As digital advertising has matured, brands have abandoned magazine ads in favour of the more detailed metrics and hyper targeting that online can offer. Magazines have gone from taking 5% of ad spend in 2015 to just 3% today, but multiple studies have shown that the format actually still offers a lot of value in terms of attention and effectiveness.
At magazine marketing agency Magnetic Media’s annual Spark event this year, closing the gap between where advertisers spend money and where the perception of effectiveness is was at the top of the agenda. With total underinvestment in the magazine market at an estimated £220 million, there is a lot of work to be done to re-educate advertisers on the potential of the medium.
Magnetic presented a new study with Benchmarketing on ‘Attention Pays: Optimising for Profit’, which explores the investment gap across the market, and what the optimum level of investment is for advertisers.
Optimising investment in media spend
Choosing where to put ad spend is not simply a matter of choosing the most effective platform and running with it, according to Anna Sampson, Magnetic’s Insight and Strategy Director.
“It’s not just about effectiveness, it’s about optimisation…it’s about absolutely smashing it out of the park, it’s about giving it your all, and what takes you to your absolute peak,” she said, arguing that we should learn from sporting heroes who have teams helping them optimise every aspect of their performance.
“The same is true in media. Study after study tells us that we need a mix of media, and that combining different channels has the benefit of amplifying effectiveness.”
Read the rest of this article by Esther Kezia Thorpe on What’s New in Publishing…
