From MIN:

Flipboard Offering Publishers Magazine-Like iPad Feed Experience
Monday, December 6, 2010
Steve Smith

How ironic that a start-up that aggregates and formats simple social media and RSS feeds onto the iPad is helping magazines look more magazine-like on the tablet platform. But the buzz-fueled aggregation app Flipboard is doing exactly that with inaugural partners Bon Appétit, Washington Post Magazine and Lonely Planet. In an effort to ‘iPadify’ shared content from major media partners, Flipboard is creating a more sophisticated layout framework for articles that are fed into its app. Flipboard offers a unique system that it calls a ‘social magazine,’ which turns RSS, Twitter and Facebook feeds into neatly laid out illustrated pages that literally flip to advance and pop-up fuller article excerpts in a window with accompanying image. The new partnership wit media companies takes that elegance to the next level. When a user double taps on an article from a partner like Bon Appétit or ABC News, the reader gets a multi-page rendition of the article in a magazine-like layout, including full page ads.

“We believe the timeless principles of print can enhance the social media experience, not only to make content more discoverable but also to make it easier to read,” says Flipboard CEO Mike McCue. Flipboard had been rumored to be in conversations with media companies about ways to help them monetize the feeds that Flipboard uses to populate its product. Flipboard is working with ad agency OMD to test the full page ads that occupy these enhanced articles. Initial sponsors include Pepsi, Gatorade, Infiniti, Showtime and Levi’s.

In our use of the featured Flipboard pages, the system did produce very readable and engaging page designs. The excerpts click through to a richer environment that is closer to the typical magazine app than it is to a Web site, to which Flipbook pages often link. The full-page ads generally have been well-tuned to the touch and feel strengths of the platform. Best of all, Flipboard does all of this while retaining its signature snappiness. The app has always done a very good job of caching the most likely next pages a user will tap and so creating a more seamless flipping experience.

Overall, Flipboard appears to be making good on its earlier promise to give something back to the media partners on whose content its app relies. This is an interesting new way to syndicate content into a touch-based tablet ecosystem that lets publishers keep a handle on the ways in which their content is presented, and keep their fingers in the revenue stream it might produce. 

Mediabids works with Marchex on a few per-inquiry advertising campaigns, so if you are a publication who runs PI ads, you may have contributed to their success. 

Marchex Harnesses the Power of the Call

Written on

May 13, 2010 

Author

Gavin Dunaway  |

ADOTAS – So I’m walking along, minding my own business, when suddenly my iPhone starts making a weird sound — kinda like a marimba. It’s not the sound for a text message, Facebook update or a new email, so I’m a little frightened. After I slink it out of my pocket, I’m confused when the screen says, “Incoming call.”

A phone call? Wha? People still make them in the age of clicks and texts?

They certainly do, and Marchex has found that inbound phone calls convert at five times the rate of clicks. No wonder the company has launched a pay-for-call exchange, a performance-based call advertising service.

Marchex believes the pay-for-call market is about to explode due to the huge digital supply on a wealth of platforms and innovations in technology that cost-effectively serve, track, optimize and filter phone calls. In addition, advertisers can now glean far more user information from calls including geographic and demographic data.

The pay-for-call exchange — which spreads across 50 offline, online and mobile publisher partnerships — provides both campaign creation tools and call-filtering technologies. In beta testing, average call conversions ranged from 20% to 30% while consumer engagement on the phone averaged more than eight minutes.

If the last decade of digital marketing revolved around online conversions via clicks, Marchex believes the next 10 will revolve around driving conversions through calls.

“Pay-for-call advertising is the natural next step in the evolution of performance media,” said Marchex Chief Operating Officer Pete Christothoulou. “It is the last mile for advertisers, literally connecting them to their prospective customers through the phone. Each iteration of advertising products and business models — from pay-per-view to pay-per-click to pay-per-conversation — brings advertisers closer to customers and the actual transaction while increasing efficiency and ROI.”

From MIN: 

As part of its new promotion of magazines to consumers and advertisers alike, the ‘Power of Print’ campaign launched a video into the YouTube ecosystem yesterday. The lions (and lionesses) of print—Time Inc. CEO Ann Moore, Condé Nast president and CEO Charles Townsend, Wenner Media chairman Jann Wenner, Hearst Magazines president Cathie Black and Meredith National Media Group president Jack Griffin—all mock the bloggers and pundits who have declared the death of print at the hands of the Internet.

“What actually happens is that people find room in their lives for the new medium alongside the media they already love,” says Moore. This will continue as long as the old media continue to provide “an irreplaceable value,” adds Townsend.

Watch it here . The video is part of the multititle in-print push to defend and promote the enduring value of magazines. The campaign will appear across thousands of ad pages in scores of titles in coming months.

The YouTube video has been viewed just over 3,100 times as of this morning.

