As we continue to move forward in the digital age, print media must rethink its strategy by considering the digital opportunities available to them. In this post, I take the example of Encounter magazine as a case study, looking as the positives and negatives of a magazines’ foray into the digital space, as well as the opportunities available for brands to gain added value from their advertising and advertorial activity.
Encounter is a multi-client online digital magazine produced on behalf of the large brand food & beverage manufacturers and read by local convenience store retailers, small independent retailers and impulse retailers.
Encounter’s online retail magazine enables manufacturers, marketers and brand owners to inspire independent retailers and small shop owners by transforming content into interactive digital messages, enriched with vivid graphics, video and flash that hope to engage and inspire action.
As clients continually want to see more for their money and increased ROI, taking print media into the digital space provides endless opportunities to analyse and improve a brand’s advertising content.
From heat-map analytics to show exactly when and how retailers stopped to zoom in or click a link, to in-depth tools to measure how much your content is shared, the possibilities are endless and from a brand perspective, this is invaluable insight that simply could not be gathered from a print ad campaign.
Aside from more thorough ROI measurement and deeper insight into the effectiveness of an ad’s design strategy, the above content from alcohol supplier, Intercontinental Brand Ltd demonstrates how the digital magazine format can be used for even more added value.
The advert features a prompt asking retailers to register their interest to receive £5.00 off their next order to ICB Ltd. The incentive offered, coupled with a single click action time (as oppose to print magazine – computer action time) entices the retailer to register for the promotion. The retailer has nothing to lose and the brand receives the added value of data capture through their own systems.
The concept of taking common digital advertising techniques and placing them into an online magazine format appears to be common sense and cuts print costs significantly, but then why is it that not more publications are making the transition?
The main challenge for the likes of Encounter is building a strong audience of brands and retailers alike. Will they ever succeed in competing with the likes of Convenience Store and The Grocer with their trusted reputation and year’s in the field? I’m not sure – but if The Grocer were to add these digital capabilities into their digital edition, that would make for an interesting case study.
Perhaps it comes to down the patriotic nature of print editors and the fact that brands still love to see their ads in print, or perhaps people are just not ready to let go of the ‘put down, pick up’ nature of print that we have all come to love….this will be an interesting space to watch.
Posted by Rachel on January 10th, 2012
