Buying a product from a magazine used to involve tearing out a page and traipsing around the shops to look for a match. Then, online shopping meant all that browsing could be done with your fingertips. Now, the digital revolution has shrunk that journey from inspiration to purchase to a single step, providing some lucrative opportunities for publishers.
E-commerce is fast becoming a productive way for publishers to more closely link advertiser partners with a loyal, self-selected audience, by ensuring advertisers’ products are never more than a click away from their valued editorial content. It’s also encouraging publishers to get into the retailing business themselves, selling others’ products but also their own creations. And many are finding that, because they know their audiences so well, they’re ahead of the game when it comes to offering them products and services that hit the spot.
The value of sales through e-commerce in the UK has risen 44 per cent in three years, and now accounts for 19 per cent of total turnover by UK businesses, according to the Office of National Statistics. And it’s this valuable prize – e-commerce sales amounted to £483 billion in 2011 – that publishers are seeking a share of.
The shift towards e-commerce is taking place globally. Time Out New York City sells event tickets through its website and its apps, for instance. Real Simple magazine has a mobile gift guide that allows consumers to buy directly through its app. Vogue partnered with retailer Moda Operandi during New York Fashion Week to allow readers to pre-order fashions directly from the catwalk. Hearst in the US has ShopBazaar, an e-commerce site linked to Harper’s Bazaar that allows readers to buy direct what they see in the magazine. Hearst in China is trialling a different e-commerce model, in which shoppers select from different retailers’ sites but unite their purchases at the check-out, while in Japan it has invested in a branded bricks-and-mortar Elle store.
In the UK, publishers are gradually getting to grips with the opportunity that the new era of e-commerce presents. “Without doubt, e-commerce revenue for publishers has significant potential,” says Tim Faircliff, co-chair of the Association of Online Publishers. “This has been around for many years and I helped launch such revenue for the Telegraph across fantasy football and crosswords back in the early 2000s. Now, the levels of sophistication and deep insight into audience behaviour offer publishers significant opportunity to ‘sell’ content and broaden the revenue base.”
Bauer’s new iPhone app for the glossy women’s weekly title Grazia has an integrated e-commerce feature enabling users to shop in-app, share via social channels, and save to a cross-edition wish list. Hearst has set up a series of online shops for some of their most prominent titles, including Elle, Men’s Health and Cosmopolitan, selling items selected by their editorial teams. The store, called the UK Edit, is run by specialist e-commerce partner The Hut Group.
Owen Davies is Chief Executive of MyTimeMedia Ltd, which publishes hobby magazines including Model Engineer, Model Boats and Popular Patchwork. The company also runs the e-commerce hub MyHobbyStore.co.uk, which sells products of interest to hobbyists across all the magazines’ categories, and also sells books and magazine subscriptions. He says e-commerce has proved highly lucrative. “It’s the biggest part of our business now.” The site sells everything from remote-controlled planes to dolls’ houses. “We don’t have magazines in all these areas but we do have online communities for them,” Davies says. Lots of products sold through the site are exclusive to MyHobbyStore, but the vast majority are made by a third-party, such as Hornby trains and Corgi cars.
“We don’t really endorse products – I would say we leverage our community in the same way as any other retailer,” he says. The company doesn’t do any click-through-to-buy content that links to external suppliers, as it wants to maintain control of the supply chain and guarantee levels of stock and service. “So, we provide the customer relationship – it’s important to us to make sure we deliver excellent service.” The site also works as a driver of sales of digital issues of magazines.
Tailored offer
Daily newspapers are also getting in on the e-commerce action. The Times has enjoyed success with its virtual reality-enabled fashion and seasonal gift features, which enable users with smart devices to scan a product they like and buy straight off the page.
Publishers’ e-commerce sales don’t have to necessarily link to the editorial content of a brand – just meet the audience’s needs. At Immediate Media, for instance, an e-commerce site for Radio Times does a brisk trade in holiday packages developed with a travel partner. Revenue is divided between the two parties. “Radio Times has an older, affluent audience and an active audience,” says Jess Burney, Immediate Media’s Director of Enterprise, CRM & Subscriptions. “Radio Times helps them make the most of their leisure viewing, and these are people who like to go around Europe, go on cruises, and like to buy. What we’re doing here is using the insight on our customers to present offers our customers will find attractive.” With a database of a million subscribers to the magazine, Burney says e-commerce provides an opportunity to leverage that relationship and understanding of the readership. Aside from a share of sales, the publisher also gets back data that can be used for retargeting. The model is being considered for extension into other Immediate titles.
