Auto Ads In The Retail Sections?

[FishWrapAutoRep]

Running automotive ads in the retail section of the newspaper can be very beneficial. What kind of ads do you think will be most effective? Lease, new, used, branding etc...Should it be more of a branding or offer type of ad??

[asammons]

I have found that running a used car dealer on the back of a retail section is very beneficial for your customer. I have a used car dealer who runs 2 times/ week on the back of a retail section and has has great response. They were advertising with competing print media and cancelled with them after the response they got with us. After a few months of advertising with us they signed an $85,000 contract! The great thing about it is they were a new advertiser.
The ad we use basically looks the same every week but we switch out the cars. The colors are vibrant. Also, they use a small portion of the ad to promote the Humane Society.

[FishWrapAutoRep]

wow, what's the average price of the cars? when you say the back of the retail section is that main, local, sports?

[asammons]

The pricing of the cars range from $10,000 all the way up to the high $20's. They do have a few cars that go all the way up to about the $35's. They have had a huge success even on the higher priced cars with our newspaper.
They run on the back of our main section. They have recently decided to also run a full page ad in our Wheels section that is in the back of our newspaper next to the classifieds. Our Wheels section is pretty big and we have a great deal of car dealers in that as well. We actually have more in our section than our competing newspaper that is about 3 times the size of us.
I am also in the middle of launching on online Auto Verticle similar to Auto Trader and Cars.com. We have been out soft selling it and many dealers are ready to be on board. I am very excited about this. Great way to bundle newsprint and online revenue.