Google Print Ads lets advertisers choose newspapers, magazines, etc. based on geography, demographics, circulation, ad size, section, and other criteria, then select when and where they want their ads to run. They then place a bid for the amount their willing to pay and publishers respond from there.

When Google first launched Print Ads, they had 50 newspaper partners. In the end they had over 800 U.S. publications (see the full list here).

All of that is moot now of course. "In the last few months, we’ve been taking a long, hard look at all the things we are doing to ensure we are investing our resources in the projects that will have the biggest impact for our users and partners," says Director of Google Print Ads, Spencer Spinnell. "While we hoped that Print Ads would create a new revenue stream for newspapers and produce more relevant advertising for consumers, the product has not created the impact that we — or our partners — wanted."

Google will stop offering Print Ads on February 28. For advertisers who already have campaigns booked, they will run the ads through the end of March.

 Google’s New Traditional Media Blog

Fair warning: the blog’s name is reminiscent of something pretend tough guys would say, or perhaps online daters who decide to meet in real life.  Still, as part of the first post on Let’s Take it Offline, Kate Pacher announced, "We’ve created this blog as a place for you to turn for the latest in feature launches and tips to help you run effective traditional media campaigns."

She then continued, "We’ll also share recent industry findings, which we think will be interesting and useful for both individuals who are new to the offline advertising space as well as those of you who have been advertising offline for a while."

Since we’ve seen some of Google’s blogs get ignored for weeks and even months, a key point will be how well Let’s Take it Offline sticks to those "latest" and "recent" guarantees.  People are more likely to give Google’s traditional media programs a shot if they don’t seem like a small side project.

Google still has to overcome old giants in several industries, though, and the economy isn’t encouraging financial experimentation.

This move has been a cause for anxiety for many competing media companies such as ITV, who’s chairman Michael Grade has been lobbying to reign in the big giant.

Google thinks of the dichotomy between online and offline is uncalled for. They believe differently "We believe that online and offline are part of the same melting pot, It is not an ‘either or’."

Google Print Ads is being considered as an extension of Google AdWords. Those who use Google AdWords service now don’t pay based on a price list for putting up their ads on the Internet, similarly Google’s Print Ads is supposed to allow the advertisers to bid for the price they are willing to pay for a slot in the print newspapers on a specific page and day. Of course, it’s up to the publishers to accept or reject the bids.

Google would get a share in the advertising revenue if a deal is struck. Further, Google has even offered to design ads for those advertisers who don’t have the resources to get it done on their own.

This move by Google would be considered as a welcome gesture by those print publishers who have been looking to get new advertisers for their publications. On the other hand those in the same business might perceive this move as an encroachment by the big giant on their territory. Another aspect of note is the ‘bid for ad space’ as against ‘pay according to the price list,’ this facility would even allow those who hitherto couldn’t afford an advert in the print to advertise.

Google has proved beyond doubt that it knows very well to crawl the Internet, but now it seems to be proving its metal outside it too.

The news has been brought out in a Times Online Article.

Comments

That’s really about all that Journal Register Company had to say. In one of the most lopsided announcements I’ve ever seen, there were roughly 125 words concerning the new partnership, 95 regarding the company (as a standard “About Us” section), and then a whopping 230 words in the form of a Safe Harbor statement.

That sort of thing just really doesn’t impart a lot of confidence in the reader. Google Print Ads has had enough problems as it is; some time ago, WebProNews contributor Nathan Weinberg even labeled the program a “failure.”

Instead of concluding the announcement with a legal disclaimer that’s about as long as this article, Journal Register Company could have discussed its own operations. After all, it “owns 27 daily newspapers and 368 non-daily publications,” and “currently operates 239 individual Web sites” – those have got to provide some conversational fodder.

Or it could have mentioned, as David B. Wilkerson did, the distinguished group of newspapers that the New Haven Register will be joining – the New York Times, the Boston Globe, the Washington Post and the Seattle Times are all already members of Google’s Print Ad program.

The announcement did at least include a positive comment from Journal Register Company’s chairman and CEO, Robert M. Jelenic, who said, “We believe Google’s technology will help us manage our advertising inventory more efficiently and we will continue to explore opportunities to enhance revenues, especially with non-traditional newspaper advertisers.”

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According to Business Week, CoffeeCup Software wound up getting three ads in Martha Stewart Living, a total of $177,000 worth of ad space, for $4,000 apiece. What a steal!

Also, the article says:

Several more advertisers spoke with BusinessWeek following the story’s publication, echoing similar sentiments. Carl D. Haugen, president of BluePenguin Software, spent $3,000 on an ad through Google, which ran in the November issue of Budget Living magazine. Haugen offered a 20% discount on its antispyware software to Budget Living readers, so he could better track the ad’s performance. Over one month later, the ad had only generated $181.37 in sales, says Haugen.

Now, when I wrote about this in February, I said:

I bid on page ads in every tech publication on the list, on the off chance the bids are actually low. I might bid higher, but I doubt it, unless people want to take up a collection. I guess we could test if print advertising is actually at all useful.

The Publishing 2.0 blog said they “have to scratch my head when I heard things like this from Inside Google”. Heh. Looks like I was right. The ads did go for far below what they normally cost, at a level I could have afforded, just like I predicted might happen. And my statement about seeing if print ads were actually useful might have been pretty accurate as well.

Keep in mind, I use to be involved with selling newspaper advertising, and I never thought the advertisers were getting their money’s worth. Was the bowling place getting thousands of dollars worth of new business because of some ads on our pages? I didn’t think so.

My suggestion to Google: Cut back. Restart the program with much smaller inventory, sell it in a Million Dollar Homepage style, block by block, and don’t add more inventory until you’re making a profit on what you’ve got. This is a market that needs time to grow. Even if it does very little business for the next few years, it can work eventually, if you’re smarter about it.

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Nathan Weinberg writes the popular InsideGoogle blog, offering the latest news and insights about Google and search engines.

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