Advertising in magazines

Using press and magazine advertising, brochures, mailings - old hat or still cost-effective?
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livinginitaly
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Post by livinginitaly »

How do you approach a magazine about this sort of thing? I thought these advertorials were centered around a "theme", requiring more than one business of the same kind in the article.
Yes, magazines will often 'think up' a scheme that they feel is current and then research possible contributers. But this takes an awful lot of effort on there behalf and it has to be said that often these people are split into two types ....... the good ones, who are extremely 'overworked' and working on many articles / features and simply don't have the time to give adequate effort to a project like this .... and the bad ones, who are generally lazy and would much prefer people to come to them with ideas that they can take to the editor and claim 'sole copyright' :)

Take a look at the contact details of the magazine, they'll normally list the principle contact for each section or department. I normally contact the advertising manager.

Tell them that you're aware of the increase in popularity with the region your property is in, and that you'd like to 'share an idea' with them. You have a wonderful property with <sell features and benefits> and was wondering if they may like to 'give away' a weeks stay as a competition prize, in return for a 'little advertorial space'. In my experience i've never had anyone say no .......... i've had a few "we'll get back to you's" (and they have, after a 'prompter').

This would work best if you develop on your 'local association' theme. If in the advertorial, you can show a number of properties, all the better. Plus, if the demand is great you'll need somewhere to place the overspill. At all times though, ensure that all enquiries come through you.

To build on this, over the last few weeks a number of new routes have started up with Ryanair. Obviously I only really pay attention to the Italian routes, but for example .... they now fly from Doncaster and Liverpool to Pisa / Rome. I would be very tempted to contact the local press in Doncaster (Doncaster free press) and Liverpool (Liverpool Echo) with the offer. They'd then probably contact Ryanair to arrange a free flight deal and the whole thing would fill a page. It's 'current', 'newsworthy' and costs the paper nothing.

Many people 'play down' what they can offer through 'modesty' or 'lack of confidence', but if you have a quality property, in a sought after area, why not boast about it :)
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paolo
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Post by paolo »

Hi Joanna,

I think you just have to keep reminding magazines and newspapers of your idea for a piece. Journalists and writers are as lazy as anyone else and love having a fully formed idea drop in their lap. In the UK, the national newspapers and lots of magazines tend to have a USA special at least once a year, and in these they look to say something new and propose some less well-known holiday spots and themes.

You need an angle. For instance - this is where hip New Yorkers are starting to come; or, the unknown Long Island. Sooner or later a writer is going to have to come up with a piece on New York or Long Island and if you are at 'front of mind' at the time, you may get lucky.
Paolo
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HolidayWebs
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PR

Post by HolidayWebs »

What you're really talking about here is PR & it doesn't mean Page Rank here! but (I think) Public Relations. I have 2 sisters who work in the industry (not that they've helped me much) & you basically have to do the following:

1) find the magazines & publications you think are appropriate
2) contact them & try & get the 'Names' of the appropriate editor plus contact details
3) Put together a Press Release which must follow certain conventions
4) Send it out to all your contacts
5) & then, most difficult, chase them up & try & find out if they will run a story or whatever
6) & finally keep checking the mags - otherwise you'll never know if you're featured

It's a lot of work which is why PR companies can charge so much for what is in fact free advertising. It's also a case of who you know which is why PR companies specialise as they know particular journalists.

I did come across this UK web site which may be of interest to someone: http://responsesource.com/index_pr.php This isn't really of interest to the individual property owner, I shouldn't think.
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A-two
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Re: PR

Post by A-two »

HolidayWebs wrote:3) Put together a Press Release which must follow certain conventions
Thanks everyone for all the great suggestions. What are the conventions of a Press Release? If you could expand a bit, that would be helpful.

Thanks,
Joanna

www.southold-beach-house.com
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HolidayWebs
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Press Releases

Post by HolidayWebs »

I was afraid you might ask that ...

I've had a scout around & found these links which look useful:

How to Write A Press Release: 1099.com/c/co/gw/lf/linda011.html

& a Step By Step with a template to help you email one here: canadaone.com/promote/newsrelease1.html

You can see some live ones here: responsesource.com/releases/

Let us know how you get on. Z.
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TravelPixel
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Post by TravelPixel »

some interesting points here about old media (print media etc) vs new media (online, mobile phones, digital tv).

