Delivering cut-through

The basic principles for effective communication are not unique to the publishing category. Ultimately, putting the right message in the right place to cut through to the right people at the right time is what it’s all about, isn’t it? Magazines are the media and thus have the ability to self-promote as well as being a promotional vehicle themselves - giving them an advantage over many other consumer categories. However, consumers need to know what a magazine stands for in order to interact with it and for that, they need to be told.

Current trends

Above-the-line (ATL) spend on consumer magazines is steadily increasing. Direct-mail spend, although high by proportion, is trending downward, partly fuelled by online spend (whose definition should sit on both sides of the line). Not so long ago, some had signalled the rapid demise of paper magazines in favour of computerised versions. Yet consumer appetite for magazines remains healthy because the market is evolving. The use of brand extensions online gives publishers another channel to communicate with more readers - and a platform to drive circulations offline. Whatever lies on the road ahead, it seems sensible to have both bases covered - with a strong brand that can cut across both. Lastminute.com’s recent offline magazine launch illustrates this from the opposite point of view.

TV remains, overall, the biggest beneficiary of consumer magazine spend in recent years, with celebrity titles driving this. High potential circulations in this market are attractive to publishers – however, the fierce competition for share of voice means that multi-million pound ATL budgets are commonplace.

Advertising magazines .. in magazines

Most publishers take advantage of house space. Often used to deliver to the reader a ‘buy next week’ or subscription offer, hoping that one, this is motivating and two, it is memorable. Using the allocated space more creatively can deliver brand reinforcement to the readers who are happy to have their purchase decisions endorsed. Creative opportunities are, after all, offered up to other advertisers as a way of delivering cut-through.

But consumer acquisition is just as important, and advertising in rival magazines is not the answer. Publishing houses fortunate to have a complementary audience portfolio that can offer readers an additional magazine experience (rather than encouraging cannibalisation of existing sales) have an advantage. By contrast, however, running a mismatched house ad (eg. for a young men’s lifestyle title in an older women’s lifestyle), because it is ‘free’ can be at best, a waste, and at worst, harmful. And, if you’re launching a new title, you will need to give your prospective consumers a little more than just telling them it’s out next week in order to entice them.

Know your product and audience

Magazines can appeal to every kind of person in every kind of situation. As well as being ‘women’ or ‘children’, readers are football fans, celebrity-gossip-lovers, cyclists and house buyers. There is something for everyone - and chances are, there is another magazine sitting right next to yours that will be offering that same reader something similar. Getting people to make their purchase decision before they reach the newsstand requires cut-through. Publishers must make their brand known for something. Does your consumer want an entertaining read for the train home to block out the miserable journey, or practical advice from an expert on which computer to buy? Simply asking how, where, why and when from the perspective of the consumer can present logical solutions on how to reach them.

Understand and be clear about what you are offering. Is your magazine bought twice in a lifetime or can it be bought every Thursday? Are you delivering / reinforcing a brand message or is a tactical short-term approach required – or both? Describing, here, the types of consumer and magazine illustrates what a sweeping generalisation it is to talk about above-the-line strategies for such a diverse group of brands with such varied appeal, however basic principles exist.

Some of the most visible campaigns are for launches, which need to start achieving circulations from zero for day one. A completely new brand needs to give a compelling reason to buy. With a substantial marketing budget this should be easier than without. However, just having a large pot of money is not going to have the desired effect in the long term if it isn’t planned effectively from the start.

Launching a category

When Nuts and Zoo launched almost simultaneously in 2004, they were offering similar products to the same audience - attempting to give young males a new, more frequent way to buy and read about babes, football and weird stuff. Although Nuts and Zoo went in it from the beginning as rivals, it’s quite possible that the volume of advertising and the PR buzz created from the launch of two noisy titles at the same time validated the category straightaway, benefiting both. The men they were targeting probably felt like they’d be missing out if they weren’t reading one or both of them.

Nuts was the first to market, stealing a week on Zoo, getting it into readers’ hands first (made effortless by free sample issues and enticing promotional activity). When Zoo launched a week later with free issues and its entourage, the category was already building this weekly urgency dynamic in consumer minds. Probably not since the days of teen football mags had these men bought a weekly magazine.

Both followed the samplers with heavy TV campaigns, delivering the awareness and frequency required to hook readers in and prompt them to purchase every week, with Nuts’ campaign line specifically ensuring that prospective readers knew to go and buy it on a Thursday.

Although both titles spent a similar amount in the first six months, their campaigns were quite different: Nuts went in heavy from the outset and then lowered the volume on its reminders after the first month. Zoo went for lower launch month weight with heavier (and more) weekly reminders to follow. Nuts’ TV campaign hit around 90% of its audience during launch month; Zoo consequently took longer to reach this level.

Nuts ended the first ABC period using press ads in the Metro newspaper - weekly reminders to an audience used to reading on the train every day. Zoo, meanwhile, used the perfectly matched Daily Star for this job. Nuts came out on top in the first ABCs, whilst Zoo posted a respectable figure too. There’s no doubt that the launch campaign strategy will have been a contributor to this outcome.

It is important for both circulations, long term, to ensure that they can develop as brands that consumers understand and want to engage with. Communications must grow and develop with the magazine. In a market with high potential to be cover-led, the brand needs to trigger that desire before the reader enters the newsagent (particularly in the face of ongoing price cutting). If the launch budgets aren’t sustained, it will be even more important for these titles to focus on how best to engage with their core readers and understand their triggers to purchase. Use of electronic communications can play a big part in keeping the message fresh, frequent and engaging. From promoting their websites to sms, email, podcasting, webcasting, and, as unveiled recently, paper-thin TV screens that can apparently be produced cheaply and easily embedded into paper – you can use your imagination for the potential uses of that.

Psychologies

A completely different launch strategy was that of Psychologies. I first heard about Psychologies from seeing it around on 6-sheet posters at stations on my way to and from work. Seeing it every day, the name registered, as did the fact that it was a new magazine. As I don’t really tend to read monthlies very often, and had no real affinity with the face on the front cover, I didn’t pay attention to the storylines and didn’t think too much about it. Had you asked me a couple of days into the campaign to name a magazine, then Psychologies would probably have been quite high on my spontaneous recall list. Had you asked me if I was going to buy it, however, I’d have probably said no.

Then, one day a couple of weeks ago, I was standing on the escalator on the tube on my way home from work. Staring blindly at the posters, as usual, I noticed the run of several for Psychologies. In one it said something like: ‘Would you like you if you met you?’ Hmm, I thought, as I glided slowly by, I wonder? Then another message: ‘Why do women stare at women more than men?’ Hmm, I pondered again. By the time I’d glided by another message, I’d made up my mind. I want to read this magazine to find out the answer! So I’ve got the first issue, and I like it. Will I pick it up again? The intention is there, yes, but I may need a reminder until I get into the habit.

This isn’t a multi-million pound TV launch campaign that’s triggered me to buy; it’s a couple of weeks of posters on the commuter journey with an interesting message at a time when I’ve got a few seconds to think about it. I’ve been lured into trial by the advertising. It cut through to me and turned me into a reader. I, of course, am only one person, but this presents an example from someone on whom the campaign worked.

One size doesn’t fit all

These examples show very different strategies whilst illustrating how important it is to reach the right people, in the right place, at the right time, with the right message. More often than not, multi-million-pound advertising budgets aren’t available to marketers (and even when it is, it doesn’t in itself guarantee success, as Full House publisher Burda will testify). But there are other advertising opportunities that can be explored to help build and develop magazine brands and reinforce and persuade people to buy. Crucially, it requires a clear understanding of who you are out to get.