FREE PUBLICITY

Wairarapa Daily Times, 14 March 1932, Page 4

FREE PUBLICITY

UNREASONABLE REQUESTS. “The universal recognition of the value and influence of newspaper advertising publicity, while it has been an important factor in assisting towards meeting the cost of newspaper service to the public, has not been without its embarrassments to newspaper proprietors,” said the president of the Newspaper Proprietors’ Association, in his address at the opening of the Auckland Advertising Convention, “it has led, amongst other things, to what is known in newspaper circles as ‘the free publicity evil.’ Paid advertising assists the newspaper to improve its service to the public; free publicity undermines the iinancial resources of the newspaper and lessens its capacity to give its readers the service that otherwise would be possible. So the public, as well as the newspaper, suffer from the abuse of free publicity.

‘ ‘ Free publicity is merely another name for free advertising. It is usually an attempt to get advertising matter into the nawspaper in the guise of news. A quite common view amongst seekers after free publicity is that it costs the newspaper nothing to give. The fact is that the newspaper which gives free publicity is giving away its means of existence. Unfortunately, this is not fully appreciated, and the point of view of the newspaper is at times misunderstood. The average advertiser who has contracted to buy regularly, say, a ten-inch advertising space in a newspaper, would not for a moment think of demanding periodical enlargements of the space without extra payment. He would regard such a request as unreasonable, unbusinesslike, if not unethical. Yet, strange to say, that same business man only too frequently will press a demand for free space in the news columns of the paper, through which he hopes to serve exactly the same purpose as if he had used a paidfor extension of his ordinary advertising space. And he will do it without a single qualm. Yet he is seeking something for nothing at the newspaper’s expense, and ultimately at the expense of its readers.

“Naturally a newspaper is not hostile to advertisers who use its columns. Its desire is to assist the advertiser to secure the best attainable results from his advertising. It therefore is in no spirit of antagonism to advertisers that newspapers have found it necessary to resist the growing demands, not only by advertisers, but by non-advertisers, for the free use of their columns for this insidious form of advertising. On the contrary, the Press holds the view that it is acting for the common good —that advertisers and the public generally share with the newspapers the advantages which follow on maintaining a high quality Press.”