Access to provincial and national advertising is extremely difficult for small individual publications. Government and larger corporate advertisers are loath to deal with hundreds of small individual publishers.

But there is strength in numbers.

AIP has run pilot Grassroots Advertising Procurement (GAP) projects in KZN and the Eastern Cape, uniting its member newspapers into provincial-based advertising sales agencies. The agencies are non-profit (which means they charge less commission than commercial agencies), are managed by a neutral locally-appointed project manager, with a local advisory board of participating member publishers, and financial management is subject to national oversight and auditing by AIP's secretariat.

The strategy worked fantastically, especially with larger government agencies which have booked large advertising campaigns through the GAPs.

AIP has now secured seed funding from German and Dutch donors to set up permanent provincial GAP sales agencies. But, there is a catch: AIP and its partners do not give handouts or create relationships that lead to donor dependency.

Provincial GAP projects must therefore be grassroots driven. Publishers must band together, must take responsibility for driving the project, and must agree to abide by the quality controls that are essential for GAPs to be successful.

So, if you would like to establish a GAP in your area, register below and AIP will put you in contact with other likeminded publishers in your region. 

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