In Which Newspaper Should I Run My Chiropractic Ads?

Large Metro Newspaper...Small Suburban Newspaper...Free Community Newspaper


You've made the decision to try chiropractic newspaper ads. Now to decide which newspaper to use. There are several papers to choose from in your area, where do you begin? Realistically you can’t run print ads in every paper, so you will have to do some research, gather information and lastly, talk with a representative from the paper.

Where to begin is always a stumbling block but don’t let it stall your efforts to get your ad launched and doing what it’s supposed to do, bring in new patients. The following suggestions should give you the confidence and tools you will need to complete task and create a guideline for all of your future chiropractic advertising.

What is available and which paper do your patients read?

Make a list of papers available in your area. You may or may not know each and every publication that is circulated, therefore go online and do a search for papers circulated in your zip code and maybe a few in surrounding areas. If you are still not sure which ones to choose from, ask your patients what papers they read on a regular basis.

As one newspaper begins to stand out in popularity, go ahead and make the call and find out who your ad rep is and request a media kit. Sometimes they might give you the information on the phone or by email. The ad rep may want to set an appointment to meet with you, but hold off on that for awhile. You will want to repeat this step several times and if you meet with every rep that takes lot of your time. There will be plenty of time to meet once you decide on which paper to advertise with.

Their numbers will tell the story.

Once you receive your media kits, you will have access to some very important numbers. This information will narrow your search and choices. The first number you want to find is the number of subscribers the paper has. These will be broken into categories for the larger newspapers; Sunday subscribers, weekend subscribers and weekly subscribers, with Sunday probably having a higher number. Compare the subscriber rates of your selected papers.
Another number to note is the coverage of the newspaper. If your practice is located in a suburban area you will need to know if the paper covers or has a section specifically for your area. This factor will become clear for several reasons covered later.

Large newspaper vs. Small newspaper

Larger papers may have large subscriber numbers, but…smaller newspapers; particularly the local suburban papers are usually free and are mailed to every address within a specific area. Because there are no subscriptions then there will be no numbers to compare. However, don’t let that or the fact that it’s a free paper, cloud your judgment. Here’s why…small local papers will cover the local business, news and sports teams. In small towns they typically rally and support the local high school teams and the parents and grandparents like to follow their kids and grand children’s sporting events.

Competition, quality, geographic area and cost

Where is your competition advertising? This is important because you don’t want your ad to end up competing with the chiropractor down the street on the same day, same week or same page.

Content quality is important for obvious reasons, the format, and the layout and over all look. Does the newspaper feature newsworthy articles and is it more than one or two pages? How many times is it published and mailed? Most likely even it is once a week, if the price is right, then your return on investment might be greater with a small local paper. Larger newspapers typically charge more for advertising as they have a bigger overhead. However, you may be good at negotiating a great rate or the paper might need more advertising so they might be running some ad specials.

Geographic area is important because if you are not reaching readers that are in your area then you are wasting your money. Most likely, unless you offer a specific service that no one else offers such as spinal decompression, people typically don't want to travel outside of their community and even if they do, just to take advantage of your offer, they probably will not be back.

If your practice is located in a large metro area, you still may have a smaller area paper available to you as most large urban areas are divided into smaller sub cities. You might ask your patients if they receive any small complimentary papers in their mail. If not complimentary, ask if they subscribe to a smaller paper.

If it’s free it can’t be good.

Don’t be so quick to judge. The advertisers are paying for the “free” papers, now you might be one of those advertisers. You and other businesses are helping to provide a great service to many who receive this paper. Your chiropractic advertising might produce a better return with a local paper that is mailed to the zip codes in your area. Those readers might actually be more likely to call for an appointment because you're close to their home.