reading material to help them through the daily expanded offer.
A reorientation in terms of content or at least an expansion of the
Content of Stocks was not a topic until now?
We have discussed this a lot over the past few months. We have decided to keep our current focus. We are not turning Stocks into just any business magazine that generally covers business topics. We remain an investor magazine, but of course our horizons have broadened. After all, many investors today have large cash holdings that also need to be managed. We are also increasingly writing about other forms of investment; for example, fixed-income investments are a focus in the latest Stocks issue.
But that also means that Stocks' target audience is changing, now that retail investors feel most alienated by the stock market.
Our target group has shifted heavily in the direction of wealthy private investors. Online or day traders, a hallmark of the boom in 2000, are largely a thing of the past. This is also evident from the fact that of the major Swiss online traders, only Swissquote remains.
But Stocks will not be able to avoid cost-cutting measures either. How many people have you had to lay off?
We haven't laid anyone off. However, with ten people in the editorial department and four in layout, we have been a very lean team since the start. Of course, we are very happy about this tight staffing level at the moment. But we have also made other savings. We've cut back on our promotional print run, and we've put the brakes on circulation and advertising - just like all the other print media. We simply have to get through the winter in the best possible way...
... and wait for currently absolutely missing ads, which, especially in the financial sector, hardly ever return as violently as in the past boom years.
I am convinced that there is an enormous need to catch up, especially for advertising in the financial sector. After all, banks can't just stand by and watch their customers migrate to the competition or even turn their backs on the financial markets.
Believes in a return of financial service providers to the advertising market: Stocks publisher Ralph Büchi
Interview: Daniel Schifferle

The Quality in Journalism Association is presenting the Media Award for the second time. The prize honors "outstanding initiatives worthy of imitation" that ensure and improve journalistic quality and is awarded to publishers or editorial offices, media institutions or individuals. The projects must have proven themselves in practice or be about to be introduced. The first Media Award was presented in 2001 to the Zürichsee newspapers and the Zürcher Unterländer for their editorial handbook. The closing date for entries is June 16, 2003. Further information can be obtained by calling 01 318 64 64.

Fifteen months after 20 Minuten, Tamedia has also received permission from SBB Immobilien to equip the stations of the Zurich S-Bahn network with boxes for its Express. However, according to Werbewoche information, the "long-term and fairly priced contract" does not include any exclusive rights; to date, only 20 Minuten has such rights for the Bern and Basel regions. A total of 700 new distribution boxes - those of the ZürichExpress have already been sold on - will be used to sell slightly more than half of the commuter circulation of 190000 copies. However, Express Zeitung AG is placing most of these "points of distribution", which extend as far as Schaffhausen, Zug and Wil SG, around the railroad stations. The second Zurich commuter newspaper will also be available from March 24 at all VBZ stops and on the Forch and Sihltal lines.
(oc)

Blue Spirit Communications is now responsible for advertising and trade marketing for the car rental company Hertz and is developing pan-European POS advertising media and promotional tools in the travel retail sector for British American Tobacco International.

The 2003 edition of the Swiss Press Catalog - Newspaper Edition - has been published. The reference work of the Association of Swiss Advertising Companies VSW contains all the basic data for the placement of advertisements in newspapers, official journals, advertisements and consumer magazines. For each title there is information on circulation, publication frequency, type area, column layout, unit rates and page prices. The catalog can be ordered via www.vsw-assp.ch.

The one-man agency Markus Cavegn Werbung is to realize a B2B presence for K Zurich. The company offers outsourcing for advertising agencies and is part of the British agency group K Nine and was founded at the beginning of 2002.

Market research Wemf's advertising sales statistics are still taking some time It has become quiet around the Advertising Index Switzerland (AIS), the new Wemf statistics on advertising expenditure, which should show the invoiced gross advertising sales on a weekly basis. In the summer, Wemf announced the AIS for January. In fact, Wemf has been collecting and processing data since the beginning of the year. But it remains to be seen when it will be published. Certainly not in March, and whether it will be enough for April is uncertain, says Hans-Jürg Gränicher, AIS project manager and former managing director of Media Focus (MF). "We don't want to go out until the data is in order," he says. Then all figures would be shown retroactively to January. Gränicher admits that he underestimated the amount of data. AIS was initially open to working with MF. This is still the case, says Gränicher, but so far MF has not made any proposals. Jens Windel, MF-VR delegate, disagrees. Contact has been made with Wemf several times, he says. "But Wemf has other priorities for the time being." (mk)

Press market The advertising agency Publicis wants to strengthen the reader and advertiser base of the young NZZ am Sonntag with picture puzzles A year ago - on March 17 - the publishing group on Falkenstrasse launched its Sunday boat, the NZZ am Sonntag (NZZaS). The launching triumvirate - Felix E. Müller, Thomas Häberling and Tobias Trevisan - foresaw that it would be sent into troubled waters. But hardly anyone could have imagined at the time that such a rough storm would arise and shake up the advertising market to such an extent. Nevertheless, the NZZaS sailed close to the wind in the Zurich print regatta in its initial phase and is now optimistic about the subscription conversions following structural adjustments. Over the next few months, this cliff will decide whether it will be possible to keep the readers who were previously supplied free of charge on board as paying subscribers.
Playfully courted readers
According to projections by publishing director Trevisan, there is a lot to be said for this. In order to effectively support this goal, the publisher commissioned its in-house agency Publicis to develop a new audience and advertising campaign. Since, according to media specialist Ueli Custer, the title's strength lies more in the upper strata of the population, the creative team led by CD Markus Gut came up with a playful advertising idea. "While we focused on content and intentions in the introductory advertising, we are now aiming for a clearer positioning now that a certain level of awareness has been achieved," says Gut. "We are trying to combine the journalistic values of the NZZ - competence, credibility and seriousness - with the reading needs on Sunday - the day of relaxation and entertainment," Trevisan explains his guidelines.
Not only the information content, but also the reading pleasure should be emphasized. The UAP, of all things, is also claimed by competitor SonntagsZeitung. In contrast to their campaign, Publicis combined the independent publication of the NZZaS with lifestyle elements. The long-term concept comes across as a striking rebus of news topics and challenges the viewer to decipher the message - in the initial phase with even simple riddles. Even the first subjects reveal the multifaceted nature of the campaign, which is not limited to the sports culture subject of the prima ballerina.
Not only readers are called upon. The campaign reveals its great creative potential in the advertiser version, which also had to be targeted due to the relatively high thousand reader price of the NZZaS. Using the same mechanics, but brand logos instead of images, advertisers are conveyed the good taste and high brand affinity of the readers. Only the new maxim claim "to be enjoyed with understanding" is probably (still) unintentionally reminiscent of a warning against a possible reading overdose.
All beginnings are easy: The first reading (puzzle) ads from Publicis for the NZZ am Sonntag are still quick and easy to solve.
Luca Aloisi

Tourism marketing The Grisons ski and snowboard region of Flims Laax Falera is launching a new offer for March and April: Ski & Sleep, which is being promoted with an advertising campaign from Spillmann/Felser/Leo Burnett. The Alpenarena agency has created both the term Ski & Sleep and the corresponding visual, which is used in all advertising measures: two white cushions that look like two white mountains, snow-soft mountain cushions, almost like Fischli-Weiss.

EmmiSomething new every now and then: For once, an in-house production makes it into the ad rating. Click on www.werbewoche.ch/adrating and give your opinion on the aloe vera yogurt - but please apply cream to your hands first.Tibits
Everyone thought it was great that spring was also arriving in the "Tibits" and that the food was being served on the field.