FOLIO: Personalities -- The Blog People Page

Social media? So 2009. This year the publishing catchphrase is "marketing services" (with of course, a strong social media component). Depending on your definition, magazine publishers have always offered "marketing services," but today that increasingly has come to mean going beyond custom publishing and targeting below-the line-budgets ranging from direct marketing and lead gen to consumer or trade promotion, events, even market intelligence. Increasingly, publishers are bypassing the agencies to work directly with the brand on the marketing message.

But if the publisher now has direct access (or even input) on the marketing message, what does that mean for traditional publishing roles, such as editors and salesp More...

Recently, the National Rifle Association's member magazine America's First Freedom took Garden & Gun to task for not accepting an ad from the organization. The NRA claimed it was a politically-motivated decision that doesn't stand up for a demographic Garden & Gun claims to serve. According to Garden & Gun, the magazine has a policy of not accepting political ads of any stripe.

"We regret that they chose to write about us without checking their sources with us and were disappointed by their decision to criticize us for refusing their ad without having their facts correct," president and CEO Rebecca Darwin tells More...

There's a new attitude in magazine publishing: Cautious optimism.

In recent months, the industry has seen some flashes of improvement. MPA's Publishers Information Bureau reported that ad pages grew 0.8 percent in the second quarter. That's not too impressive until you realize that's the first time in NINE quarters that PIB reported that both revenue and pages had increased (ad pages are considered the real bellwether for PIB since revenue estimates assume full rate card rates). One hundred thirty magazines reported ad page gains in the second quarter, compared to 15 for the same time period last year.

Elsewhere, MediaFinder says that 87 magazines closed in the first half of 2010, down from 279 in the first half of 2010. T More...

Magazine publishers are scrambling to be on the iPad and why not?  Wired saw 73,000 downloads in the first nine days after its iPad edition launched and editor-in-chief Chris Anderson anticipated iPad downloads beating newsstand sales (which average mid-80,000) in June without cannibalizing print sales. IDG's PCWorld and Macworld went from 600 monthly downloads COMBINED with their digital editions to 8,000 downloads with their iPad version. With the iPad (and the slew of tablets expected to hit the market), publishers have finally found a format online.
 
But getting an app approved can be a frustrating ord More...

Most editorial operations are approaching the Web today with a mix of scientific process and search engine voodoo. At b-to-b publisher Questex Media, manager of search Alison McPartland and her team have developed a strategy that includes defining key areas certain editors are good at, and trying to apply those lessons to other editors within the group.

"We want to show the particular strength or weakness in each editor," says McPartland. "There are different ways to focus on how they're preparing content online and we want to highlight those differences. If someone is our top Optimization Editor, what is he or she doing that you could be doing?"

Below are four benchmark classifications for online editor More...

Business-to-business publishers seem to be going one of two ways when it comes to their remaining print magazines; either slashing budgets and staff to the bare bones as they scramble to develop replacement products or investing in the print title as a premium offering within their multimedia stable.

Those choosing the latter route are increasingly turning to expertise from the consumer world. Cygnus Business Media recently hired designer J.C. Suares, who has worked with titles ranging from Fast Company to Variety to ESPN. Reed Exhibition's JCK, which unveiled a new and expanded design earlier this month, tapped art director Robert Newman, former design d More...

Five years ago, “luxe” publishers—glossy, high-end magazines that were freely distributed to select demographics, hotels and retailers—were all the rage in the city and regional market. Modern Luxury, 944 Media, Niche Media and Greenspun were boasting big city glitz and fat books full of ad pages from high-end national and international brands.

Today, however, several luxe publishers have fallen on hard times. In April, Modern Luxury announced it was on the block in hopes of either being acquired or finding a new equity partner. The company lost its founder and previous chief executive, Michael Kong, earlier this year after lenders including GE Business Financial Services took control of the company after Kong was sai More...

Every highly competitive magazine market is used to trash talk, undercut rates and the occasional sneaky gambit from rivals (remember the Pub Exec publisher trying to get the lowdown on FOLIO: newsletters by pretending to be a prospective advertiser?)

In the city and regional category, where barriers to entry are fairly low yet the clash for the limited dollars of local advertisers can be a life and death struggle week in and week out, competition can get especially cutthroat, particularly when a newcomer enters a highly concentrated market.

In 2008, Rena Tran founded Erie Life Magazine, More...

Last week, Peter Sprague, CEO of enthusiast publisher Premier Guitar, offered predictions and analysis of the magazine market in 2010, particularly around the digital push during a FOLIO: Webinar called "State of the Art in Digital Magazines." Sprague's comments ranged from critiquing the surge in electronic devices used by publishers to criticism of current multi-media audit efforts.

Why should you care? At a time when many publications are hanging on by their fingertips, Premier Guitar posted a 35 percent increase in ad revenue in 2009 and is up 40 percent to date More...

Lead generation has dominated much of the b-to-b conversation for the last year, offering hope, revenue and not just a little frustration on the part of publishers, many of whom quickly find out the lead gen business can be more than they bargained for.

"We've been able to re-build our properties not from larger, share-of-market accounts, but with smaller companies who want to see lead generation from e-products," says one b-to-b publisher who wishes to remain anonymous. "Even some of our larger accounts are not buying based on the number of unique visitors or page views or any of the other site metrics. They want to see direct ROI in terms of clicks on their ads."

The publisher' traffic continues to skyrock More...

While b-to-b publishing executives saw print account for 52.4 percent of total revenue in 2009, they anticipate print dropping to 47.5 percent of overall revenue in 2010, according to the latest FOLIO: B-to-B CEO Survey, conducted by Readex Research. That's the first time print has fallen below 50 percent of total revenues for b-to-b publishers as a whole, according to the Folio: surveys.

Meanwhile, paid subscriptions are the only other area b-to-b executives expect to drop in 2010, down from 7.3 of total revenue last year to 6.9 percent this year.

A recent report from American Business Media said print was the hardest hit category for b-to-b publishers in 2009, down 24 percent to $7.5 billion, while events fell 15.8 perce More...

In February, the Inc. magazine editorial staff produced its April issue working from home and remote locations like coffee shops and hotels (the non-edit side remained in the office). With rent the second highest expense for most publishers (after people), the virtual office is something more publishers are considering.

Now Inc.’s April issue is hitting newsstands and includes a feature story from senior writer Max Chafkin on the experience, which yielded some surprising results and changed views of both employees who were originally in fa More...