Media options: print, broadcast or new media? Indiana experts weigh in on the choices and outlook for the advertising industry.

• Author: Held, Shari
• Position: MEDIA & MARKETING - Industry overview

TODAY ADVERTISING options abound, making it difficult to determine where to place your message for the most impact. Should you invest in print (newspapers, magazines, brochures), broadcast (television, radio, cable) or Internet-based mediums (banner ads, e-newsletters, social media, Web sites)?

"The first thing you have to do is define your target audience," says Lisa Liechty, owner and president, Liechty Media, Fort Wayne.

Next, define your target geography, the outcome you want and your budget.

"Everybody is interested in response to some degree, but there is a difference in the image or branding goal versus 'I want people to make my phone ring,'" she says. "Each medium can carry these things better than others and not all mediums will support different budget levels."

Print: Not dead yet. "Print is not dead, but there has been a transfer of budgets," says Vaughn Hickman, founder and principal of Carmel-based Hickman + Associates. "Traditional media is losing portions of advertising budgets to the new media area."

That doesn't bode well when advertising budgets are not as robust as before.

"Advertising is at a crossroads since reaching a high around 2000," Hickman says. "It has become a smaller part of the U.S. economy." He cites an Advertising Age survey published this July that reported fewer buyers anticipate increasing their budgets in TV, newspapers, radio and outdoor ads, compared to last year. Pessimism in broadcast TV and newspapers is particularly bad, with 30 percent of respondents expecting to decrease spending in broadcast over the next six months and 44 percent expecting expenditures in newspaper ads to decline.

Liechty still considers newspapers to be a viable medium, especially since many have embraced online publishing of their product, but when it comes to enhancing the corporate brand, glossy magazines do a better job--"particularly if the magazine has higher-quality production and editorial values."

"Printing has changed considerably in the past 10 years," says Tim Simic, president of Hammond-based Green Light Creative. "Now we are able to produce beautiful four-color pieces in smaller quantities for a very reasonable price. Technology has opened up a lot of doors. Print is a great complement to new media, but sometimes a print piece can have more impact."

Broadcast blues. "Generally newspaper and television, because they have greater reach than the other mediums, are going to be the most outright expensive," Liechty...