Paper or plastic? …

This is interesting/frightening to those of us in the print media: If you go to Google.com and type, “decline in newspaper sales,” you’ll get 1.8 million virtual thoughts on the subject, give or take a few. Almost all of them seem to suggest that while educators can debate ad nauseam over whether Johnny can read, they would probably have to reach a consensus that he isn’t reading printed news.

This hurts me on many levels. Foremost, I might have to say, “ahem, I was wrong,” and I never like to do anything that beings with “ahem,” much less anything that ends with “I was wrong.” Throughout my adulthood, I have declared that as long as there is a men’s room there would be newspapers, but now I’m beginning to wonder. Today’s 30-somethings turn to the computer for news. The generation behind them will turn to the phone for same. Arithmetic never was my strong suit, but even I can do the math here: The printed word could fast become an endangered species.

While this development certainly affects my livelihood, it probably has an impact on your business, as well. If you’ve grown accustomed to communicating with your customers via the newsletter, you might want to start considering a Plan B. And Plan B almost certainly won’t have anything to do with ink and paper. I would take a look at all the e-letters you receive — and then pare them down to the ones you like. And then pick the one you like BEST.

Odds are, that’s the route you’ll ultimately want to take.

Of course, given the second paragraph of this missive, I might not be the best in the world at laying odds.

-- Yale

Comments

[trey]

Be careful as you move towards e-news that you don't leave a segment of the consumer behind. Some people delete their e-mails before even reading them. Others have Spam blocking programs that they don't update, and our e-mails get blocked. These people seem to respond better to our paper newsletter. So while the future may be more paperless right now there are still people who don't respond to our e-news but do respond to paper. It could be a response to receiving so much electronic solicitation.