Newspapers are not dead. This despite the fact many so-called marketing experts living in large urban centres believe such tripe.
And that is an insult to you, our dear readers.
Unfortunately, the big-city mindset that print is no longer read has made it to small towns as well, where that belief is even further from the truth.
But such fake news impacts the ability for small community newspapers to make money, to provide larger news holes to spread important and entertaining information to the public.
We have municipal staff opting try to sneak in some free advertising via press releases – trust us, it happens pretty much weekly. Others decide to advertise through Facebook and Google despite the fact they are trying to reach citizens inside C-K. As a Chatham-Kent owned and operated media company, we’re left scratching our heads.
Yes, you see municipal advertising in this newspaper. It’s in here fairly regularly actually. Some content winds up online as well on our website. But when you see more spent on Facebook from one municipal department, Tourism, as was spent with all C-K print media combined – on ads targeting local residents – that’s where we have an issue.
Add in a second municipal department, Economic Development, spending lavishly on social media, as well as a local online-only news outlet, rather than with traditional local media, it is frustrating.
For starters, this is not just about The Chatham Voice. There are five independent, locally owned newspapers serving Chatham-Kent. And there are the PostMedia products.
Our reach in print and online ensures the news is delivered, and read, by the young and older in Chatham-Kent.
The readership for these papers is by and large right here in the communities we serve.
In the case of the local independents, so are our head offices. We pay rent locally, pay taxes locally, buy and shop in local stores, and support local at most every opportunity.
Facebook and Google? They have no actual footprint here, employ no local residents, and sure as hell do not pay a dime in taxes here.
Yet, there are municipal divisions that are very happy to do business with them; divisions urging people to buy local and shop local.
We see the annoying irony. Do you?
