Revenues from print classified advertising increased by more than 5% during 2005, a major improvement on the 12% decline recorded in 2004, according to the World Association of Newspaper’s (WAN) third annual Digital Classified Survey.
The report also shows that newspapers in developed countries increased overall revenues by 4.2% in 2005 from a year earlier.
The report says that the overall figures disguise the contrast between the growth in recruitment and property advertising when compared to the declining categories of automotive, travel and private party advertising. Automotive classified advertising was down by 12%, the biggest decline of all the categories.
In addition, WAN found that the internet accounted for 7.6% of recruitment revenues at newspapers that participated in its study, up from 2.7% in 2004 and 1.5% in 2003.
White collar jobs have been the quickest recruitment category to move online and this is the category where newspapers have lost the most in the previous few years, as 21% of their market share has moved online.
Newspapers have held on to about one quarter of the revenues lost from print with their own online operations. Another quarter of the revenues have migrated to “pure play” internet companies, while the remaining revenues have been cost savings to advertisers due to lower rates and stronger competition online than in print. WAN points out that another problem for newspapers is their inability to charge anything like their print rates for online ads.
A recent report from Jupiter Research said that classified advertising spending will total $3.4 billion, or 21.7% by 2011 (see Online Adspend To Reach $25.9 Billion By 2011).
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