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News at a Glance
Mail Room Breaking RecordsThe year 2007 has seen record-break ing months, every month, for January through May for outgoing pieces of literature from the home office mail room. May itself was the busiest month on record, with 71,956 pieces! Please note that these are individual literature requests, and do not include the fulfillment houses that regularly mail The Good News, World News and Prophecy and United News for us—millions more pieces a year. — Peter Eddington [ back to top ] 50,000 Young Families to Be Added to GN in 2007-08As the 2007-08 fiscal year gets underway July 1, we are mapping out an exciting Good News print advertising campaign. The plan features a full-page card insert in the October 2007 issues of Parents and American Baby magazines (similar to our April and May 2007 efforts) and brochure insertions in American Baby co-op mailers and Parents Healthy Kids sampling programs. Over 6 million inserts/brochures, advertising our booklet Marriage and Family: The Missing Dimension will be distributed through these programs. We expect to add over 50,000 young families, whose median age is 29, to the Good News subscription file in 2007-08. The 2007-08 print advertising campaign also includes: •A four-month-long supermarket distribution campaign beginning in September in 2,000 major supermarkets distributing 320,000 copies of four newly redesigned 5½-by-8½-inch "take one" brochures. •Postcard insertions in various card packs, reaching over 7.3 million households and adding over 40,000 Good News subscribers. •750,000 advertising brochures and postcards will be placed in the Rodale Prevention package insert program. •Two new trifold "take one" brochures, "The Debt Trap" and "The Middle East in Bible Prophecy," will be made available to interested brethren to distribute beginning about Aug. 1. Overall, this proposal calls for almost 17 million total advertising impressions, adding nearly 106,000 new subscribers at a targeted cost per response of $4.14. — John LaBissoniere [ back to top ] Great Times for Online Marketers—UCG Keeping Up and MoreThese are great times for online marketers. Internet ad spending grew by a third from 2005 to 2006, according to the Interactive Advertising Bureau and PricewaterhouseCoopers (IAB/PwC). Online ad spending revenues totaled $16.8 billion in 2006, up from $12.5 billion in 2005. "It's been a long time since any medium had three years in a row of 30%-plus ad spending increases," notes eMarketer senior analyst David Hallerman. "With a 34% gain in 2006…the Internet now matches cable TV from 1983 to 1985 and broadcast TV from 1952 to 1954 for such strong, long-term spending increases. Such comparisons to TV advertising are apropos, since online video grabbed everyone's attention in the past year." Of particular note: Online revenues in Canada grew 80 percent in 2006! This is likely due to the substantially greater broadband penetration in Canada, at 58 percent of households versus 46 percent in the United States. Our own United Church of God online advertising budget has grown 44 percent, 81 percent and 33 percent for 2005, 2006 and 2007. We're actually above the U.S. average growth rate in this regard. See the chart on page 2 with our online advertising impressions at Google and Yahoo for January through May for the past three years. These are some very significant increases, with this past March showing 10.4 million views of our ads at Google and Yahoo! — Peter Eddington [ back to top ] Impressive Increases for World News and Prophecy CirculationWorld News and Prophecy is seeing impressive increases in circulation from year to year. Circulation for the May 2007 issue was 47,232. Not a lot of advertising has been done for this publication. We have some online ads running at Yahoo and Google, and we mention the publication from time to time in The Good News magazine, but that's about it. These increases are very encouraging. Please see the accompanying chart that shows the circulation for the May issue for the past seven years. — Peter Eddington [ back to top ] Good News Tops Half MillionThe number of English-language Good News magazines to be printed for the July/August 2007 issue at three locations around the world is as follows: Glasgow, Kentucky ............ 427,374 Eagle Farm, Australia .......... 62,000 Cape Town, South Africa ..... 17,380 Total ................................. 506,754 This is a 9 percent increase over the total print quantity for the previous issue (May/June 2007) of 464,574. — John LaBissoniere [ back to top ] Beyond Today Response IncreasingSince April, nine new Beyond Today programs have aired and three programs have aired again. Of the nine new programs aired, four are currently in the top 10 program ranking of 58 programs aired so far: Current Rank ............... Program #1 .................. The Easter Charade #4 .................. Death of Darwinism #5 ........................... Is God Angry? #8 .............. Europe's Long Dream The Easter program received a total of 413 responses. Altogether, 13,534 responses have been received since Beyond Today began airing in December 2005. Of these, 7,433 have come through the Beyond Today Web site. Phone responses from TV added 3,826 and phone calls from radio added another 1,400. Yahoo and Google Web responses totaled 875. Average program response continues on a steady upward track. Below are average response rankings from each report: Report Date .. Average Response April 3, 2006 ............................... 73 June 6, 2006 ................................ 92 Aug. 1, 2006 ............................. 121 Sept. 20, 2006 ........................... 138 Dec. 5, 2006 .............................. 152 Feb. 5, 2007 ............................... 156 April 6, 2007 ............................. 