Merchantry, a company providing e-commerce software solutions in the US and the UK, says that within five years, every publisher will be offering e-commerce. But whether it’s based on a model that simply sends orders to external retailers in return for a cut of the takings, or one that involves the publisher doing the warehousing and fulfilment themselves, or something in between, is yet to become clear. Merchantry says most publishers are half-way along the route to e-commerce through their use of affiliate marketing – linking readers to a retailer or brand’s own e-commerce site on a commission basis. But the company warns that, while an easy approach to roll out, it can lead to lost revenue and valuable consumer data. Publishers only get a commission on that first sale that results from a link being followed, allowing data on valuable consumers to go to the retailer, and make nothing on any future purchases that person might make following their introduction.
“There is an emerging strategic battleground over the user / viewer and a convergence of retail thinking and media thinking,” says Faircliff. “Publishers are striving to develop a deeper level of knowledge and a one-to-one relationship with their audiences. The retail sector has been doing this well for many years – think of the Tesco loyalty programme. Various models exist and, in the publisher world, are often led by marketing disciplines and budgets. It will require new types of partnerships and approaches as well as some radical thinking on the competitive space. eBay partnering with Argos is an example of such thinking – as a test case for fulfilment and customer-driven demand, it is an interesting development.”
Role reversal
Just as publishers are entering the world of retailing, so too are retailers becoming providers of quality content, sometimes poaching top editorial talent to head their operations.
The John Lewis Edition, published by department store chain John Lewis, is now a hugely popular women’s lifestyle title, as is the magazine published by fashion e-tailer ASOS.com. Online product brochures have grown into content marketing operations, with high-quality photography, engaging articles, videos, guides and the kind of content that was previously the business of publishers.
The Net-A-Porter Group is among the leaders in this field. The fashion e-tailer sells high-end fashion but also produces fashion editorial, updated weekly, which is viewed by more than 2.5 million women a month. Former Gourmet editor-in-chief Ruth Reichl moved to direct editorial at Gilt Taste, although the site recently closed, and former Wallpaper and Esquire UK editor-in-chief Jeremy Langmead is the editor of Mr Porter, the male fashion arm of Net-A-Porter. Other retailers muscling in on the editorial world include US electronics chain Radio Shack and menswear vendor Gilt Man. Likewise, publishers are snapping up retail talent. “We compete against other retailers; we have retail buyers who are specialists in their field,” says Owen Davies of MyTimeMedia.
The advantage these retailers-turned-publishers have is that the editorial is seen by consumers as a kind of bonus service, a nice add-on to the shopping experience, which gives them a reason to keep coming back. For publishers, however, there is a legacy of editorial independence to protect.
Jess Burney says there’s no question of e-commerce potential leading editorial agendas astray, nor a danger of consumers being annoyed by being sold to while they’re enjoying content. “We’re very upfront, and this is the key part of being transparent,” she says. “We do say why we choose the partner, and people know they’re buying from a partner. There’s a clear line between what’s editorial and what’s an offer.”
The Radio Times, in its editorial, does feature holiday suggestions along the lines of “10 Downton Abbey-inspired breaks” along with international tours, and where there are links to partner promotions bookable online; there are click-throughs provided, but the editorial always has stand-alone validity. “We’re looking to get people, particularly online, interested in content that drives eyeballs, so there’s very little point the travel editor creating content if it’s not going to get them interested,” Burney says. Other publishers also see links to e-commerce as a service to readers, not an unwanted sales pitch. “We have a web platform that automatically links through from a feature,” says Davies. “We have product reviews on our sites, and if there’s one of those products on our e-commerce site, it will link through.”
Tim Faircliff says this separation of church and state is something that publishers have successfully managed for years, it’s just that the challenge has gone a little more high-tech.
“In the new digital economy, where content is still the key asset, there will always be potential conflicts, but certainly AOP premium publisher members are experts in protecting their credibility and editorial independence,” he says. “The need to make money from their content is a natural and good tension as it forces a greater understanding of audience desires than ever before.”
