The ROI study by Benchmarketing

Using the results from over 500 econometric models over the last five years, Benchmarketing has proved that newsbrands continue to play a very important part in the modern media mix. As a result, advertising spend should return to 2013 levels for optimum effectiveness.

Many individual case studies over the years have proven the effectiveness of newsbrands as part of the media mix.

Yet until now there has been no large scale study to conclusively demonstrate and quantify the value that newsbrands bring to advertisers and the return on investment that they deliver.

Newsworks commissioned the highly respected econometrics consultancy Benchmarketing, led by managing director Sally Dickerson, to carry out a detailed analysis to provide this evidence. Benchmarketing conducted a meta-analysis of over 500 econometric models from 2011-2016. Meta-analysis is common in pharmaceuticals, particularly in clinical drugs trials. One trial isn’t enough, you need hundreds to be sure of your results.

The results paint an impressive picture for the role of newsbrands. Key findings include:

Adding newspapers to a campaign increases overall campaign effectiveness, ranging from a 20% improvement in FMCG campaigns to up to four times for services campaigns
Newspapers supercharge the effectiveness of other media when they are included in the mix, with improvements in ROI ranging from two times (for TV), four times (for online display) to 10 times (for radio)
Adding digital newsbrands to the mix boosts newspaper ROI by up to five times

Findings by category

Automotive

The analysis shows that adding print newsbrands to the media mix in the automotive category improves overall campaign revenue return on investment (RROI) by 70%.

Combined services

The analysis shows that adding print newsbrands to the media mix for services improves overall campaign RROI by a factor of three.

Finance

The analysis shows that adding print newsbrands to the media mix in the finance category improves overall campaign RROI by a factor of 5.7.

FMCG

The analysis shows that adding print newsbrands to the media mix in the food and drink category improves overall campaign RROI by a factor of 1.2 (this is significant, given that these are often low margin products).