Print publishers have engaged in primitive e-commerce since the dawn of the World Wide Web. Along with their content, newspaper and magazines sites vigorously promote subscriptions to print editions. Later pages let users enter names, addresses, phone numbers and desired delivery schedules. Many publishers also have added boxes for credit-card numbers despite shrinking, though not extinct, concern about fraud. This approach also employs the Web as a circulation-service center where customers can order, adjust or cancel subscriptions, stop deliveries during vacations, and ask questions.
Online promotions vary wildly.
This modest effort drew more than 14,000 new orders in 1998. The Houston Chronicle has sold 1,789 print subscriptions on its site since March 1997, an 18.6 weekly average, Marketing Coordinator Michael S. Swanson says. This combo generates 15 new subscriptions per month for the 11,288-circulation newspaper, according to Editor and Publisher Tom H. Collinson. The ISP may lose a few dollars per month, but the value of new readers outweighs the lost revenue. Offline promotions drive subscription starts on the Detroit Free Press and The Detroit News sites.