As he is wont to do, Alan Mutter, The Newsosaur, just rained on what little parade the Newspaper Association of America has to offer right now: A projection of revenue falloff of “only” 5.5% for 2008.
Mutter presents a credible anecdotal argument that any such projections are made of air, given the current swoon of the U.S. economy.
Fortunately, he didn’t take a peek back at the NAA’s 2008 projections, made back in December 2008. If he did, he’d be in an even worse mood:
Newspaper Association of America Business Analyst Jim Conaghan expects advertising revenue to decline only 1.2 percent in 2008, compared to 7 percent this year. That is to say that online revenue growth, which he predicts at 22 percent, will not quite cover continued losses of revenue from classifieds.
2008 Prediction: 1.2% down
2008 Actual: 11.5% down
2009 Prediction: 5.5% down
2009 Actual: Stay tuned, and buckle up
I’m still bullish on newspaper companies figuring out ways to grow the business in 2009, but the last place I’d look for reliable predictive data is the NAA.
Richard Wakefield says
October 9, 2008 at 8:43 amWe have a considerably more pessimistic forecast of the (NAA) newspaper advertising expenditures – not to be confused with ad revenue, which is considerably different and lower than ad expenditures.
We see for 2008: print down 16.1% to $35.4 billion; online down 2.4% to $3.1 billion; total NAA ad expenditures down 15.2% to $38.5 billion.
We see for 2009: print down 15.6% from 2008 to $29.9 billion; online down 27.7% to $2.2 billion; total ad expenditures down 16.5% to $32.1 billion.
Yes, it's a really gloomy forecast. But, we prepared this forecast using state-of-the-art econometric models and the only category with a brief history is “online”.
Our web site has more details.
Richard Wakefield says
October 9, 2008 at 9:43 amWe have a considerably more pessimistic forecast of the (NAA) newspaper advertising expenditures – not to be confused with ad revenue, which is considerably different and lower than ad expenditures.
We see for 2008: print down 16.1% to $35.4 billion; online down 2.4% to $3.1 billion; total NAA ad expenditures down 15.2% to $38.5 billion.
We see for 2009: print down 15.6% from 2008 to $29.9 billion; online down 27.7% to $2.2 billion; total ad expenditures down 16.5% to $32.1 billion.
Yes, it's a really gloomy forecast. But, we prepared this forecast using state-of-the-art econometric models and the only category with a brief history is “online”.
Our web site has more details.
Richard Wakefield says
October 9, 2008 at 2:43 pmWe have a considerably more pessimistic forecast of the (NAA) newspaper advertising expenditures – not to be confused with ad revenue, which is considerably different and lower than ad expenditures.
We see for 2008: print down 16.1% to $35.4 billion; online down 2.4% to $3.1 billion; total NAA ad expenditures down 15.2% to $38.5 billion.
We see for 2009: print down 15.6% from 2008 to $29.9 billion; online down 27.7% to $2.2 billion; total ad expenditures down 16.5% to $32.1 billion.
Yes, it's a really gloomy forecast. But, we prepared this forecast using state-of-the-art econometric models and the only category with a brief history is “online”.
Our web site has more details.