While I was thumbing through the newspaper this morning (yes the analog printed version) I was again thinking about switching to a tablet or e-Reader subscription when our current subscriptions expire. As I moved through the paper I noticed the advertisements – full page, half page, quarter pages and the like. If we choose to go the digital subscription route the ads that we have become so accustomed to seeing would no longer be available.

There are digital ads of course – on the right side, on the header, home page take-over’s, pop-ups (if allowed), even within the content itself. But the large full page ‘interruptive’ advertisement would be no more.

It then crossed my mind that on newspaper and magazine home pages there should be a tab of current issue advertisements. This would create additional value for the advertiser and act as a nice sales feature for the advertising staff.

For example, let’s say you are reading the newspaper and saw an advertisement while riding the train. You are interested in the product but don’t care to tear out the page from the newspaper. You could then access the website from any device and scroll down the list of advertisements for that day’s/week’s/ or month’s issue.

No doubt publishers would be tempted to charge an additional fee to their advertisers for this ‘added’ exposure. However that would defeat the idea of offering additional value to expensive on-page advertising buys. An added benefit is that advertisers would gain insight as to reader engagement of their ads when they were viewed online.

All I am suggesting is a small tab on the publisher home page creating additional value for advertisers.
Good idea or dumb idea? If a dumb idea why would it be such?