One of the key points of advertising in new media and indeed one of its main attractions is the ability to hyper target niche markets. While you can argue specialist print media does this it is held back by being in a 'sequential' (literary format) form.

Non sequential media (hyperlinks and the internet are the best example) allows crosslinking and super informed choice for those who know how to tap into the vertical market.

My 2 cents...

:D
Val
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Niche marketing

Post by Val »

As our cottage is in a bird watching reserve we thought it would be a good idea to put ads in specialist birdwatching magazines in order to target our audience. It remains to be seen whether this stragey will be effective. ( We're not quite off the ground yet- completion is imminent, possibly next week).
I will let you know what response we get.

I got a couple of quotes which seem very reasonable : £50 plus Vat for a run of four ads in 'Birdwatch' which is a glossy monthly. Is this new VAT rate a killer, or what?!! It bumps up the cost of that ad to £60!

I read the suggestions about The Lady magazine with interest. That may be worth a go , too. As has been mentioned, there are lots of people who don't use the internet.
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Nemo
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Re: Niche marketing

Post by Nemo »

Val wrote:I read the suggestions about The Lady magazine with interest. That may be worth a go , too. As has been mentioned, there are lots of people who don't use the internet.
As the thread here is very old, I suspect the market has moved on in spades! However, I always used to source our self catering holidays in The Lady, although now I rely exclusively on the internet. However, I suspect there are plenty of people out there who prefer other methods, rather than the internet.

It would be interesting to see what the cost is now of an ad in The Lady. One of my fellow owners in Norfolk, does extensive advertising in his local paper and brings in most of his bookings that way. I don't know what proportion of his income he spends though as it is quite expensive.
Val
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Advertising in The Lady

Post by Val »

I checked the prices for lineage ads in The Lady and they are expensive : £30.64 for the first ten words and £13.27 for the next five words. There is a discount if you opt for a block of several months' ads in advance, 10% if you book six, I think it was.
I think I'll wait and see how my Bird magazine ads pan out. Also I'm going to try Ebay, having sold loads of stuff on there in the past. It's a massive audience.
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Nemo
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Post by Nemo »

I do very well with ebay, particularly for my lower priced short breaks. It also reaches the odd person for peak season as well!
Casavarenna
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Paper Ads

Post by Casavarenna »

We used to holiday let in the UK and now in Italy. We get virtually no response from these (glossies, dedicated target markets (e.g. Opera, or newspapers) and we track it all by using dedicated domain names redirected.

90% of our business comes from the net and 9% from small travel personal travel agents.

We have also noticed over 10 years that the cheap flight/cheap hire car and multi-location break is much more popular. so much so we now take 3 day+ bookings and charge a higher % (e.g 3 days is 60% of the weekly price and same cleaning fee).

Its all net and agents for us...
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HoneypotCottages
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Post by HoneypotCottages »

A few months down the line I realise but to bump the thread again.....this is something we are looking into. I like the idea of approaching magazines, a holiday in return for advertising space however, I suspect this is more complicated and quite time consuming :?

Am going to do a bit more research 8)
Andy Smith
Val
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Post by Val »

The verdict on magazine advertising in the end was 'No' from us in the end.
We only had two enquiries and one booking from two lineage ads - one in the RSPB mag and one in another birding mag.
However it did result in the RSPB offering to put our brochures in their local visitor centre in return for putting some of their publicity leaflets in the cottage, which we were more than happy to do. This may result in some bookings in the future.
Also one of the RSPB wardens, having seen our ad in their magazine, said she'd be inviting family up and would like them to stay at our place when they came up, so you never know.
On balance though. we've decided to off-hire the lineage ads
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Giddy Goat
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Post by Giddy Goat »

Like that: "off-hire". :lol:

By the same token I decided to off-hire The Lady, both hard and soft editions. Tried them twice. Expensive and totally useless!
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greenbarn
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Post by greenbarn »

Giddy Goat wrote: I decided to off-hire The Lady, both hard and soft editions. Tried them twice. Expensive and totally useless!
I did that and ended up losing half the house, so certainly expensive.......

Val, I think that getting your brochures into the RSPB visitor centre is likely to bring rather more enquiries than the original magazine ad. Good luck with it.
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