Tourisme Plus has joined Today News Associates, a recently formed association of Canadian print and electronic travel news publications.

The association was started by Baxter Publications, which publishes magazines including Canadian Travel Press and Travel Courier executive vice president Wendy McClung to make advertising with print and online travel publications easier and more appealing for advertisers.

“By bringing the publications we have together in the group now we are able to give advertisers a customized or whole distribution in English and French,” says McClung. “It makes it a one-stop shop for them. They can tell us what they need and who they want to reach and we customize the program for them working with our competitors. Even though only two of us in the group have a print publication, there is still only so much money a client has. It’s more economical to come to us then to pick two or three individual projects to market with.”

Baxter Publications handles the administrative end of the association at this point, says McClung with commission going to the company that sells the ads. She says though it is early days of the project, all of the sales so far have been for online advertising which are charged in impressions. “We find out who clients want to reach and how, then we design a program for them,” she says. “We know what publications in the association reach who, so we may suggest dividing the impressions equally or not depending on the client. We can use one publication, than another, move the advertising around. The client doesn’t have to do anything, it is all done on the association side and completely monitored.”

McClung says Today News Associates is the first group of its kind she knows of. “It takes a big load off our minds, we are looking out for each other — not fighting for that one banner ad,” she says. “It also takes a lot off the minds of the clients, they know they will get it all if they go through Today News Associates.”

Today News Associates includes Press Today, West Today, Travelpress.com, Travel Industry Today, Cruise Industry Today, Canadian Travel Press, Travel Courier, Trade Talk, Tourisme Plus Aujourd’hui, Tourismeplus.com and Tourisme Plus.