City Media

Find Deals and Offers Online with Metro

Today, Metro, Canada’s No. 1 free national daily newspaper will start delivering deals, ads and online offers on a new online shopping section at shop.metronews.ca.  Metro has partnered with City Media to create this new shopping section and to increase advertising exposure for their Metro Toronto local retail newspaper advertisers.

 

Shop.metronews.ca provides readers with the ability to quickly locate deals and offers that are advertised in the Toronto newspaper. Tracy Day, Metro Retail Sales Director explains that “now, an ad that appears in the Toronto print edition of Metro  can be made searchable online in the new shopping section on www.metronews.ca  and on all major search engines.”Online ads are delivered using City Media’s innovative technology that incorporates enhanced searchability and the option to buy products, tickets and coupons directly from shop.metronews.ca.

 

"We are very pleased that we were chosen by the management team at Metro to assist them with the development and roll-out of their new online shopping section. It continues to demonstrate that our company is leading the way in building new and innovative advertising technology for the internet" says Katherine Haine, President of City Media.

 

Metro Marketing and Interactive Director, Jodi Brown, adds that “we are excited to offer our Toronto local retailers a simple way to make their Metro newspaper ads go even further with the addition of a digital version and plan to roll out the technology for all our cities across Canada in the coming months.”

 

About Metro
Metro is the nation’s No. 1 free national daily newspaper brand and the first national daily to publish in both official languages. In Canada, Metro editions are published in: Halifax, Montreal, Ottawa, Toronto, Calgary, Edmonton and Vancouver. Metro targets 18- to 49-year-olds and has a circulation that now exceeds 800,000. Metro is the largest international newspaper in the world. Metro is published in over 100 major cities in 19 countries across Europe, North & South America and Asia. Metro has a unique global reach — attracting a young, active, well-educated, metropolitan audience of over 17 million daily readers.

 

For further information please contact:

Robyn Payne
Marketing & Research Manager, Metro English Canada               

 

About City Media

City Media is a leader in developing world-class revenue generating web applications for the Newspaper industry. Since their inception in 2006, City Media has partnered with both corporate and owner-operated newspapers across Canada. This leading media platform for the newspaper industry is made up of three key products – AdsOnline™, OffersOnline™ and ShopsOnline™.  With its proven ability to generate new non-traditional revenue streams for newspapers, the adoption rate of City Media’s media platform is growing quickly. The company prides itself on being an innovator within the internet product industry and continues to create and launch world-class solutions on an ongoing basis.

 

For further information please contact:

www.citymedia.ca

 1-888-890-5551

New ad service connects consumers directly with local advertisers via traditional media

Toronto ON, April 14, 2009 - Canadian consumers are using search engines to seek out what was once deemed “junk mail” prior to the Internet age in an effort to source local goods, services, and discounts to save money during the recession.

According to a preliminary report from City Media, the leader in digital marketing services for traditional media, more than 60 per cent of consumers go directly to the Internet to hunt down advertisements from local businesses in hopes of finding online discounts for easily accessible goods and services.

The new trend is a digital throwback to pre-Internet recessions when moms and dads often religiously sifted through piles of flyers from local businesses offering discounts and clipped coupons. Many consumers are now searching for these local offers and discounts online.

“Searching for information on Google is now more common than using the Yellow Pages,” said Katherine Wiggett, president and CEO of City Media. “Consumers are going online to find local shopping information, local advertisers can't afford to miss out on this online exposure.”

Toronto, February 17, 2009:  Over the last few years, the newspaper industry has been facing the challenge of declining revenues as advertisers migrate away from traditional advertising. The quest for an online business model that helps newspapers retain these dollars has been an ongoing concern. City Media, a Canadian based company offers a well timed, turnkey solution that builds bottom line profit and transitions local advertisers to the newspaper website.

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Recently, City Media released a new solution that eases the transition to online for both media operators and advertisers. “One of our key success factors is that we focus on offering advertisers and consumers high value at an affordable price. Advertisers and media operators require very little time and investment to get up and running and it generates results immediately!” says Katherine Wiggett, President of City Media. “Local advertisers want to move online and would prefer to buy locally from someone they trust like their local newspaper. We make it easy to do just that.” adds Wiggett.

