Why Should We Bother With Magazines ?

Author : Ankur Ashta | Marketing professional, and author of the book, Heart, Mind & Wallet: Decoding the consumers’ needs to create winning stories. The book is about consumer insights and how human beings interact with brands and marketing."

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If you are a marketer, it is highly unlikely that you haven’t heard about digital media being the next big thing. As unlikely as this ‘fact’, is that you haven’t seen a digital media presentation where one-third of the slides draw comparison between digital and other traditional media, such as TV, newspapers and magazines, and very comfortably declare the dominance (existing or imminent) of digital over these media.

Now, the boring bit of these presentations is the indispensability that is administered to digital as a medium. None of us, after all, can debate that. What is interesting is how digital is pegged against traditional media to make the latter look trivial.

While TV is hit for its lack of control on duplication of audience and the limitation of people meters (to measure/monitor the reach), print is hit by quoting ‘lack of time’ people have for the printed word. Magazines are the most tortured victims of this comparison, for they are usually announced dead or dying. And it is not done without data – India can boast of 90 million smart phones today and the figure is projected to touch 520 million by 2020.

Now the question is: With the increasing influx of these ‘internet savvy’ devices, which are capable of affecting the health of magazines (if not just kill them), why should we bother with magazines? 

Over and above the regular advantages of magazines being captive and targeted media (there are hundreds of specialist titles available) and the fact that they offer high quality production (versus newspapers), we also need to acknowledge the credibility magazines offer to the content they represent. Search for ‘credibility of internet as a source’ and you would be inundated with suggestions on how you should evaluate the ‘internet-information’ before you quote it anywhere. Magazines, on the other hand, come with a guarantee of sorts – the information given is verified and reliable. 

We also need to understand that electronic media, primarily, caters to the need for large quantities of rapidly available information. Newspapers, because of their periodicity, are constrained on quantity but information pretty much is rapid. Magazines, on the other hand, satisfy the need for long-term-high-quality information, at a decelerated yet sustainable pace.

 

From an advertiser’s standpoint, it is the high-quality and decelerated pace that make magazines an almost-perfect medium of communication. Cosmetics and watch industry would swear by this statement for these two industries are benefiting from magazines since ages now. And full credit to them for the way they are milking magazine, the medium, to cater to each stage of purchase funnel – from brand awareness to brand advocacy.

So, while these categories use covers (front jackets or outside back covers) for months together to drive brand awareness, they – at the same time – utilize the editorial content to push the opinion and consideration scores for the brands. The fact that advertisers can personalize magazine copies, makes the medium a ‘must-have-in-your-plan’ for the premium brands to facilitate relationship-building. Imagine a top-end watch company sending you a personalized copy of a premium lifestyle magazine with a small note of thanks.

 

 

The cosmetics brands have an added advantage of pushing free samples for the consumers to try. Consider the example given below:

Garnier encouraged the trial for its brand of shampoo, Fructis, through this die-cut, push-out sachet. This, to my mind, is a brilliant way of engaging with the consumers and helping them in their decision-making.

Given the high credibility of magazine content, ‘expert speak’ is another way cosmetics brands can lure consumers into trying their products. If you are a reasonably gullible person, it shouldn’t take a lip balm (the low cost item, for many, that it is) much to attract you towards a purchase. 

While these are examples of highly personalized goods, products which are family-buys and involve somewhat evolved decision-making can also try out things to establish themselves with the consumers. An automobile that stands out for its style can associate with style magazines and can be a part of the content, insouciantly. If you are a niche brand of tyres, imagine the awareness scores you can drive by dedicated presence in one section of automobile magazines – issue after issue. If memory serves me right, I have not seen Yokohama, the Japanese brand of tyres, advertising anywhere but in automobile (or related) magazines. 

Similarly, a brand of gas stoves can crack into the consideration set of home-makers, just by persistently holding to a relevant section in household magazines.

While the options are limitless, the key to success with magazines is patience and clarity of objectives. IPC/Nielsen Ad Value Research 2012 suggests that every pound spent on magazine advertising delivers an average return on investment of 1.4 pounds. This said, there is also enough evidence to show that magazines are capable tantalizing all our senses which make them even more effective to send messages across.

So, while you enjoy your copy of magazine as a consumer, it is time you understand its efficacy as a medium and start utilizing the long-term, high quality medium to establish your brand – at a sustainable pace.

References:

•  ‘Why are magazines important?’ Available on the website of IPC Advertising: http://www.ipcadvertising.com/resource/c7smxnkbj2e8rjxw3fsmwpc5.pdf

• ‘The Strengths of Print for brand and corporate communication,’ 2008. Published by The Print Media Academy of Heidelberger Druckmaschinen AG and Faculty of Advertising and Marketing Communication of Stuttgart Media University.

Image Credits: IPC Advertising, www.yourcover.com, www.cybelesays.com