Dear Tig: Sales Cannibals, Selling Not-for-Profits, and Who “Owns” Advertising?

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Dear Tig,

We're preparing a proposal on sponsorship of our weekly email newsletter that reaches between 45,000 and 50,000 members. We also have a printed magazine distributed to our entire 100,000 membership. To complete this proposal, I'd like to be able to reasonably predict what impact soliciting sponsorship of our newsletters will have upon advertisers in the printed magazines. The fear is that it would cut into the success of our magazine advertising.

Thanks, On the Fence

Dear Fence-Sitter,

I'm quite confident that an email sponsorship will not entirely cannibalize offline sales. Of course, there may be some budget shifting among your existing advertisers. But remember that most companies keep two very different budget line items open for offline and online sponsorships.

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