Here's a concept: your average newspaper may have to "go the distance" with you in order to get your business for classified advertising - perhaps charging next to nothing for an ad. That's not surprising to AdJab central, really. What IS surprising is that "newspapers have almost lost all advertising for apartments," according to a former Knight Ridder staffer. Wow.So will this dramatically damage the newspaper business? Away from the usual suspect arguments about newspapers and their readership drops these days, will the paper just up and dump the classified at some point? There's still a ton of people who can't live without their inky pages, so it's chicken/egg - but what's worse, having a cost structure for printing the paper that's hurt by minimal business, or peeving some folks by forcing them to the Internet or a competitor?
1. I think that classifieds have no future on paper.
The way you can search these ads online beats the paper (ink or papercuts nevertheless) by far.
I have compiled a list of recent links to posts and articles about the future of the print medium here:
http://jungleweb.blogspot.com/
(if you're interested).
Thanks for pointing me to one of these!!
Posted at 5:51PM on Aug 30th 2005 by thecod