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.
Traditionally, publishers have chased audience numbers. In the digital world, this can prove counter-productive because, says Mark Alker, it’s not how many people visit your site that counts, it’s what they do when they’re there.
Obvious now, but less so twenty years ago when Lorna Tilbian was advising media companies who were banking on it doing just that. Tilbian has a long track record of getting it right. Ray Snoddy meets her.
DC Thomson golf brand bunkered has announced a series of editorial team changes and new hires as it accelerates growth plans.
Future announced last week that Nikki Ogunnaike has been appointed as the new editor in chief of Marie Claire US.
Zephr has been incorporated into Zuora’s offering including a new Dynamic Offers module, with the application of Zephr’s functionality expanded to other industry groups beyond media.
A new report from Anzu and Lumen unveils gaming's untapped potential for attention-driven advertising.
Marketforce has announced the launch of Apex, the next generation in magazine allocation systems.
The PPA has announced the selection of its inaugural Next Gen Board.
The collaboration between Azerion and SeenThis ANZ aims to help to minimise CO2 emissions produced by digital advertising campaigns.
GumGum has announced it has increased engagement for Co-op’s summer 2022 food ranges and community fund across the UK with high-impact, contextual ads.
AOP has announced the winners of the Digital Publishing Awards 2023.
Rising costs have prompted publishers to fine tune their free supermarket distribution strategies. We grab five minutes with Self Select Distribution’s Andy Barker to find out how publishers can make their free distribution work harder.
The partnership between the music video streaming service and the measurement company paves the way for greater success in measuring CTV campaigns.
Good-Loop has announced its partnership with adaptive streaming tech platform, SeenThis, to minimise the carbon footprint of its purpose-powered ad units.
AOP and Deloitte have released the latest Digital Publishers’ Revenue Index.
