02/16/2018

New Ohio market research overflows with ideas to help you grow

Photo: John Marling of Pulse Research

By Dennis Hetzel, Executive Director

Based on the reactions from publishers and ad directors at our convention last week, the Pulse Research market study conducted across Ohio for the ONMA exceeded all expectations.

Multiple execs wanted the complete slide deck right away. I saw rapid note-taking as John Marling from Pulse provided specific, actionable ideas that sales reps could use to prepare fresh presentations to all sorts of local businesses – everything from convenience stores to dry cleaners to oil-change shops to restaurants and even churches.

That’s right. Churches.

Did you know there that a remarkably high percentage of survey respondents – 22 percent -- plan to change churches in the coming year? That’s an opportunity.

Beyond direct opportunities, the survey also provided some surprising insights into digital media usage and local news interests.

The digital media questions reinforce the important of Google and Amazon, but here’s the surprise: In third place on “viewed or used in last 30 days” was “local business website,” beating Facebook. ONMA members that are providing digital services to local businesses probably are on the right track. 

Among the 184 respondents who have or run businesses, Facebook advertising and online advertising in general were seen as more effective than newspapers, newspaper websites, radio or TV. That’s scary. But here’s a huge opportunity from this group (Question 156): 88% said “yes” that they would like help “putting together a comprehensive advertising plan” for their business.

And, although it should be noted this is a print-centric audience, it was still great to see that newspapers out-performed radio and tv in terms of purchase decisions by substantial margins. High readership of print advertising also is clear.

Editors can take note, among other things, that a huge number (91%) were interested in state or national news. While local papers can’t be the New York Times, it tells me that local media outlets should not get overly parochial – look for local angles on national and state stories with local impact.  Focus on local, but don’t live in a bubble.

It also reinforced findings I’ve seen on many surveys over the years: High school sports coverage, while important, is a passion topic only for a minority of readers. Other local topics command far more general interest.

The detailed findings cross dozens of different business segments and run more than 100 pages. We have posted both the complete study and Marling’s abbreviated convention presentation in the “members only” area of www.ohionews.org.  We think this research is powerful and helpful – so we want to keep it in the password-protected area of the site.

Marling was joined at his session by Corey Elliott of Borrell & Associates, who provided a valuable, big-picture look at advertising and marketing trends. We’ve also posted Corey’s slide deck on our website.

The most powerful part of his presentation was to drive home how much money is being spent in everyone’s market on “digital services” – that is everything from website management to social media marketing. In the Dayton metro area alone, his estimate was $2.2 billion being spent among hundreds and hundreds of different vendors – ranging from someone’s brother managing a Facebook page for a small business to giant vendors such as GoDaddy.com.

Elliott’s point: It’s a huge opportunity for local media. Just as the Pulse Research shows, businesses want and need our help. We just have to learn how to provide it – and both thank-yous and dollars will follow.

Marling also praised ONMA members for their cooperation in the Pulse of America study. It was the best response rate they have seen anywhere, making the findings valid across the state with a low margin of error. We ran ads seeking survey respondents across all of our network newspapers, and some non-network papers also ran print and digital ads.

This is great, helpful stuff.  Please put it to use. Give us feedback on its value. Share your success stories, because we’re all in this together.