By The Associated Press (AP) – Feb 8, 2010

Average single-copy sales at newsstands and other retail sites for leading U.S. consumer magazines during the second half of 2009, among magazines that reported totals to the Audit Bureau of Circulations:

1. Cosmopolitan — 1,753,368 (down 1.4 percent)

2. People — 1,325,330 (down 10 percent)

3. Woman's World — 1,168,958 (down 4.9 percent)

4. First — 1,041,011 (down 6.4 percent)

5. Us Weekly — 812,089 (up 1.9 percent)

6. In Touch Weekly — 746,973 (down 10.5 percent)

7. Family Circle — 715,000 (down 9.4 percent)

8. In Style — 689,705 (down 6.8 percent)

9. O, the Oprah Magazine — 662,304 (up 5.8 percent)

10. Glamour — 587,677 (down 4 percent)

11. Lindy's Football Annuals — 580,509 (down 5.8 percent)

12. Star — 574,927 (down 6.8 percent)

13. National Enquirer — 562,292 (down 9.3 percent)

14. People Stylewatch — 536,934 (up 1.9 percent)

15. Woman's Day — 469,068 (down 7.2 percent)

16. Life & Style Weekly — 461,958 (virtually unchanged)

17. Men's Health — 438,238 (down 13.8 percent)

18. All You — 432,801 (down 1 percent)

19. Vanity Fair — 421,833 (up 5.1 percent)

20. Real Simple — 411,705 (up 6.2 percent)

21. OK! Weekly — 404,423 (down 17.5 percent)

22. Good Housekeeping — 395,289 (down 30.7 percent)

23. Seventeen — 392,262 (up 0.1 percent)

24. Every Day with Rachael Ray — 367,744 (down 3 percent)

25. Weight Watchers — 364,396 (down 2.1 percent)

Source: Audit Bureau of Circulations

Before you get too excited about this report from MediaPost, read the very last paragraph. Full story here Bargain Hunters Start With Newspaper and Magazine Ads

by Jack Loechner, 2 hours ago

According to a recent Adweek Media/ Harris Poll, 23% of adult Americans believe that newspaper and magazine advertisements are where they can find the best bargains. 18% believe online advertisements are most likely to help them find the best bargains. 10% say direct mail and 12% catalogs, 11% television commercials, and just 2% say radio. And, 34% of Americans believe the type of ad makes no difference when they are looking for the best bargain. When looking for the best bargains, different age groups have different ideas of where to look: 18-34 year olds are more likely to say online ads (22%) and television commercials (17%) are the best places to go 35-44 year olds go online (26%) 24% of those 44-54 and 33% of those 55 and older say newspaper and magazine advertisements those are media most likely to help them find the best bargain Advertising Most Likely to Help Find Bargain - Age (Base: All U.S. adults; % of Category Respondents)   Age   Total 18-34 35-44 45-54 55+ Newspaper/Magazine advertisements 23% 15% 16% 24% 33% Online advertisements 18 22 26 17 12 Direct mail and catalogs 12 13 13 14 10 Television commercials 11 17 12 8 7 Radio 2 2 3 < .5 1 None- the type of ad makes no difference 34 31 31 36 36 Source: Harris Polls, January 2010 Among the genders, women are more likely than men to say newspaper and magazine advertisements, and direct mail and catalogs are more likely to help them find a bargain. Men, on the other hand, are more likely to say online advertisements are more likely to help them find a bargain. There is also an interesting educational difference in the media people believe can help them find the best bargains: One-quarter of those with a high school education or less say newspaper and magazine advertisements are more likely to help them find a bargain, compared to 20% of those with at least a college degree. 29% with at least a college degree believe online advertisements are more likely to help them find a bargain compared to 12% of those with a high school education or less Advertising Most Likely to Help Find Bargain - Gender & Education (Base: All U.S. adults; % of Category Respondents)     Gender Education   Total Men Women HS or less Some college College grad Newspaper/Magazine advertisements 23% 22% 24% 25% 23% 20% Online advertisements 18 21 16 12 18 29 Direct mail and catalogs 12 11 14 12 12 12 Television commercials 11 12 10 12 12 8 Radio 2 2 1 3 1 1 None- the type of ad makes no difference 34 32 35 36 33 31 Source: Harris Polls, January 2010 The report concludes that, while newspaper ads are still slightly ahead of others among all adults when it comes to bargain hunting, online is not far behind. And, online ads lead newspaper and magazine ads, as a source of information about bargains, among younger, better educated consumers, who are much more attractive to most advertisers.

Interesting blog (Reflections of a Newsosaur) on how newspapers can capitalize on the expected popularity of the IPad. Full story here

Excerpt: 

How media can profit from new iPad

While it may be difficult for Apple’s new iPad to live up to the hype that accompanied its release today, there can be no doubt that this slick new device has raised the bar for interactive content delivery.

Unfortunately, as discussed previously here, most media companies already are late in developing editorial and advertising strategies to meet this new challenge.

 Significantly, publishers and broadcasters should be single-mindedly focused on finding ways to charge (checklist at left) for all the exciting new content, services and advertising opportunities that will be enabled by the ’Pad and the imitators that follow.