Against all expectations, the paper advertising market remains buoyant despite the breakthrough of digital advertising in recent years. BALmétrie, in collaboration with Ipsos, has published audience figures for this traditional medium. In 2015, every French person read at least one paper advertising document every week.

We are not far from a paradox. While we protest against the advertising that regularly invades our letterboxes, we continue, willy-nilly, to take a look at them, when we are not frankly lingering over them in search of a bargain.

The audience for paper advertising grew by 0.6 points in 2015

The proof is in the results published by BALmétrie, which scrutinise our reading behaviour. In 2015, 93.4% of French people read at least one piece of paper advertising every week. If it wasn’t a mailing sent by post (58.1%), it was a leaflet that fell into our hands as we left a shop or dropped in our letterbox (69.8%).

What’s more, in a context dominated by the emergence of digital advertising, good old-fashioned advertising has increased its audience by 0.6 points compared to 2014. This dynamism leaves those who thought it was living its last days astonished.

30% of French people install adlockers

This good health reflects consumer behaviour and their use of the various advertising channels. We all agree that advertising is too intrusive and invasive. However, while 30% of Internet users installed an ad blocker in 2015, only 17% put a “stop advertising” sticker on their letterbox.

Even though there were fewer advertising mailshots last year due to the drop in investment, which caused the audience for direct mail to fall by 3.1 points, the French prefer to consult them. In 2016, the read rate for paper advertising remained higher than for its digital equivalents (92% for advertising mail, compared with 83% for email).

Supermarket leaflets still in vogue in 2016

The agri-food sector continues to be the main user of leaflets. 56.4% of French people consult a document published by supermarkets every week. The other major suppliers of leaflets are the furniture and decoration sector (35.3%) and the gardening and DIY sector (31.9%). They remain faithful to the publications that we often leaf through absent-mindedly in search of products or a good deal.

This is what BALmétrie’s figures show: we don’t mind being ‘disturbed’ by advertising, but only when we want to be! We are probably more willing to pay attention to a flyer because we decide when and how much we pay attention to it. The world of Web 2.0 and digitisation has undeniably changed consumer behaviour. However, their free will remains intact, and they are still ultimately in control of their choice of advertising channel. They continue to place their trust in paper documents, in line with the global trend in this traditional communications sector.

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