March 29, 1999
Vol. 11, No. 7

BILLBOARDS IN TORONTO PUT MORE ON DISPLAY THAN A FRONT PAGE

Xerox marries technology and Globe and Mail in a marketing flash

Big front page: Globe and Mail VP Sales Sandy Muir shows one of the billboards that displays each day's front page (Photo: John Harquail/Black Star)

The promise of technology – at least in the newspaper business – was always that of labor savings, and speed.

Where hundreds of craftsmen once stood building pages with hot metal, hammers and saws, today stands a box no bigger than a refrigerator, calmly pumping out the same – if not more – pages as its predecessors.

And whereas 50 years ago a morning newspaper might have closed its front page at 7 p.m. or slightly later, today that same deadline is later by five or more hours.

But some bright people in Toronto have figured out a way to leverage technology toward a marketing purpose.

For eight weeks that began March 22, every morning at 1:30, a digital version of the front page of the Globe and Mail will be rushed to two job shops, where fancy digital color printers that handle material 54-inches wide (and as long as is "manageable") output the page.

The large, long strips are then delivered to a billboard company, which rushes the image of the front page to seven billboards around the metropolitan Toronto area, so that commuters on their way to work can get a sense of the news of the day.

This marketing campaign was dreamed up and paid for by Xerox Corp., the makers of the wide color printers, and there's an object lesson here.

I am not suggesting that newspapers around North America all contract with Xerox to put up front-page billboards every morning, but I am suggesting that there are new and wonderful technologies that can improve marketing but aren't being utilized.

(Conflict-of-interest alert: Though I have consulted with Xerox, it wasn't with this group or on this project.)

For many U.S. papers – more than 40 percent, according to the TrendWatch Newspapers 1998 survey – the entire publication is in digital format. Publishers should start realizing that with the entire package in digital format, things can be done.

Like what? Glad you asked:

  • Establish a marketing relationship with the local mall – install in several locations computer-based kiosks that hold CD-ROMs with that day's paper (and/or provide intranet access to only your on-line edition).

  • Provide your local public libraries with access to the on-line edition or a CD-ROM-based edition.

  • Using technologies similar to Xerox's, put the day's front page on the sides of your delivery trucks.

  • Provide advertisers with enlarged copies of their display advertising, for in-store promotion (and cross-promotion).

    That's the key in Toronto: "We're delighted when you work with a client and can have this kind of creative approach that really serves us both very well," Anne Marron, vice president of marketing for the Globe and Mail, tells Senior Editor Pete Wetmore. "We are the vehicle they're using. It's good for us.

    "We've got seven high-traffic locations where we've got the face of our product up there," Marron says, "plus it's good relations with a client."

    Marron is right, because the promise of technology is fulfilled only when newspapers decide to cooperate – with it, and with their clients.

    – David M. Cole

    Inside ...

    From NEWSINC., March 29, 1999, Copyright © 1999, The Cole Group. All Rights Reserved.

    • Top | ColeGroup.com | Consulting | Cole Papers | NewsInc. | Cole's Store | Miscellanea | Search
    Copyright © 1990-2008, The Cole Group. All Rights Reserved. Contact us.
    Modified date: 03/29/1999, 11:24:13 AM.
    URL: http://www.newsinc.net/990329sa.html