Jeremy Mayes, a search marketer from Illinois, has been invited to participate in the new wave of Google Print Ads tests running in US newspapers. He offers some details on the process on his blog: (found via Greg Sterling’s blog)

1st e-mail received from Google: “We’d like to invite you to participate in a free test that Google is performing with a limited group of our current advertisers. As part of this test, we’ll convert your existing (Market Segment Removed) related online ad to a print ad and place it in a newspaper. By participating, you’ll be helping us test an extension of our AdWords program while gaining free exposure for your business. (…)Your ads may appear in daily newspapers in one or more U.S. cities over the next few months. Google will select the newspapers and corresponding sections for ad placement but cannot guarantee that your ad will run. (…)

2nd e-mail received from Google: Jeremy asked to run a graphic ads (as opposed to text only). “Please reply to this email with your (…) graphic ad(s) as compressed attachments. You may choose to submit your ads in any of the sizes listed below. Submitting both formats increases the chances you’ll gain free exposure for your business.” Proposed sizes are: Ad Unit #1: 2.0″W x 2.25″H, Ad Unit #2: 4.0″W x 1.0″H . They also mention the following: “If you’re new to print advertising and want help building your ad, our production specialists can guide you through the remainder of the process. During this test, there is no charge associated with these services. ”

3rd e-mail: confirmation that the submitted ad has been selected to run in test. “Congratulations! Your ad has been selected to run in Google’s print advertising test. Attached is a list of newspapers, sections, and scheduled run dates for your ad, as well as a sample tearsheet displaying your ad. We determined where your ad would be placed by including it in a content bundle specifically relevant to your products or services. Please note that some of the placements listed have not yet been confirmed by the newspapers and that your ad may appear in other publications in the near future. You may receive other confirmation emails such as this one.”

Jeremy is reporting that their ad is running in 27 newspapers. “The ad is running 78 times but in most cases is running the same newspaper on a number of consecutive dates. Some of the better known papers include the Chicago Tribune, Boston Herald, Houston Chronicle, Miami Herald and a bunch of others. My ad started running on 11/29/06 and is scheduled to run in various papers through 12/21/06. The Google print team sent a pdf showing my ad in one of the papers as well. I’ve already started to see some activity on my tracking url.”

What it means: my first reaction was: those are small ad spaces. They’re basically trying to replicate their AdWords but in print newspapers inventory. I’d love to see what the actual ad looks like! I suspect Google might be buying full pages at the discounted full-page ad rate and then cutting it in smaller spaces. No business model has been announced yet for this advertising vehicle, as this is still test mode for Google.