ViewPoint
September 2009

Verified Would Like to Welcome...

Jobboom
Canoe, Inc.
Montreal, QB
Jobboom is a free monthly magazine that delves into the job market, career, and lifestyle-related realities. It calls out to workers from different backgrounds who are concerned with how work affects their lives and society. Jobboom takes interest in their day-to-day lives, gives them a voice and tools to fulfill their potential at their workplace, and informs them in a bold and no-nonsense way.

The Hawk Eye
Harris Enterprise, Inc.
Burlington, IA
The Burlington Hawk Eye is Iowa's oldest daily newspaper, serving the Southeastern Iowa and West-Central Illinois region.

Ottawa Herald
Harris Enterprise, Inc.
Ottawa, KS
The Ottawa Herald provides timely news and information relating to the lives and interests of its readers. The Herald promotes local commerce through advertising and promotional opportunities driven by enlightened consultation, leading the community to progressive courses of action by means of community forums and through fearless editorial stances.

The Journal Record
The Journal Record Publishing Co.
Oklahoma City, OK
The Journal Record is the daily business and legislative newspaper of record for Oklahoma, with a focus on business professionals, large industry sectors, and small businesses. The Record's award-winning writers cover the state from news bureaus in Oklahoma City, Tulsa, and at the State Capitol.

E-Newsletter Survey

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Trad Media Still Influential In Travel Decisions

About 117 million Americans—or about 52% of U.S. adults—have taken at least a two-day trip in the last two years. But only 47% of them used the Internet to research and make travel arrangements, per a new study.

C. Lee Smith, President and CEO of Ad-ology Research, tells MediaDailyNews that websites for specific hotels, attractions, and locations ranked high in the survey, but conceded he was a little surprised that just half of those surveyed relied on the web to arrange travel. "Another surprise is that travel magazines did as well as they did, as did newspapers' entertainment sections. Traditional media is still holding its own."

Magazines were the most influential for travel services; newspapers were the most influential for local attractions.

Some 39% of recent travelers say online media actually influenced their choice of travel services; 34% used the Internet to search for flights, and 31% to search for hotels. Hotel/bed and breakfast websites had the most influence on choice of travel service.

The data is per Westerville, Ohio-based Ad-ology Research's study on media influence on consumer choice in travel services. The firm says online content also influenced 34% to visit local attractions and events, like amusement parks, zoos, and concerts. Traditional media influenced 27% of travelers and 32.7% of those visiting local attractions.

The firm found that word of mouth and digital also had a major influence, especially on younger consumers. Social media influenced the travel choices of 35.9% of 18- to 24-year-olds, versus 23% of all U.S. adults.

Markets where spending on airfare is highest are New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Chicago, Philadelphia, Washington, Boston, Dallas, Houston, and Atlanta, in descending order. For the study, Ad-ology surveyed an online consumer panel of 1,154 adults in January.

© 2009 MediaPost Communications

Monetizing Newspaper Content

According to a survey conducted for the American Press Institute reported in Media Buyer/Planner, more than half of newspaper publishers believe readers will pay to access online newspaper content. 51% of publishers say they believe they can successfully charge for content, while 49% either aren't sure or believe paying for content will not work.

But Alan Mutter, in his Reflections of a Newsosaur blog, said "While 68% of the publishers responding to the survey said they thought readers who objected to paying for content would have a difficult time replacing the information they get from newspaper websites, 52% of polled readers said it would be either 'very easy' or 'somewhat easy' to do so."

The survey, which was conducted for the latest in the series of industry conferences this year studying how to monetize the valuable content most newspapers give away for free, shows that publishers who are worried about charging for content have good reason to be concerned.

