‘Who Want’s Yesterday’s Papers?’ asked The Rolling Stones back in 1967. Now, advertisers are asking the same thing about today’s newspapers and, for that matter, 30-second TV spots, too.

Take J&J. The healthcare giant slashed its so-called measured media spending - ads that can be tracked in conventional media - by $250 million last year. That’s a 22 percent drop and just about matches what the company hinted would be spent on web sites, search engines and the like. These new outlets are called unmeasured media, because ad spending is harder to track.

In trying to sort it all out, Advertising Age notes J&J increased direct e-mail efforts, launched new web sites for particular brands and also rolled out more sites providing info about specific illnesses (which its products purportedly treat in some fashion). Online spending rose 31% to $32.1 million, which is rather meager, but it’s the upward growth that really matters.

Oh, yes, The answer to the question posed by the philosopher Jagger? ‘Nobody in the world.’
Here’s the complete story in Advertising Age.

[tags]Advertising, Johnson & Johnson[/tags]