Forget bad journalism. The LAT front page ad is bad advertising
Almost all of the hand-wringing about this week’s front-page Los Angeles Times ad has been focused on journalists, and how hard this is for them to swallow.
“There is not an editor in this nation — including me — who really wants to see something like that on the front page of his or her publication,” (Russ) Stanton said.
Stipulated. And yet, this misses an important point: This may be bad journalism, but it’s even worse advertising. Good advertising doesn’t try to trick the viewer by pretending to be something it’s not.
The LAT ad is the print equivalent of a Windows-shaped pop-up banner that warns you that your operating system may be infected with a virus. It may get your attention, but it succeeds only in annoying you once you realize it’s just trying to fool you.
It would seem the Los Angeles Times paid no attention this week when Google’s CEO warned them and the rest of the newspaper industry not to piss off their customers:
“I would encourage everybody when they think about — in all the rhetoric, all the concern about this or that — think in terms of what your reader wants. Try to figure out how to solve their problem. These are ultimately consumer businesses and if you piss off enough of them, you will not have any more, right”
Yes, management of the Los Angeles Times should be smacked, but not for the reasons already cited around the web. They should be smacked because they sold an ad that pisses off both their readers and NBC’s snookered targets, all while making a major U.S. newspaper look as desperate as Mister Haney trying to scam a few dollars from the citizens of Hooterville.
Now, a days every thing in the world is a big part for every human being.
With due respect, I disagree with your analysis. The underlying premise highlights what really ails the industry. The idea that readers cannot tell the difference between the ad copy and the editorial content next to it assumes the reader is stupid, a mindset far too prevalent in newsrooms across the country. “Only editors know what’s newsworthy,” has been the mantra for more than a century. The Internet has proven that point-of-view to be, at the least inaccurate and, at worst, totally false. Anyone doing a Google search knows the difference between the paid ads and the natural search results. The reader decides for themselves what’s relevant to them, utilizing all, some or none of what they find.
Why can’t it be the same in print? Advertisers are fleeing newspapers, in part, because advertising content is increasingly less effective in persuading readers to become potential customers. If ad content looked more like news content, rather than less, (better organized, logical, with a real story to tell) readers would be far more likely to utilize it to make their purchasing decisions. The newspaper would become a unique and valuable advertising tool, rather than a dying relic. Say it can’t work? Check out the Wall Street Journal most days and you’ll find a two, three or four-page spread of advertising content that looks just like the rest of the Journal’s editorial copy. It’s effective advertising and takes nothing away from the integrity of the news.
Editors and reporters are always on their guard to insure the business aspects of a newspaper do not interfere with the newsroom’s ability to report objectively. Maybe it’s time for the business side to invoke the same iron-clad barrier in reverse. To survive, newspapers must adopt a new mantra: “it’s the advertising, stupid.”