More data from the study includes:

• 58% of publishers said they are considering charging for content
• 49% said they have no timetable in mind for how that will play out
• 12% said they plan to charge for content by the end of the year
• 18% said they will do so in the first quarter of 2010
• 10% said they would begin charging by the beginning of next summer
• 10% currently charge for some portion of the web content

According to the study:

• 38% of the respondents say they will limit full access to stories to monthly subscribers
• 28% say they will likely offer monthly subscriptions as well as micropayments for individual articles
• 15% expect to offer monthly subscriptions, micropayments, and "day passes"
• 19% expect news articles to remain free but that they will produce content specifically for the website which would be behind a pay wall
• 9% say they may adopt a system which would make visitors pay separately for each story they want to read

REPORT  |  SLIDE PRESENTATION  |  COMMENTS FROM ALAN MUTTER

© 2009 MediaPost Communications

Events Calendar

OMMA Mobile
October 30, 2009
Los Angeles, CA
www.mediapost.com

SNA Classified Managers' Conference
November 4 – 6, 2009
Myrtle Beach, SC
www.suburban-news.org

SNA Audience Development Conference
November 5 – 6, 2009
Myrtle Beach, SC
www.suburban-news.org

ASBPE National Editorial Conference (digital)
November 6, 2009
San Francisco, CA
www.asbpe.org

ArkLa Miss Circulation Conference
November 5 – 6, 2009
Vicksburg, LA
www.mspress.org

min: Monetize Your Content & Audience Now
November 11, 2009
New York, NY
www.minonline.com

Journalism Education Association Fall Convention
November 12 – 15, 2009
Washington, DC
www.jea.org

Stanford Professional Publishing Course: Publishing on the Web Workshop
November 16 – 19, 2009
Monterey, CA
www.publishingcourses.stanford.edu

If you have an event that you would like to announce, please send your information
to e-newsletter@verifiedaudit.com.

Commemorative Issues Prove Profitable

Although it may sound a little morbid, magazine publishers need all the help they can get, and some of it comes from dead people. In the summer of 2009, newsweeklies and celebrity titles have received a much-needed economic boost from commemorative issues—first for Michael Jackson, then for Senator Ted Kennedy.

Both Time and Newsweek did special commemorative issues for Kennedy. The Time coverage included a respectful overview by Richard Lacayo, highlighting his many achievements, and a nuanced essay by Michael Scherer balancing the good, the bad, and the ugly aspects of Kennedy's long political career. Other essayists covered his complicated relationships with his brothers, John F. Kennedy and Robert F. Kennedy, and the clan's formidable patriarch, Joseph Kennedy.

Time also produced a 112-page book recounting Kennedy's life, describing the volume as "an intimate portrait from his early years to his last days as the Lion of the Senate," including previously unreleased photographs by Ken Regan.

Newsweek's special commemorative issue, available only on newsstands, included essays by Kennedy's former colleagues in the Senate, Orrin Hatch and Birch Bayh, along with commentary and reflections by other invited authors and Newsweek editors.

Commemorative issues can be big business for magazines. The sale of various special issues and magazine-branded books commemorating Michael Jackson has yielded an extra $55 million in newsstand sales, according to Ad Age, which cited a survey by the Magazine Information Network. That compares to total magazine retail sales of $1.8 billion or more.

© 2009 MediaPost Communications

Tips & Techniques: Record Retention

Your office is drowning in paper. Your file cabinets have long since overflowed, every cubbyhole is stuffed, and no horizontal surfaces are visible. Just how long do you have to hang on to all this stuff anyway?

As a rule, all documents for a circulation audit must be retained for at least two years after the Audit Report is issued. Please note that this is the date that the Audit Report is issued, not the date the audit itself was conducted. These are different dates.

Documents for retention include printing invoices, postal statements, all original route sheets, driver's notes, contractor invoices, copies of checks, payroll records, and more.

Requester documentation should be retained for a minimum of three years.

Paid subscriber documentation (request/renewal form and proof of payment) should be retained until the subscription is renewed.

The secret to minimizing the sheer bulk is to know when it's safe to throw stuff out. Carefully labeling documents by audit year makes this task more efficient.

If you have questions regarding record retention, please contact Verified at 415-461-6006.

Please send comments and story ideas to e-newsletter@verifiedaudit.com or contact us at:

Verified Audit Circulation
900 Larkspur Landing Circle, Suite 295
Larkspur, CA 94939-1758
415.461.6006
415.461.6007 fax