Newspapers have seen a sharp fall-off in employment advertising revenue since the beginning of the year. Although we are finding that many newspapers are adding to their print classified advertising revenue through sales of their online services, employment advertising is vulnerable more than any other category to economic and demographic forces that are changing both newspaper business models and individuals’ interactions with media.

For instance, where are college graduates looking for jobs? A survey of the Class of 2001 by Vault.com – albeit, a biased source with a self-selected online pool of respondents – shows 76 percent said they did not find print classifieds helpful. Company Web sites were the top choice at 55 percent, followed by corporate recruiting events (45 percent), college career centers (44 percent) and online job boards (also 44 percent). Even the Newspaper Association of America – presumably less biased than Vault.com, but still not a dispassionate observer – reported in its survey of changing media habits that 78 percent of the adults surveyed rely on newspapers for employment advertising. That means nearly one-quarter of all those responding said they do not rely on the newspaper for employment ads.

Newspapers will never again have the market share in employment advertising that they had a few years ago.

Yet they have the opportunity to increase their revenue in the employment advertising category, and to strengthen their ties to employers, job-seekers and their local markets.

It means newspapers have to do more than just publish their daily or weekly print editions. To increase revenue in this category, newspapers will have to:

• offer employers "applicant tracking systems" and "multiple-media posting systems," giving those advertisers new ways to manage their hiring processes and to reach prospective employees;

• partner with other media in their markets, like radio stations and television stations, or beat them as head-on competitors for employment dollars;

• develop new media choices to offer employers like online job sites, separate weekly or monthly print employment publications, direct-mail programs, niche-employment products, virtual and on-site career fairs, and;

• improve, expand and better promote their existing print employment services.

Those are just a few of the steps you’ll need to take to hang on to – and more importantly, increase – your employment revenue.

The AIM Group and Classified Intelligence recently completed a three-month study of employment advertising (www.aimgroup.com/reports), and we found that new competitors are taking a permanent chunk out of revenue that used to belong to the local newspaper:

• Nearly three-quarters of all radio stations in the U.S. are now pursuing employment ad revenue.

• Monster.com and technology-niche site Dice.com are among the profitable online job boards – and literally thousands of other sites are chasing employment ad dollars.

If employment revenue is important to you – and even at small weeklies it can represent a significant percentage of revenue – focus on it for the next few months by developing an aggressive program of new employment services. Your business will benefit, both in the short term and for the foreseeable future.