Consumer magazines spent most of the past two decades managing decline. The more confident publishers have stopped doing that. Newsstand sales and print advertising are still shrinking, but well-made titles with loyal readers are raising cover prices and growing.
Scale matters less than it did. Bauer has made Grazia a more premium product and charged more for it, while independents such as Anthem have put print back at the centre of the business and grown their export sales. Stylist has changed format several times without losing its readers. Others have gone the other way, and Gay Times dropped print entirely to build a global audience online.
For most consumer publishers, print is our USP. It’s the anchor that makes advertisers trust us and the very thing that readers want from us.
Jon Bickley Our print strategy: Anthem
Behind the confidence sits some hard arithmetic. Newstrade is now a small share of revenue and events and ecommerce are growing from a low base. Trust has become a selling point as AI fills the web with content of uncertain origin, but the paid-for consumer model that works at scale is still being worked out.
Below you'll find some of our best feature articles on consumer magazines, from premium print and cover pricing to brand extensions, membership and the future of specialist titles, alongside our latest news and industry commentary.
For a while now, magazine publishers have been on the defensive, unsure about the viability of their traditional business model in a fast-changing world. Katie Vanneck-Smith wants to change all that.
We asked Tamar Riley, portfolio managing director at Immediate, what does best practice publishing look like in consumer media? This is what she said…
For premium titles like Grazia, Mojo and Empire, growth is increasingly coming not from extending reach but from deepening engagement with existing passionate audiences, as Lauren Holleyoake tells Ciar Byrne.
The printed magazine will be a cherished part of people’s lives for years to come, says Jon Bickley, co-founder and CEO. That is why it’s the key component in Anthem’s publishing strategy.
With the arrival of AI and the widespread availability of unattributable content, specialist publishers need to ensure that their titles are the trusted go-to brands in their sectors, Our Media’s Andy Marshall tells Ciar Byrne.
Stylist’s mission has been clear from day one: to engage with its female audience in an intelligent, positive and non-exploitative way. 16 years on, and current PPA Media Brand of the Year, they are staying true to those values, says Lisa Smosarski.
Gay Times was stuck in a rut, tied to its traditional publishing model and reaching only a small part of the LGBTQ+ community. Under the editorship of Lewis Corner, that began to change, as he explains to Ciar Byrne.
Whatever the rest of 2024 holds, two things are certain. Firstly, the bumpy economic ride will continue. Secondly, the need for media companies to have a broad base of revenue streams has never been more important or more challenging to achieve.
How do you create a specialist consumer media business that is fit for the future? What steps do you need to take to be resilient and flexible as audiences and technology evolve? Carolyn Morgan researched 20 innovators from across Europe to find out.
For many publishers, circulation is all about chasing volume, but they would be much better off chasing profitability, says Natalie Smith, client relationship manager at Warners.
Restaurants, bars and fashion colleges are just some of the new initiatives coming out of up-market publisher, Condé Nast. Whilst brand extensions and digital development are now a primary focus, as Nicholas Coleridge tells Meg Carter, everything the
With sales of digital magazines generally failing to live up to the early hype, Rebekah Billingsley asks, is it time brands started to look at alternative ways to make money beyond issue sales?
by Karlene Lukovitz
‘Innovate or die’ has become something of a mantra for our industry. I know, writes Peter Houston, … it’s easier said than done. But at the Digital Innovators’ Summit in Berlin at the end of March there were plenty of media people ready to give it a
The Digital Media Innovation Conference 2014, organised by the SIIA’s Information Industry Network took place on 8 April at One Wimpole Street, London. The theme of the day was innovation and a range of excellent speakers looked at the importance of
David Hepworth's regular column, in the May / June 2014 issue of InPublishing magazine.
The simultaneous rise of video advertising online and programmatic trading could open up new and largely untapped revenue streams for publishers, industry-watchers and key players in the technology sector say. Jo Bowman concludes her three part serie
The PPA’s annual Publishing Futures survey provides the most comprehensive set of data on the UK consumer magazine and business publishing sector – but what does it tell us about where the industry’s heading? Jim Bilton of Wessenden Marketing, author
Publishers have seen huge change over the last five years, especially in the digital space. Martin Maynard asks Andreas Schrader, CEO of vjoon, how his company has faced the challenge of digital and finds out what benefits they have been able to deli
The first of Jim Foster's new regular columns for InPublishing, looking at the world of ePublishing.
2014 sees predicted growth in digital revenues, similar to the trend of the last three to four years, amongst the UK’s leading digital publishers, according to the results of the latest AOP Organisation Census, with data monetisation emerging as a ke
As audiences receive information from an ever increasing variety of sources, where should you be focusing your resources? At Publishing & Media Expo in February, Luke Bilton, head of content for UBM Live London, shared tips for using customer insight
Publishers launch things. That’s what they do! Launches are the beating heart of the industry. Ten years ago, launches were mainly print, whilst now they are as likely to be digital, but either way, launches are still the lifeblood of publishing and
Magazines aimed at children have certain responsibilities; to entertain, to educate, to promote positive role models… and, of course, to make money. It’s a big ask! Girl Talk editor Bea Appleby looks at how her title has strived to meet its responsib
Finishability and serendipity are two of the qualities Martin Belam most likes about Flipboard.
