Counselor Ranked No. 1 B2B Magazine
Suppliers advertising more to reach qualified distributors and increase sales

TREVOSE, PA – March 23, 2009 - Advertising Specialty Institute^®, the largest media and marketing organization serving the advertising specialty industry, announced that Counselor® was ranked No. 1 in ad pages for 2008 among all business-to-business magazines.

The ranking from min’s b2b, a publication that tracks the magazine industry, also noted that Advantages™ magazine from ASI ranked No. 3.  Together with Counselor, the two books accounted for 15% of all ad pages among the top 25 business-to-business publications in the nation. 

The article also ranked magazines in the advertising/marketing/sales management category for North America, where Advantages, Counselor and Successful Promotions® comprised 29% of all ad pages and Successful Promotions posted the highest percentage increase versus the prior year.  Competing industry publications accounted for only 18% of ad pages.

According to min’s figures, ASI is the No. 1 group publisher of all of the 55 business-to-business publishers.

The president and chief executive officer of ASI, Timothy M. Andrews, said the rankings help get the word out that the ad specialty industry is important and vibrant.

“These rankings reinforce that many suppliers are increasing their marketing to be more successful, particularly in a challenging economic environment,” Andrews said.  “And ASI’s Counselor and Advantages are their publications of choice.”

“For 2009, bookings are trending up versus 2008 for our magazine and digital properties,” said Rich Fairfield, publisher and senior vice president of ASI.  “Our magazines provide the perfect way for suppliers to advertise to qualified distributors, who are searching for products everyday for their clients.”
 
The increase in advertising also supports findings from multiple studies showing that economic downturns offer opportunities to increase sales and build market share.  Andrews noted that it makes great business sense to advertise now, as messages are more likely to be noticed as some others pull back on their promotion budgets overall.    

ASI’s magazines have won nine nationally-recognized writing, reporting and design awards, including three Jesse H. Neal Awards for editorial excellence.
    
For more information about any of ASI’s six magazines, contact Rich Fairfield, publisher and senior vice president, at rfairfield@asicentral.com.

About ASI
Advertising Specialty Institute is the largest media and marketing organization serving the advertising specialty industry, with a membership of over 26,000 distributor firms (sellers) and supplier firms (manufacturers) of advertising specialties.  Supplier firms use ASI print and electronic resources to market products to over 22,000 ASI distributor firms.  Distributor firms use ASI print and electronic resources, which contain nearly every product in the industry from more than 3,500 reputable suppliers, to locate supplier firms and to market services to buyers.  ASI provides catalogs, information directories, newsletters, magazines, websites and databases, and offers e-commerce, marketing and selling tools.  Visit asicentral.com.

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