Hotel Travel NewYork

Off line advertising is a great way to get an extra traffic
boost, but it can be very expensive if you haven’t done it
before….

There is a ‘fixed’, published rate for advertising in
newspapers and magazines. This is called the “rate-card” price.
The ‘rate-card’ is a newspapers or magazines published “priced
list” of space in the publication concerned.

Does the “rate-card” price reflect the average price you could
expect to pay in the publication concerned? NO! It represents
the absolute highest, top dollar rate you could ever be insane
enough to contemplate paying!! The “rate card” price for say,
Daily Mirror would be the £5000 price. The”rate card is a kind
of wish list from the newspapers. This is the price they would
like to get for all of their adverts.

This is what they consider the space to be “really” worth. In
practice, they hardly EVER get “rate card” for an advert, and
most of the time they get half of one-third of rate card prices.

However, if you are naive little bunny, and you telephone any
national newspaper classified department and say to them; “Hey,
look, I’m a rank amateur in this business, I was wondering if
you could see your way clear to telling me how much my half-page
advert would cost to insert in your excellent publication.”

They will reply……

“Why certainly sir, our rate card for that advert is….let me
see now….ah yes, £5000.”

And you hop away thinking:- “Cripes! That’s a bit steep. But if
the competition is paying that rate , then they must be really
pulling in the orders”. So you stump up your five grand, and
send your advert into the paper. The conversation on the
classified desk goes something like this:-

Sue: “Here , John, you’ll never guess what! You know that ACME
publishing company I quoted five grand last week?”

John: “Yeah?”

Sue: “They’ve only gone and sent me a cheque and their advert!”

John: “What!!! You’re pulling my plonker!”

Sue: (Laughing). No. Straight up. Look, here’s the cheque.”

John: “Bank it, quick!”

Etc., Etc. You sit back and wait expectantly. The advert
appears. The phones start ringing, the first day’s post arrives.
The results look unpromising, but you reassure yourself that
people need a bit of time to respond, and the post is a bit slow
etc. Next day you get about one third of the post you expected.
You put this down to a hold-up at the sorting office. Next day
you get about one tenth of the post you expected. and the
following day you get about three letters! You start to become
alarmed. Ten days later, you know you’ve blown about three
grand. You hastily examine your advert. What’s wrong with it?
You look at the competition. Hmm, they’re offering a thirty day
money-back guarantee and you’re only offering fourteen. Damn!
That must be it.

You call Sue (now your friend) on the classified desk. You tell
her your tale of woe. She’s biting her wrist to stop laughing
long enough to talk to you. The conversation might go like this:-

You: “Sue, I had a terrible response to that advert.”

Sue: (Sympathetic) “Oh no! Give it a bit more time. Sometimes
the first advert never does well because you’re a new company.
People need to see the advert a few more times before they’re
confident enough to buy from you.”

You: “You reckon?”

Sue: (Hardly able to control her mirth). “No doubt about it,
Also, you went in on a Tuesday, didn’t you?”

You: “Yes….”

Sue: “I think you ought to try a Friday. It’s closer to the
weekend, and people are more relaxed.”

You: (Growing donkey ears). “Do you really think so…?”

Sue: “Definitely. As it happens, we have some space in this
Fridays issue. It’s a really great position. We normally charge
more for a Friday, but since you lost money last time, we’ll let
you have it for £4700.”

So you book the space, and increase your money-back guarantee
(or whatever). You’ve guessed the rest. Friday comes and goes
and the response is about the same as your last advert. You kiss
another three grand bye-byes. But before this, down at the
classified department:-

Sue: “Here’s a riddle for you, John. What company starts with
“A” and has just sent me a cheque for £4700?”

John: “You’re putting me on!!”

Sue: (Waiving cheque) “Tum tee tum tum!”

John: “You jammy sod!”

Etc. Etc.

Now why would a nice girl like Sue take such enormous pleasure
in stitching you up? Does she hate you? Did you kick her cat
once, and she’s never forgotten? Oh no, nothing so personal. Sue
is pleased because:-

She’s making a thumping ten percent commission on each advert
she sells!!

And ten percent of five grand is £500. Ten percent of £4700 is
£470. That makes £970 for two phone calls from you! She’s
probably quite a nice girl. I’m sure she buys her mother flowers
on Mothers’ Day. And I also know that she is having an expensive
foreign holiday this year, courtesy of ACME publishing!