Line between print, online ads blurs

Now that newspapers are publishing their classifieds ads on their own Web sites -- and even pushing them to other sites like Yahoo!, Homescape and now Zillow (see today's Inman News story) -- it's getting harder to distinguish between a print and online ad.

Someday all newspaper classified ads will presumably have a parallel existence online (we are probably close to that day now). Newspapers have to get classified ads into digital form as part of the process of printing them, and putting them online doesn't take much additional effort or expense.

But many online ads -- like those carried by Craigslist -- will never exist on the printed page. For realtors and many other advertisers, having a classified ad appear in print may not be that important.

In the battle for traffic, many Web sites do something that newspapers don't seem to think they can afford to: publish listings or classified ads for free. Web sites view your listings as content that will draw consumers, and allow them to sell ads to other companies with deep pockets. 

Newspapers -- which have all sorts of additional pesky expenses like reporters and editors, printing presses, and newsprint -- haven't gotten around to seeing listings and classified ads as content.   

Which raises a question. Why do newspapers have to publish classified ads in their print editions at all? With the cost of newsprint on the rise, many newspapers have stopped wasting paper on information that readers can get online, such as stock prices.

As the big advertisers -- the folks who buy display ads in their print editions -- migrate to the Web, why aren't newspapers doing the same thing as Web sites like Craigslist, and offering their readers the opportunity to post online classified ads for free?

Those who want to buy a classified print ad would still be free to do so, but newspapers would have to make most of their ad revenue by charging for display ads, whether in print or online. Realtors, for example, could feed listings to newspaper Web sites at no charge, but brokers would have to shell out for display ads if they wanted to showcase their firms and agents.

Makes too much sense. Please tell me somebody is doing this already.

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