Retail newspaper advertisements play a critical role in promoting brands and creating awareness about them amongst the masses. In so doing, newspapers play a crucial role in what is called Brand Positioning.
Retailers have many options for advertising in the newspapers – local, regional or national dailies besides local editions of regional or national newspapers – all advertisements being in English, Hindi or any other vernacular language. Hence, a Haryanvi retailer in Gurgaon could reach the general Gujarati buyers in Ahmedabad through Gujarat Samachar or Marathi prospects in Pune through Maharashtra Times.
The three main purposes of retail advertising in newspapers are as follows:
1. Selling an establishment: To this, the customer must be attracted to the premises which, if it is a shop, increases what is known as ‘footfalls’ – i.e., the number of people passing through the shop. Once inside, they could possibly buy something which they would not have bought otherwise.
2. Selling exclusive or own-labelled goods: Retail distributors are sometimes appointed as dealers of certain makes. For example, some supermarkets market their own labelled goods which they get manufacturers to pack in their supermarket’s name. Large departmental stores have special brand names for all their products, which will usually be cheaper and they will compete with national brands. Because competition between own-label and national brands is intense, there is a risk of the national brands being de-listed in favour of a store’s own labelled products. Own-label products are normally made to the specifications or recipes of the concerned retailer, and are not mere copies of existing national brands. All retail outlets are likely to use advertising to promote their sales.
3. Clearance sales: Special offers could be made to clear stocks of products which are seasonal, with promotions – such as the sale of air-conditioners during winter and water heaters in summer.
Usually, since retailers function in a narrowly restricted market geographically, they focus their advertising messages to the preferences and buying habits of the locally targeted audience. The difference between the local and national marketer is that the former tries to get a relatively quicker response while the national advertiser’s main interest lies in establishing long-run favourable opinion and thereby building brand equity.
Thus, anyone from anywhere in India can place retail advertisements in leading newspapers like The Times of India, Hindustan Times, Dainik Jagran, Amar Ujala, Navbharat Times, Hindustan Hindi, The Indian Express, Anandabazar Patrika, Malayala Manorama, Daily Thanthi, Andhra Jyothi, Maharashtra Times, Gujarat Samachar, Kashmir Times, Assam Tribune and others among over 1000 members of the Indian Newspaper Society (INS).
However, such operations are so complex – since they also include getting the rate cards of all the required newspapers – that it would distract from the main purpose of the business which encompass a multitude of other retail business activities. Thus, for speedy and stress-free newspaper advertising, the retailers should channelize advertising activities through the tried and tested online facility Myadvtcorner, the arm of an INS-accredited advertising agency which provides a variety of free services including the latest rates of every edition of every newspaper, obtaining rebates wherever possible, providing retail ad samples, doing retail newspaper ad booking online and booking retail ads in newspapers like retail business ads and retail classified advertisements.
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