MPA Head Sees Print as “Robust” and “Relevant”

MPA_Logo_NOTAG-300x239This will come as no big surprise for people who truly understand marketing, but “delivering content created specifically for a particular platform, through the lens of a magazine’s ‘brand umbrella,’ has served to attract new audiences (often younger) to individual magazine brands.”

So notes Mary Bern of the Association of Magazine Media (MPA) in discussing the current state of affairs in the magazine industry.

“In the first quarter of 2015 vs. 2014, magazine media mobile web audience grew over 65%, video audience growth is up more than 14%, and many of the brands are reporting that there is very little duplication with their print audience,” Berner notes in an interview with Ellen Harvey in Publishing Executive. “Ditto with social media. Our Magazine Media 360° Social Media Report shows that magazine media consumers are enthusiastically interacting with their brands on social platforms.”

Berner notes that while digital platforms are growing in importance to the magazine consumer, the total print audience is holding its own.

“Americans of all ages read print magazines — especially younger adults. Counterintuitively, adults under 25 read more print magazines than adults over 25,” Harvey notes, citing stats from MPA’s Brand Audience Report.

Harvey calls the “print is dead” narrative “ill-informed,” and cites several recent examples of digital brands that launch in print to expand their audience engagement.

“For example, websites like WebMD and C-Net have launched print magazines, as have online businesses such as Paperless Post and Angie’s List,” Harvey notes.

“Each time one of these players launches a print magazine, the reasons cited are remarkably similar: print deeply engages consumers and delivers a tangibility, permanence, and credibility that no other media offers.”

Yes, digital media will continue to grow. And yes, publishers will use it to grow their audience and create more exposure. All of which will continue to satisfying the public’s love of print magazines.