$60 a month does not seem like much but play it out over a year and you have $840. Why $60? This is what ANF membership costs in some states.
When a newsagent asked me recently if I thought them joining the ANF for $60 a month was worth if, I talked with them about what else they could spend the money on.
Before I get to the list, I suggest newsagents think about what they get for the $60 a month it costs to be a member of the ANF. I cannot think of any tangible benefit. For all their talk of lobbying and representation on policy – the bread and butter of a good association – the ANF does not have anything to value to point to. So the question about the value of $60 a month is important.
Smart newsagents will take the $60 a month the ANF would have cost and invest this in new traffic strategies that add value to their business.
Here is the list of how one could spend $60 a month that I discussed recently with one newsagent:
- Facebook advertising. $10 can put an ad in front of between 5,000 and 8,000 people depending on your location. $60 can buy plenty of new eyeballs and eyeballs drive new traffic.
- Google advertising. At between 3 cents and ten cents a click, your website, e-com site or other online presence could achieve 2,000 clicks and more. Each click could be someone new to the business and could result in feet through the door.
- Visual merchandising. $60 a month could buy close to two hours in-store of a visual merchandising professional on a regular call cycle. This could be someone who provides you with a fresh look in-store as well as training for your people.
- New product lines. While funding this from the monthly saving, over the course of a year, investing $840 in a new product line fresh to the business could generate More than $1,000 in gross profit and attract new shoppers to the business who also purchase other items that make the $840 investment worth in excess of $2,000. Yes, there are specific lines that fit this criteria. So, in year two, you’d have another $840 to invest as the first year’s investment would be paying for itself.
- Dinner outside. Have a pub meal with your business partner away from the business, to talk about business. You are certain to look at the business differently and through the conversations reveal to yourselves valuable opportunities you might have missed without such time out.
Sure I could add other items to the list. I wanted to go for ideas that helped attract new shoppers and give the business fresh appeal.
I am serious in suggesting newsagents think about alternatives for the $60 a month they pay for the ANF as $60 a month invested wisely ought to deliver between three and four times the cost to the business.
Every dollar you spend is a business decision. Think about the alternatives and consider what you could do in your business.
The $60 spend is about relevance to your business today as it is only the money you make from the business today that matters.
I think the EFTPOS deal through the ANF is the best around bar none.
The savings on EFTPOS fees alone would cover the $60 a month fee for membership.
Overall I feel I have value for money over the years , they have helped me out quite a few times regarding issues I have had here and there .
Once again Mark Stopping putting down associations wonder why people think your not good in Newsagency if have not nice things to say about people doing things in associations dont put on the blog
Ruth it is your choice to see this as a put down. rather, it is designed to get newsagents thinking about how they spend their money. This is a free an open space. no one forces you to read it. I am not writing here to be liked.
I’d happily pay more than $60 if they actually did anything that was useful!
All the major newsagent issues like magazine oversupply and low agency commissions are never touched.
But they do the hard yards in finding new low commission products that I don’t want.
I don’t even know if ANF is representing newsagents. i know i would be better without them
Mark, when I viewed your presentation regarding MPA’s application and the possibility in future of publishers not accepting early returns and newsagents losing the little control we have to manage stock, I thought you must have got it wrong. However, when I read the the MPA’s application, it was much, much worse than even what you said; they also want to enshrine in a code of conduct a 49% oversupply of top selling magazines and up to 75% of the bottom selling magazines. They also want to have reserve rights on shelf space.
My question is,how can we work together to fight this. Because MPA is out of the box running and we don’t even have our spikes on.
I know the ANF supported the MPA application originally, but I don’t think they understood the significance of what was being suggested and, in its defence, it is in written in a very clever, seemingly benign, deliberately convoluted way that, in my opinion, lulled the ACCC to sleep. It seems there is no where else to go and we will have to convince the ANF of the real significance of the MPA’s application. The relevance to exposition is where do we go when we need to act together.
Henry the trial is throwing up plenty of interesting information that I think will lead to reconsideration of some positions. Add to that the voices of independent publishers left out of the MPA process and there will be plenty of talking to come.