The future of publishing

According to data released last week by ad tracking service TNS Media Intelligence, spending on advertising has fallen at its steepest rate since the industry's last recession in 2001. Spending across the media tracked by TNS MI fell 3.7% during the second quarter of 2008. And with the crazy September we've seen on Wall Street, which isn't over yet, no one is expecting ad sales to rebound quickly.

While companies are spending less on advertising this year, the phenomenon isn't totally new and can't be completely blamed on a teetering economy. In fact, for quite some time, companies have been redistributing their advertising and marketing budgets and giving smaller pieces of the pie to traditional print publications. Increasingly more companies are spending their marketing budgets on their own content-laden products (read: custom media) rather than trusting outside media to deliver their messages for them.

These numbers aren't shown in the news about falling ad budgets: According to research from Junta42 and BtoB Magazine, custom content now represents 29.4% of b-to-b marketing budgets. BtoB reports that the Custom Publishing Council and Publications Management find that on average, organizations spend 27% of their total marketing dollars on custom content activities.

In these lean times, if you're considering redistributing your budgets for marketing and advertising, why not think about a custom content project? Many of the most successful organizations in the world have found that custom media is the ideal vehicle to deliver their key messages to their target audiences. It can work for you too.