Happy 100th PPA! Now what?
If it wants to survive another 100 years, the Professional Publisher’s Association has to help the industry solve the nitty-gritty of what magazines should be and do – and what the business models might look like, says Peter Houston, founder of Flipping Pages Media.
The Professional Publisher’s Association, the industry group that looks out for the interests of Britain’s magazine publishers, is 100 years old tomorrow. Many Happy Returns!
If you love magazines, have a read of Vanessa Thorpe’s article from Sunday’s Observer. The piece on how magazine’s helped shape society is a real chest-sweller, sweeping proudly through highlights of the PPA’s own ‘100 Magazine Moments’ centenary publication.
From Mrs Thatcher telling Woman’s Own that society was dead to the counter-punch from Big Issue founders Gordon Roddick and John Bird, it’s a tale to make any magazine maker burst with pride.
But what about magazines in the next 100 years, the next 10, or the next five for that matter? And what about the PPA’s role?
Maybe you’ve heard, the magazine industry has been having a fairly tough time of it recently. Recession and a digitally driven fragmentation of consumer reading habits don’t make for a rosy outlook. Pick a number, any number, and it’s probably bad news.
Amidst the profits squeeze, magazine publishers are having to figure out where to invest. Some are in the process of abandoning magazines altogether and shifting focus to events and data. Others are engaged in ruthless eugenics programmes, where the weakest magazines are put out of their misery, clearing space for stronger titles more likely to survive in a brave new multi-platform future.
One hundred years old and the PPA finds itself in the middle of a magazine maelstrom, where no one can really answer the question – what is the future for magazines?
In the absence of a clear answer, the best the PPA can do is keep the conversation moving forward, and where possible, keep it positive.
The association’s CEO Barry McIlheney has made a good start on challenging the ‘Death of Print’ meme that has haunted the magazine market since Tim Berners Lee coded his first hyperlink. Labelling it the “phoney war” between print and digital, he has succeeded to some extent in shifting focus to print’s place in a multiplatform future.
But to survive another 100 years, the PPA has to help the industry solve the nitty gritty of what magazines should be and do, and what the business models might look like.
Here are three examples:
As digital asset management and distribution technologies develop, ‘streaming’ magazines that build over time are being developed; shoppable magazines that link directly to retailer’s e-commerce platforms are being made; magazines that scale elegantly across desktop, tablet and phone are already out there. No one company knows how to do all those things – the PPA can help publishers share their learning.
In digital, discoverability is still a huge issue for publishers. Apple’s game-changing newsstand app simply didn’t change the game. With Apple controlling the bulk of digital magazine downloads and associated customer data, publishers are struggling to get their titles found. Publishers need access to their reader data so they can get back to marketing their own titles – the PPA can aid the effort to make Apple listen.
The system for reporting combined multiplatform, print and digital circulation figures needs to be sorted. In a Radio Four Media Show interview last week Conde Naste’s Nicholas Colridge said audited circulation numbers “haven’t caught up with the fact that digital has been invented.”
Not being able to show the combined reader reach of print and digital makes it harder for publishers to engage advertisers with digital – the PPA can crank up the pressure on the auditing agencies to fix this problem once and for all.
People hold incredibly strong affection for magazine brands. I heard one publisher recently talk about a reader’s response to a re-design of their beloved monthly, “It was like a death in the family,” wrote the grieving reader. Sad as that might sound, that’s the way magazine publishers want all of their readers to feel, online, offline, print or pixel.
The PPA can’t make readers, or advertisers, love magazines. The PPA certainly can’t fix all the problems that the industry faces; that’s absolutely up to the people who make magazines. What it can do is help the industry tell itself and its customers – readers and advertisers – a better story about our multiplatform magazine future and help them work together to make it happen.