Australian Newsagency Blog

We have been able to access some remainder Christmas stock and are planning a Christmas in July Sale using the collateral created by our team.  Our plan is to run this for two weeks starting late next week.  At 50% off we still have an excellent margin on most of the stock we have planned […]

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Like many newsagents we are promoting the OzLotto $50 million jackpot in-store at every opportunity.  From the front of the shop into our Tattersalls area we have gone all out.  At our counters, too, we pitch the offer in writing and through our service.  In addition to the lottery marketing ideas I published yesterday, we […]

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We are enjoying excellent traffic from the latest HOT Ink! promotion.  As we have found previously, Tuesdays are an especially successful day for us given that it us the quietest day of the week - over $600 in ink sales Tuesday last week.  Every day since the latest catalogue promotion hit has delivered excellent business.
This […]

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The landlord at the Bayside Centre in Frankston has provided access to large format poster lightboxes for June for our promotion of copying and related services.  Australia Post has moved out of the centre and they were doing good copying business.  The opportunity to promote the business elsewhere in the centre was too good to […]

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The HOT Ink! ink and toner campaign which started a week back is working very well for us.  Sales have been fantastic - brilliant yesterday!  The brochures distributed to homes and businesses around our centre are generating good traffic including plenty of new customers.   The brochure shows us as competitive on well known brands of […]

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We have expanded our ink range at Forest Hill on the back of good growth for the category.  Regulars here will know that our sales were knocked out a bit when the new Dick Smith store opened opposite us.  Regular promotions, keen pricing (supported by professional shelf talkers) and excellent customer service helped quickly recover […]

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Click on the thumbnail to see how Alexandra and Brett Carey are promoting buy local in their newsXpress Deception Bay store.  This shows the front window of their store.  The window displays are changed regularly to keep the offer fresh and interesting.

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The pink camera we have as our Hallmark Mother’s Day Giveaway is a great promotion. I like that it is a local prize – one of our customers will definitely win. This is important given that we are pitching local shopping at every opportunity. A national prize does not have the same local […]

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Here is another variation on the stimulus package poster using the Australian flag as a backdrop for those who liked the look of our original artwork.

Feel free to use this in any way appropriate to helping your business.

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I received calls yesterday from people seeking permission to use the stimulus poster I blogged about.  Two asked if they could give copies to other businesses for them to use, another was from a newspaper wanting to run it as a full page ad to support local businesses and another was asking for permission to […]

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newsXpress is hosting an introductory briefing in Perth for prospective newsXpress members on April 30 - between 10am and 12 noon with a light lunch to follow. Any newsagent interested in achieving more from their business is welcome to attend.  Practical marketing ideas will be outlined along with details of benefits of joining newsXpress.
I will […]

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Here is a draft of a second stimulus package we are making available for us.  We have taken on board comments made to our earlier post and private comments sent to me.

Click here for a PDF copy of the poster.
The creative team at my newsagency software company, Tower Systems, is creating this collateral to provide […]

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Below is a draft of the artwork we have developed at Tower Systems for newsagents to use to invite customers to spend their federal government stimulus money in a local newsagency.  I felt it was important for newsagents to respond in some way to marketing from electrical, furniture and other outlets chasing the stimulus money.

I’d […]

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With Easter later this year the pressure was on to get Mother’s Day out and into promotional space.  It is an important season for us in terms of sales of cards and gifts.  Mother’s Day is also important in connecting us with the National Breast Cancer Foundation though the sale of Hallmark cards as part […]

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We are introducing a loyalty cards for people who work near our Sophie Randall card and gift stores.  A holder of the Sophie’s Neighbour Discount Card will receive a discount off each purchase and have access to other neighbour only offers and promotions.  We have business processes (including in our POS software) behind the offer […]

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Our Book Sale at Forest Hill is working very well.  Customers love the offers in the flyers - they always do.  Book sales are very easy to run when you partner with a good supplier and back by investing in external marketing.  This is another excellent way to draw new customers to the business.  Books, […]

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I was in a newsagency earlier this week and they were playing the TV commercial I funded late last year for the channel on their in-store TV.

If money were no object I’d like this and related commercials to run regularly on TV and in-store to remind the community about our community connection. While shoppers can […]

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Our latest HOTink! campaign ended March 31 yet we are still enjoying excellent sales.  $800 today, some new customers too.  As I mentioned in my newsagency sales benchmark report yesterday, external marketing works!  It is crucial to our growth.

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Click here for a PDF copy of our April 2009 customer newsletter for our newsXpress Forest Hill shop.
We have copies of the newsletter on a stand at the front of our newsagency  - for any passer-by to take. This is in addition to advertising flyers promoting ink, books and other deals we also make available […]

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If you know of a web developer looking for full time work please put them in touch with me.  newsXpress is looking for a full time web developer with skills in: PHP 5, Smarty templates, MYSQL query writing, HTML/XHTML and CSS, JavaScript, Ajax and graphic design.

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We are experiencing the value of marketing outside the shop with the latest Hot Ink! campaign.  Customers are bringing in the brochure in with the products they want already circled.  The Brother $20 cashback offer is popular as is the exclusive coupon offering a 10% discount off a second cartridge.  As we find each time […]

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Big W is advertising HP 74 ink for $32.84.  Our price is $25.95.  Big W is advertising the HP 56/57 twin pack for $81.98.  Our price is $69.95.
Big W claims to be committed to giving customers low prices on everything they sell.  When it comes to ink, Big W is not offering low prices.  Our […]

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The KICK START YOUR NEWSAGENCY management workshops I am involved with are in full swing. Yesterday in Brisbane we had a good discussion about our all important point of difference and again today in Sydney. It is good to see newsagents so passionate about ways in which they make their business stand out […]

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The newsagency I have written about a couple of times (here and here) when they closed for lunch and closed for a week has closed for good.  While it’s disappointing to see a newsagency close, it is good to see a sub standard operator get out of the business and therefore stop pulling the rest […]

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Elizabeth Beach from Nextra Royal Brisbane Hospital sure knows how to dress for impact. The photo shows how Elizabeth was dressed today to promote tickets in the $40 million jackpot tonight.
As Elizabeth explained to the newsagent’s workshop I was presenting in Brisbane today, dressing like this sells to customers and it engages with them […]

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