Newspapers can now operate an online marketplace for local advertising on their website. Using CityMedia’s AdsOnline/AdSearch tools, each newspaper ad is rebuilt in a web friendly format that is 100% searchable.

Local newspaper leaders understand the value of being positioned at the intersection of commerce and community. Recently, The Scugog Standard added the advertising marketplace and shopping section to www.thescugogstandard.ca. “This is cutting edge, no-one else is offering as complete a process as City Media, so there is every reason for an advertiser to be in print and get effective online exposure for the same buy,” says Rik Davie, publisher and editor of The Scugog Standard.

Research indicates that over 90% of consumers are researching and purchasing on the internet. These consumers would prefer to shop local, but if they can’t easily find a local retailer online, they will take their shopping dollars elsewhere. “City Media has made it so much easier for our readers to connect with all our advertisers. We are delighted!” adds Davie.

City Media emphasizes bridging the gap between consumers and advertisers. After 4+ years of research and market testing, City Media understands the local advertiser and how to generate real results online.

In addition to the online advertising marketplace, each advertiser can also have a virtual storefront linked to the newspaper’s website. These e-commerce enabled Webstores provide small and medium sized businesses an easy and affordable opportunity to offer their products and services for sale. This is an online solution for all types of businesses even if they have their own website.  Advertisers can now sell and promote products, services and tickets to local events on the newspaper website.

“The concept is derived from the traditional media model. People want to purchase from local businesses they trust and use the newspaper to help streamline their information. We have simply moved the model to the web!” adds Wiggett.

For more information please contact:

Katherine Wiggett, www.citymedia.ca, Ph: 1-888-890-5551

City Media WebStores™ are attracting attention throughout the newspaper industry. Katherine Wiggett, president of www.citymedia.ca calls it “a solution for community newspaper Web sites to make serious money online.” “Community media need to consider adopting a marketplace strategy for their websites,” adds Wiggett.

So far, our experience shows that WebStores™ are making money not only from ads placed by businesses, but also from transactions and the ability to promote the stores in print and online. WebStores™ add value for traditional media clients and generates 100,000 to 150,000 page views per month.

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This is an online solution for all types of businesses even if they have their own Web site. Over 81% of consumers are using the web to either buy or make a buying decision, yet only 31% of them are online and less than 7% are prepared to sell through e-commerce. We want to make it easier for these consumers to buy from local businesses (newspaper advertisers) in their local market.

Many businesses don’t have the time or the ability to change their website regularly, don’t have the “know how” to sell online and don’t want to sell outside their market area. City Media works with the newspaper to help them provide branded tools for their advertisers.

WebStores™ features free listings of the businesses in the community. The free listings also include a free Web page that contains each business’ name, address, map, phone number, store hours, site link, charge cards accepted, and a photo of the business or product. Businesses can manage their page and make changes as often as they want.

The stores are marketed through ads in the newspaper, a shopping link on the newspaper website, banner advertising and an affiliate program. The key success factor is that the newspaper promotes the WebStores™ in the printed product and drive traffic to the website. Marketing also includes flyers for businesses to give customers pointing them to the Newspaper partner shopping pages, free seminars for businesses to learn how to use their Web pages, and contests leading people to the site to sign up.

For $50 a month, businesses get a basic package that includes unlimited words, an e-commerce enabled store to handle transactions, coupons on other Web sites, the ability to post print ads, or coupons, and the ability to create an online-only coupon, ad, or videos. Every WebStore™ can sell products, services and post coupons online. These businesses would never be able to afford or have the technical expertise to do these services otherwise.

Many businesses are using their WebStore™ as their Web site. Media partners earn in t he range of $250,000 to $450,000 per paper depending on the size of the market, number of accounts and the frequency of the newspaper. There are also other revenue opportunities including transaction fees, ads online and web advertising.

Steps to success

1. Keep it simple – it must be easy for the advertiser or they won’t use it.
2. Promote it – traditional media is the hook and drives traffic to the web where you can sell.
3. Keep it affordable so that newspapers can reach small businesses that aren’t advertising.
4. Make sure customers know how to use the product so they won’t wonder what they’re paying for.
5. Provide a free service that can build a community and generate sales.
6. Let others in your industry know about your success. They could be your next customers.
7. Look for ways to reach untapped markets with new technology. Think of being viable in 10 years.

To view demo: webstore.citymedia.ca
For more information contact This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it