Newspaper Publishing Houses have several factors contributing to the rates that are levied on advertisements published in the concerned newspapers. Since advertisements are the main source of income for all newspaper publishing houses, they pay special attention to their advertising rates.
There are mainly two types of advertisements which are published in newspapers-classified and display ads. The classified section is further divided into simple run-on-line or text ads and column of classified display ads. Classified ads are the most adverts as they are published frequently by small and medium businesses, retailers, individuals for personal, matrimonial, announcements and many other important purposes.
There are many factors which lead to the charges levied on the classified ads of newspapers. Some of the universal factors are:
Newspaper Circulation: Circulation conveys the number of newspapers which is printed and distributed each day or each week/month/ year. This factor is the most important factor that regulates the newspaper advertising rates. The higher the number of newspaper copies circulated within a particular time frame, the higher will be the advertising rates. This is simply because higher circulation means higher number of subscribers or readers, higher reach and popularity, which further induces the trust factor for more popular newspapers.
Readership: Readership is often intertwined with circulation details. Readership refers to the actual number of readers of a particular newspaper. If the circulation for a newspaper is 100 copies in a day then the readership may even be up to 400, with an average of 4 readers per newspaper. This is a factor that also decides the reach and number of readers the advertiser can cater to, hence this factor is a major decider for newspaper ad rates.
Location/Newspaper Edition: Location or edition of the newspaper is another major factor contributing to the formulation of newspaper ad rates. This is because; different newspapers have different circulation numbers in different cities due to different demographics. A certain newspaper maybe read more by a certain section of people in a particular city, while the same newspaper may be very rarely circulated in another part of the country or state or region. Hence, if the number of copies distributed or read in a certain city is higher than another city in India, then the charges for advertising in that city will be higher and vice-versa.
Ad Categories: Advertising Categories also play an essential role in deciding the ad rates for a newspaper. There are many categories under which newspaper ads are published such as matrimonial, property, announcements, public notices and tenders, business, recruitment, obituary, services and many more. Many a times, newspapers decide rates based on the number of ads published under one category for a particular edition, as for certain cities a certain category of ads are published more than other categories. For example, the maximum number of matrimonial ads are published in Delhi or north Indian newspaper editions while a huge number of property adverts are published across Hyderabad or other regional newspapers. Hence the category under which the ad is getting published for a particular edition of a national newspaper or a specific regional newspaper is an important rate deciding factor.
These factors are common for all types of Newspaper advertisements but there are certain other conditional factors that contribute to the rate of advertisements. Such as for Classified Display Ads and Display Ads are priced based on the length and width of the advertisement and measured in terms of per sq. cm unit. They are often measured in terms of the number of columns covered as well.
Display ads have huge printing charges as they take up a substantial amount of space in the newspapers. Display ads are often published on preferred pages of the advertisers, which have additional charges, depending on the importance of the page.
In case of online ad booking portals, the same pricing factors are applicable while displaying the ad rates on their website. They get the ad rates directly from the publishing houses and these rates are inclusive of the commission charges for the online Newspaper booking portals. There are no extra commission charges levied on the online advertising rates. One such online portal which has direct ad rates available for 150+ newspapers across India at no extra commission along with the most economical combo discount package offers is 
