Recently I've done some research for clients on advertising for their business. One was very interested in print advertising and one needed information for placing banner advertising on specific content-based Web sites (not Google Ads or ads on search engines). What was interesting to me is that although there were obvious differences, there we also many similarities in the offerings. Here are some of the similarities and differences I found with print and Web advertising:

Cost Per Thousand (CPM)

Although the pricing for print often started higher, when looking at CPM (Cost Per Mille), the pricing was similar for print publications and online resources. Those that had many readers and more demographic information about their readers could charge a higher CPM than those that had a smaller set of viewers and no demographic info.

Pricing Based on Target Audience

Another factor in the price for an ad in print and on a Web site was how targeted the content was. Interestingly enough, for the highly-targeted print publications, often their pricing was less per-thousand readers than their broader-reaching publications. Online it seemed to be the opposite. The more targeted your content was on a particular niche market, the more valuable the ads were seen and these targeted sites charged more for their ads.

Packaged Pricing

Both print publications and Web sites based on content were offering packages for advertising with them. There were print publications that created packages that included online ads, and similarly, there were Web sites that packaged print ads with online ad prices. Both also offered advertising in their e-mail marketing messages.

Options for Reaching Customers

When looking at the packages, the Web sites offered more options for different ways to reach their readership than the print publications. Some of the additional things the websites were offering were social media mentions, video reviews and inclusion in press releases.

It is important to mention that the most glaring difference between print advertising and online advertising is the ability to prove that your message was actually viewed. If you buy an ad in the paper, and that paper is mailed to all their subscribers, it's still possible that the publication was never opened, or that the section holding your ad was completely skipped. With online advertising you are paying for every time your ad is on a page that was actually SEEN (pay per impression/page views). This can all be tracked with analytics. The other benefit with advertising online is that there is no additional cost for color ads!!

Are you seeing the same similarities and differences in your research? If your company sells ads on your Web site, what other benefits do you explain to consumers when asked why they should spend their marketing dollars advertising on your site?

Photo by Ed Yourdon.