“To effectively communicate, we must realize that we are all different in the way we perceive the world and use this understanding as a guide to our communication with others.”

photo credit: katerha

Well that just wouldn’t be a fair fight now would it?  It would fall under the proverbial saying don’t bring a knife to a gun fight.  This is part three of a series comparing what business owners may be familiar with marketing their business in with something they may have questions or reservations about.

For years local business owners have been in the local paper.  Even today with dwindling circulation and content there are still plenty of local business owners that are purchasing ads in their local newspaper.

While today I find it the least effective way to market your business that’s not what this blog is about, so I’m going to take the high road.

For business owners who have had success marketing their company in the local paper most have used it for price and product features.  Most people who are going to note ads are looking for deals, readers are looking for coupons and sales of 25% off.

The content and message you use needs to be different, but the two mediums are basically used the same way.

People are friends with people near and far, old friends and new friends, they also ‘Like’ a lot of pages that they want to be aware of what’s going on.  Reading your wall on Facebook is a lot like reading the newspaper.

You have your local news, national news, sports, music, what’s happening and ads from the businesses that you like.  You also have your obits.  Today I usually hear first about noteworthy people who have passed on Facebook first.

We all know about the birth page, we follow the pregnancy by the announcement of the birth of a child right here on Facebook.  With all this is Facebook writing the final obit for the local newspaper?

So not only does Facebook provide most of the news you want or need, but you can also read it like a paper.  With twitter if it happened 20 minutes ago it’s gone, with Facebook I can go back hours and catch stories.  You can go back and forward, forward and back, a lot how we read the newspaper.  As a business owner look at how people use Facebook today to how they used the local paper yesterday.

While there are a lot of similarities about the content and how it’s used the message does need to be a lot different on Facebook than what you’re accustomed to in print.  While price and product can fly time to time you’ll be much better off using it as a image builder and have a more engaging message than price and product.

I know it can be difficult marketing your business in something that you’re unfamiliar with.  If you’re familiar with how you read the paper, and you’ve marketed your business in the newspaper you should be in Facebook.  Just look at the usage being the same as your local newspaper, it just doesn’t cost as much and you don’t have to pay extra for color.

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About the Author:

Mike Frey

Before co-founding Paradux Media Group, Mike spent more than 15 years in the world of marketing and advertising. While working with hundreds of locally owned businesses, he developed an appreciation for minimizing clients’ dollars while maximizing tangible results for those clients.

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4 Comments

  1. JP on January 30, 2011 at 7:48 pm

    Nice post. Despite working in the social media space, I still reckon the local, free, home delivered newspaper has a future. More so than the daily, city-wide paid subscription model does. BTW I’m almost a Gen Y, as well! Not sure how the dynamics are different in the US and other markets but here in Australia, the ‘local’ paper still gets a good read due to geographic relevance, even if those readers will still turn to social media to engage with more specific audiences and groups.

    • Mike Frey on January 30, 2011 at 8:38 pm

      Thank you for the comments JP. Agree with all your points as to why the local paper is good. They do have a real up-hill battle here in the US. I am a reader of our small local paper and root for it to hang on as long as it can!

  2. Tweets that mention Local Newspaper vs Social Media -- Topsy.com on January 30, 2011 at 7:54 pm

    […] This post was mentioned on Twitter by J. Basil Dannebohm, Paradux Media Group, Mike Frey, Paradux Media Group, Bob Becker and others. Bob Becker said: RT @MikeFreyParadux: #Blog– Local Newspaper vs Facebook #Newspaper #Facebook #SocialMedia […]

  3. Mary Stewart on February 23, 2012 at 9:51 am

    Most people nowadays, prefer the social media in dealing with everything. Some of them just buy gadgets with wifi then go to the hotspot then just simply connect to the social web for free. The truth is most of us rely on social media to read news and any other articles. Which in fact for me it’s more reliable and advance.

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