Press
Ken Robbins, Agency President, Predicts Newspaper Extinction within Six Years
Digital Agency Founder Urges Move to Exclusive Online Marketing
ATLANTA—April 6, 2009—Ken Robbins, 13-year advertising veteran and founder of Response Mine Interactive—a digital agency specializing in direct response and search engine marketing—has predicted the demise of local daily print newspapers in six years, encouraging marketers to shift all of their spend print newspaper budgets to the Internet.
"The new wave of consumers like Generations X and Y go to the Internet for their news and information. They rely on social networks and micro-blogging sites like twitter to make purchasing decisions," said Robbins. "If they need to find something they go to search. If they want to see the week's circulars they go to FatWallet.com or Shopping.com, or to the retailer sites that have online circulars."
Proof of Robbins’ theory seems to be increasingly apparent with news of both small and large print newspapers contemplating bankruptcy, announcing massive layoffs and going 100 percent digital.
"The marketing return on investment for printed newspapers is terrible," Robbins commented. "As advertisers continually discover this, the collapse of the print newspaper business model is imminent demonstrated by the fall of legendary papers like the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, Rocky Mountain News, Chicago Tribune, and the massive layoffs at old guard dailies like the Atlanta Journal-Constitution and the NY Times."
Although 30 percent of media consumption is on the web, only is eight percent of media spend—a frightening reality for advertisers. As such, Robbins encourages business leaders and marketers to allocate their marketing dollars to online and search engine marketing.
Robbins' Atlanta-based digital agency represents multi-channel retailers and home services, healthcare and travel clients. Many of his retail clients depended heavily on newspapers and Sunday circulars as advertising vehicles.
"All retailers know that newspapers are not working well anymore and that search is the best application to move consumers," he said. "We’re now telling our clients: ‘The death of print newspapers is inevitable and it's just a question of whether or not you want to move your marketing where the eyeballs are—online.’"
About Response Mine Interactive
Response Mine Interactive (RMI) is an award-winning digital agency that helps companies acquire more customers using direct response interactive marketing. Since 2001, RMI has helped deliver billions of dollars in revenue for leading brands in the retail, travel, healthcare and home services industries by improving the speed, volume and efficiency in how they market online. RMI provides strategic customer acquisition and lead generation services to national companies on a pay-for-performance basis. For more information visit www.responsemine.com or call 404-233-0370.
###
Media contact: Megan Webb
Response Mine Interactive
716.573.9556
megan.webb@responsemine.com