Blabla Point: Print is not broken. Advertising is broken.

The internet changed advertising. Advertising agencies have to figure out new ways to make money. It is hard. But don't conflate advertising with Print. Print is fine. The further away it is from the crash in advertising, the faster it will thrive. Newspapers who rely on advertising for only 50% of the revenue stream will morph more easily than those who don't.

The marriage between Print and advertising started around the turn of the century. It's been a great run. But now it's time for an amicable separation.

If Transpromo morphs into Transinfo the playing field will be much clarified. Everybody hates promo. Everybody loves info. The point is that information about the user is the monetizable value. Print connected to the web is the best way to get info about masses of users in the physical world. Contrary to the meme du jour, masses of people live in the physical world, not the blabla world of cyber blablabla.

Here's today's blablablabla from the UK:

'Traditional magazine model is broken', ad giant claims
06 May 2009printweek.com

Magazine publishers and their print suppliers were confronted with some 'uncomfortable truths' about the future for print media at this week's FIPP World Magazine Congress in London.

Maurice Levy, chairman and chief executive at global advertising giant Publicis Groupe, described the financial crisis as 'a cruel and brutal accelerator and amplifier of long-term trends'."

Not to be outdone, here's the blablabla from today's Ad Age in New York:

LONDON (AdAge.com)--Unilever Chief Marketing Officer Simon Clift and Publicis Groupe CEO Maurice Levy gave a stark warning to an international gathering of magazine publishing executives today, urging the industry to innovate and to be more creative.

The job of a printer is to Print and respond quickly to print new stuff. The job of creative marketers is to innovate. (Mine magazine was driven by a marketer. Not TIme.Inc. Not American Express Publishing. Not the Ace Group. Instead of telling the industry "to innovate," Mr. Clift should get his team to focus on the innovate part.

If everyone just does their job, usually things work out fine. (see masthead of this blog.)