Reverse Publishing: Going From Digital Weekly Ads – Back To – Print Run of Press (ROP) Ads

Posted on 2 June 2009 by Patrick FlanaganNo Comments

(4.00 out of 5)

 Loading ...

Wow. Talk about coming full circle. Here is what this new reverse run of press (ROP for short – these are the ads that are published in-line within newspaper content and not inserted like a circular/flyer/FSI) ad publishing product is all about.

• Step #1: Print Circulars All ShopLocal content begins first as print circulars.  Typically this equates to starting life as a multi-page, multi-layer, HiRes Adobe PDF file.  The same asset that is sent to a commercial grade printer to mass produce say 50,000,000 (yes million) copies on any given Sunday.
• Step #2: Digital Circulars From here, this print PDF is broken down (or decomposed) into many unique individual parts and stored in a relational database that ShopLocal hosts.  At this point, the local promotional (e.g., circular) content is fully digital and easily distributed via whole hosts of digital mediums including search, display, mobile, widget, microsite, etc.
• Step #3: Crowd Sourced Popularity This digital circular content is displayed to hundreds of thousands or up to millions in some cases of in-market local shoppers within the advertisers SmartCircular (or online weekly ad) site. The result of all this exposure and consumer interaction is amazing insights into what products and offers are the most popular.  ShopLocal calls this ranking data the Wisdom of the Crowds. This crowd sourced popularity data is then used to filter out all of the products that the large audience did NOT find engaging or interesting. Rather, only the most engaging circular content makes it to the last step of this process.
  
• Step #4: Print ROP Ads The most popular circular content (as determined by the advertiser’s own customers) is then inserted into a pre-defined and pre-approved print ROP ad template. The combination of these “best of the best” local promotional offers combined with the great reach of the newspaper is what makes this a recipe for success.

So in summary from print (circular) ads all the way back to print (ROP) ads. That is essentially the life cycle of the circular content for this product.

This is the core problem that reverse ROP publishing solves. A print Sunday circular ad quickly gets tossed in the trash can / recycle bin by Monday or so which leaves a real hole as far as ongoing reach and distribution for the advertiser. By inserting targeted and timely ROP ads back into the newspaper, the advertiser is able to reach these shoppers at the right time when shopping activity is starting to pick back up on the days leading up to the weekend - Thursday or Friday.

Enough talk. Time to show everyone a few samples of what this type of advertising is all about – see the two (2) below.  To better define reverse ROP ads, they can be:

• Geo-targeted by unique newspaper and print version.  So in Gannett’s case, there are over 80 unique local newspapers to choose from. This helps ensure that the same print versioning (eg price and product assortments) that are created and applied to the print circular content can and will be re-applied to the creation and placement of these reverse ROP ads
• Flexible in the number of products shown within the ROP ad template (the template however needs to be consistent from market to market and week to week)
• Flexible in the ROP ad dimensions (height & width)
• Flexible in the placement within the local newspapers
• Able to be distributed on either the Thursday or Friday following the typical Sunday circular ad drop / newspaper insertion
• Circular products for inclusion into these reverse ROP ads can be chosen based upon:
  • Wisdom of the Crowd (WoC) popularity
  • Front circular page / back circular page location
  • Category of the items (which would allow for some level of contextual targeting – combining let’s say the category content within “LCD / Plasma TVs” with the “Sports” section placement of the ROP ad)
  • Brand of the items
• Additional filters that can be applied to the above content selection logic include
  • Item price (so for example exclusing all the items under $5.00 regardless of popularity)
  • Item sale end date (no sense advertising products that will for example not be on sale very shortly)

Here is a real reverse ROP ad that Gannett created for Best Buy and ran across a handful of it's top local newspapers. This is an ongoing process on a weekly basis to turn the digital circular content into a print ROP ad

Here is a standard reverse ROP "template" that Gannett uses to showcase the overall product concept

Related posts:

1. The Detroit Free Press (DFP) Newspaper Goes Digital Today & ShopLocal Is Playing It’s Part So bold moves today coming from Detroit’s premier newspaper –...
2. Gannett Digital Begins Rollout Of New Local Deals Page Across Newspaper.com Sites All things deals, sales and coupons are red hot and...
3. Aggregated Statistics On Retail Circulars Ads & Print Promotions So what does one learn by processing of all the...
4. Clever Retail Print – To – Web Cross Channel Promotions So within the last week or so, two nifty retail...
5. Let The Rollout Begin – 105 CircularCentral Sites Coming Right Up Having only one owner is so much better than three...

No Responses so far | Have Your Say!