Tracking the latest digital magazine publishing trends brings news from New York Media, Condé Nast, Greatist
There’s no shortage of interesting digital magazine publishing trends to watch, but hovering near the top has to be magazine subscription marketing.
With all of the “ad”-versity facing the industry – ad blocking programs, ad viewability, ad tech, etc. – it’s no wonder that digital publishers are trying to circle back and discover other ways of monetizing content. Subscriptions, of course, are a classic route, but it’s a route that has undergone some serious construction and detours since the heyday of blow-in cards.
MediaPost has a couple of recent stories on magazine subscriptions in the 21st-century. Let’s start the week right there!
New York Media Enlists Sailthru to Help Increase Magazine Subscriptions
New York Media isn’t messing around when it comes to boosting visitor conversion, as MediaPost reports that the media company has brought in Sailthru to maximize engagement.
“New York has a variety of different articles and subjects and topics of interest. Every New Yorker is going to have their favorite parts of the magazine. Why not reflect and highlight that and build an engagement based on what a reader is excited to read? … We select from the available content to match the content with your individual interest. We’ll actually scale all the available content and see which of the articles you are more interested in. We are going to highlight those in the daily newsletter and prioritize those,” Sailthru CEO Neil Lustig told Sara Guaglione.
“Part of our platform is some data science on which of your users are likely to churn and engage them differently and not wait for them to actually churn. … You have to adapt to the reader, find out where they are and communicate to them the subjects that they are interested in and in the mode they want to read it in — an app, web site, email, but more likely it’s a combination of all three. You can’t do this manually, you have to do this with machine learning. … If you don’t do that, you care going to lose readers.”
Subscription Boxes Among Latest Digital Magazine Publishing Trends?
MediaPost reports that Condé Nast properties Allure and Brides are collaborating on a subscription box, which seem to be permeating the publishing world.
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“Allure and Brides magazines are collaborating on a bridal-themed Allure Beauty Box for summer 2016, the first of many beauty box collaborations between Condé Nast titles to come. The Beauty Box is Allure’s monthly subscription-based service containing product samples curated by editors. According to a statement, Allure will later release a travel-themed box with Condé Nast Traveler, a back-to-school themed box with Teen Vogue and a male grooming one with GQ,” Guaglione writes.
“The 5,000 custom-designed boxes will also include a mini magazine with content from both brands. The box will cost $49.95 and are available on allure.com. Launched last year, Allure’s subscription service delivers beauty samples for $15 per month. One sponsored product is featured in the box each month. Chapski told Fashionista that Allure plans to expand to 50,000 subscribers by the end of 2016. According to Fashionista, data shows that 80% of its subscribers are ages 25 to 54 and a third make over $100,000 per year.”
Greatist Founder and CEO on Secrets of Millennial Media Success
Recommended interview recently posted at MediaPost with Greatist founder and CEO Derek Flanzraich.
“The way we reach millennials is starkly different from how other next-generation media companies are going about it. Search makes up such a large percentage of our traffic. Search is thought of often as bad. But for us, it’s completely organic. We write high-quality content in an authentic, fun voice. How we package and frame it is doing especially well in social and search,” Flanzraich told Guaglione.
“We monetize by creating engaging campaigns that resonate with millennials, shaping the way they think about our brand partners. It’s pretty amazing that we get to work with amazing brands like Kind, FitBit and other advertisers and help them shape their message with millennials. We are very selective about brands we work with, and when we work with the brands, we work to tell their story convincingly.”
Which digital magazine publishing trends are you tracking? Let us know in the comments!
To read more about digital magazine publishing trends, visit MediaPost.
