Q: I've been put to the task of developing a Media Kit so that we can sell advertisements in our course catalogs. Do you have any demographic information on what a typical life long learner looks like that we could use for this kit (with credit to LERN, of course)?
A: LERN typically does not recommend selling advertising in your brochure. There are a couple of key reasons:
1. If you have non-profit mailing privileges, selling ads to companies not integral to your mission can cause you to lose your non-profit and/or tax exempt privileges.
2. You need to be very sure that you are actually making money with ads. You need to factor in the time you spend selling ads and maintaining your ad records. You also need to calculate how much income you would generate if you used the space allocated for ads to offer a successful class. (This can be roughly figured out by multiplying your average course fee times your average enrollments per class).
3. Sometimes, ads can detract from the visual effectiveness of your brochure. The ad competes with your course descriptions for the reader's attention. Also, they are often stylistically different from your own internal design, and can make your pages look cluttered and/or unprofessional.
If you decide that you still want to move forward with selling ads, it is less important to know the demographic characteristics of the "typical" lifelong learner than it is to know the demographics of your audience. There is actually no typical lifelong learner. You need to analyze your participants and determine their demographics. Then you are in a strong position to tell your prospective advertisers who your publication reaches.