Point Oh!

Sarah Lacy stoked the fires of a debate that a lot people, including myself, aren’t looking forward to having in a recent article in Business Week.  Will local advertising online be hurt by the same pressures that are killing local newspapers?

Obviously, many people are betting that the answer will be no.  The New York Times is launching a series of local blogs and ESPN is just begining to roll out a series of local sports sites.  Even a hack like me is involved in an attempt to capitalize on the Great Newspaper Extinction.  Are we all wrong?

It’s clearly not Craig’s fault alone.  It’s also highly unlikely that an overabundance of inventory is driving the price down since there really aren’t too many online media properties that have nailed the local thing.

I’d love for someone to prove me wrong here but I think it’s the advertisers.  Yes, I’m sure the economy factors in substantially, but I really think it’s far more of a cultural factor.  Media buyers were always more comfortable with newspapers in their regional buys but the small businesses that are the staples of this segment aren’t as comfortable with ad networks and buying across disparate channels.  Sure, they can probably understand basic CPM advertising but they don’t understand bidding for space across multiple sites and the various advanced targeting that is available through all the modern ad networks.  Alienate people with technology and they will go away.

So maybe the blame needs to be shared.  The ad networks haven’t made the adjustments necessary to keep the advertisers spending in a rapidly evolving media landscape.  Of course, i don’t think this is a permanent trend.  In fact, I think we’ll see the advertisers come back long before the economy follows.  It’s more of a learning curve than a overarching environmental condition.