Google expands US newspaper ad sales service

by Daniel Farey-Jones, Brand Republic 18-Jul-07, 11:00

LONDON - Google is expanding its US PrintAds service, which allows its online advertisers to order ads in newspapers, following a successful trial.

The trial started last November and involved a small number of advertisers given the opportunity to place ads in 50 newspapers.

Google is offering the service to all of its AdWords customers and now 225 newspapers, covering 32 of the biggest 35 US metropolitan markets, are participating.

The range of publications includes The New York Times, Washington Post and Chicago Tribune.

Todd Haskell, the New York Times' vice-president of business development for advertising, told Reuters: "Google PrintAds has brought in new advertisers who were either too small to consider advertising in a national newspaper or who hadn't tried print advertising because their business was largely online."

Separately, Yahoo has ramped up its own newspaper sales partnership, which also launched in November, from 176 titles to 400.

It has a different focus to Google, in that it is designed to aid newspapers to sell ads on their websites.