165 June 26, 2007 ............................ 176 Currently 187 cable-access channels air Beyond Today video programs in the United States. (This is up from 182 channels in September 2006). Programs are supplied to these locations by 160 Church member "sponsors" in 36 states. — John LaBissoniere [ back to top ] Senior Pastor Visits Scandinavia and EstoniaVictor Kubik, a member of the Council of Elders and senior pastor for Eastern Europe and Scandinavia, traveled to those areas June 11 to 28. Mr. Kubik and Bruce Anderson, an elder from Minnesota, started with an extensive train and bus journey through three Nordic countries: Norway, Sweden and Finland. They visited United Church of God members, interested parties and friends. From Helsinki, Finland, Bruce Anderson flew back to the United States, and Mr. Kubik continued on to Estonia where he and elder Johnny Lambert from New York spent several days mailing out Good News magazines, Russian and Estonian Bible Study Course lessons and other literature. For complete details of the trip, see Mr. Kubik's travel blog at http://www.travelpod.com/travelblog/victorkubik/scandinavia07/tpod.html. [ back to top ] Space Available for ABC SeminarsPreparations for the seventh annual ABC continuing education seminar at the home office in Milford, Ohio, is almost complete. This special five-day seminar, scheduled for Aug. 20 to 24, is open to any who would like to experience a brief sample of the ABC program. We are planning to have six different instructors, each presenting brand-new material. We still have several openings, but space is limited, so those who wish to attend should immediately send their names and contact information, along with their tuition ($50 a person), to: Ambassador Bible Center, Continuing Education, P.O. Box 54992, Cincinnati, OH 45254. — David Johnson [ back to top ] New Magazine to Launch in JulyBreaking Free Journal has been chosen as the name of the new online magazine that will focus on addictions, mental illness and various forms of dysfunctional behavior. It will be on the Web at breakingfree.ucg.org and will launch in mid to late July. [ back to top ] Special Graduates’ Section InsideThis year's high school graduates are featured in a special section of this issue, from page 5 to page 13. Because of this special section, some regular features such as "Media News at a Glance," "From the Word," "Treasure Digest," "Turning the Hearts" and "Children's Corner" were not included in this issue. They are scheduled to return in future issues. To see the special graduates' section in color, download a color PDF at our Web site at www.ucg.org/un. If you are a graduate and were not included, please send your information to mike_bennett@ucg.org to be used in a future issue. [ back to top ] Ministers Visit India and the PhilippinesJim Franks, Ministerial Services operation manager, and David Baker, senior pastor for Asia, traveled to India and the Philippines in June. Mr. Franks left June 12 and returned June 22. They visited a group of over 200 people in a remote part of northeastern India who have asked to become part of the United Church of God. The name of the group is Church of God (Israel). "The people we visited in the remote state of Mizoram were excited to see us, and we felt very much at home with them," said Mr. Franks. "Their doctrinal positions are virtually identical to ours, but in some cases their practices are different. We spent many hours discussing doctrinal concerns, format for Sabbath services and how the Passover and Holy Days are observed in UCG. We will now wait and see how they react to our suggestions. One interesting fact about this group is that it is the first such group that I have visited that actually paid our travel expenses for the visit, with the exception of our airline tickets. I believe this speaks well of their sincerity." Mr. Franks and Mr. Baker also conducted a leadership conference in the Philippines. "We continue to experience outstanding growth in the Philippines, almost 10 percent per year for the past several years," said Mr. Franks. "Last month, the office staff from Davao set up a Good News booth at a local mall, and within a week they already had close to 800 new subscribers. With a current subscriber base of just over 8,000, this was a 10 percent increase in total subscribers in only one week! The plans are to take this booth to various malls around the country and set it up for a week at a time." [ back to top ] Calendar of EventsJuly 15-17: Northeast Region ministerial conference, Richmond, Virginia, area. July 21-22: Women's Weekend, "The Gift of Godly Friendship," Phoenix East, Arizona, www.ucgphoenix.org/women/index.php. July 21: Flint, Michigan, 40th Anniversary (see article, May issue, page 24). July 28: Ann Arbor, Michigan, 40th Anniversary (see article, May issue, page 24). Aug. 5-8: Council of Elders meeting. Aug. 10-12: Young adults' weekend, Williams Bay, Wisconsin, contact gary_black@ucg.org. Aug. 12: ABC graduation. Aug. 19-21: Southeast Region ministerial conference, Atlanta, Georgia, area. Aug. 20-24: ABC continuing education classes at the home office. Aug. 25-26: ABC continuing education classes in Houston, Texas. Sept. 2: Houston Music Festival (see article, February issue, page 16). Nov. 11-13: Northwest Region ministerial conference, Portland, Oregon, area. Dec. 11-13: Council of Elders meeting. Feb. 29-March 5, 2008: Council of Elders meeting. May 18-19: GCE annual meeting. Please send calendar items to mike_bennett@ucg.org. [ back to top ] What's New on the Web? Compass Check Meetings. Good Works Program. United News Archive. UCG Commentary. "What's Happening to Fathers?" Featured Link Youth Web site: Families, preteens, teens, young adults. ucg.org/youth
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