Hanging up on Newspapers
Scott Stines - IDEAS Magazine - December 2000

Imagine not being able to use telemarketing to sell newspaper subscriptions. The very thought of losing telemarketing as a sales channel might send even the youngest and healthiest circulation sales manager to the hospital with chest pains. Unfortunately, this is not wild speculation, but a situation that is likely to exist in certain areas of the U.S. in the coming months if pending federal or state legislation is approved.

Most newspapers in the U.S. rely on the telephone for as much as 95% of total pressure starts. This development should come as no surprise as the barriers to telemarketing have been building for some time. Some of the highest hurdles exist in California, where consumer privacy is top of mind, and also at the top of the voting ballot. In fact, California may provide us with a look at telemarketing's future in the U.S. in the years ahead: assuming legislation doesn't pull the cord in the coming months.

Stephen Johnson, V.P Circulation, at The San Francisco Newspaper Agency, estimates that in the bay area alone, approximately 40% of households subscribe to a Caller Identification service. The service allows households to identify the phone number and name of the caller before answering, and the power to block future calls with the push of a button. When is Caller Identification and call blocking coming to your market? Or is it already in place?

If Caller Identification wasn't enough, consider for a moment that more than 60% of phone numbers in the San Francisco bay area are unlisted. No problem you say, you'll just fire up your predictive dialer and roll through phone exchanges and prefixes (sequential dialing) until someone answers. Sounds good, but before launching that sequential dialing program you may want to eliminate subscriber phone numbers before reminding customers how much you know and care about their long relationship with your newspaper.

Forget for a moment about Caller Identification and the need to eliminate subscriber phone numbers from your sequential dialing database. There is one more barrier that must be overcome before implementing your subscription telemarketing program. Your database of sequential phone numbers (less subscribers) needs to be matched up against the "Do not Call" list from the Direct Marketing Association or your own list of people that have asked not to be called. It's worth the effort, as your newspaper could face stiff fines ($10,000+) for not making the effort and reaching a "Do Not Call" household that understands their rights to privacy and the law. At The San Francisco Newspaper Agency, the "Do Not Call" list has grown from 600,000 to 900,000 phone numbers over the past few years. The challenge is not just the growing "Do Not Call" list, but the difficulty of reclaiming phone numbers that have been re-assigned to individuals and households that are not on the list. Without an opportunity to reclaim re-assigned numbers the newspaper's do not call list will continue to grow until, conceivably, most phone numbers in the market will be on the list.

While the newspaper industry is not solely responsible for consumer's perceptions of telemarketing, or pending federal or state legislation, the industry has contributed to consumer frustration through the misuse of the telephone sales channel. Take for example sequential dialing, the practice of calling random phone numbers to reach non-newspaper households. This practice assumes that anyone with a phone number is a potential newspaper reader or home delivery prospect. It further assumes that all non-subscribers have the same value for the newspaper and its advertisers.

Now think for a minute about dialing a list of phone numbers without knowing who will answer the phone. Now imagine how you will sound to the person that has left the dinner table or an easy chair to take your call. This of course assumes that after learning you are calling, they don't push a button, and go back to their meal or TV program.

What is your newspaper doing to reduce it's dependence on telemarketing?

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