Advertising is a major source of revenue for newspapers. That is exemplified, in the case of print newspapers, by the fact that at times over 55 percent of the content of an entire edition can be advertisements. For online newspapers, the space devoted to advertising is usually a smaller percentage.

In recent years, many newspapers have been beset by a decline in advertising. Strong competition has come from free online classifieds, weakening interest in print classifieds. But display advertising has been on the decline, as well.

For newspapers, the key to sustaining advertiser interest lies in the results that they can deliver to the advertisers from the advertisements that advertisers place. If the results are less than expected by the advertisers, they will look elsewhere to advertise. However, if the newspaper advertisements are effective in producing sales for them, they will be inclined to continue using newspaper advertising.

Many newspaper publishers tend to lay blame for declining advertising sales on external factors such as the state of the economy or competition from new media forms. While those are clearly valid contributing factors, they are not complete explanations. The failure of the newspaper community to successfully adapt to today's changing media landscape is perhaps the overriding factor in the decline of newspaper advertising.