How To... Make the Most of Magazine Media

When observing a Chuck Norris high kick, two things become immediately clear; firstly, that this is not a man you would like to receive a high kick from, and secondly how much flexibility and mobility his strapping black jeans allow. If you were a reader of Black Belt Magazine between the years of 1977 and 1991 these two facts would have undoubtedly been brought to your attention by Action Jeans, who’s collaboration with the martial arts master spanned two decades and proved lucrative for both the brand and aspiring Karate-kicking vigilantes.

More than the impressive powers of both the jeans and Chuck Norris, what the success of the ‘Action Jeans’ adverts really demonstrate is how effective print advertising can be when creativity meets a relevant and engaged audience. As Jef Richards notes, “Creativity without strategy is called ‘art.’ Creativity with strategy is called ‘advertising”.

Magazine media has traditionally been a lucrative environment for successful advertising as it harmonises creativity and strategy, allowing brands to strike niche audiences with the precision of a Chuck Norris roundhouse.

It is these qualities that allow magazine media to stand out in the increasingly-digitalised ad-landscape. This has a lot to do with magazine editors. Editorial curation ensures brand creativity naturally fits the style and feel of a particular magazine, so adverts feel organic and not tacked on. This is particularly relevant when we consider the high profile brand safety issues faced by brands this year, with the likes of AT&T, Verizon and Johnson & Johnson all electing to withdraw their advertising from Google and YouTube. Certainly, if Chuck Norris and his Action Jeans appeared next to extremist content, it would be more terrifying for the extremists – fortunately for them such issues never arose.

Creativity without strategy is called ‘art.’ Creativity with strategy is called ‘advertising.'

There have been some great examples of original and inventive adverts in print recently. Magnetic, the marketing body for consumers magazines in the UK, looked at some of the most creative collaborations between brands and magazines in its Spotlight showcase earlier this year. One of the most successful partnerships to emerge from Spotlight was Office and Grazia’s Shoespaper (below). Office wanted to be more closely aligned to fashionable, aspirational footwear trends and initially briefed a two-month campaign targeting a range of female millennial orientated shoe brands – however Grazia responded with a longer term approach. The creative and editorial teams worked together to create an innovative, eight-page newspaper which was placed within the centrefold of Grazia quarterly. Shoespaper had a bold, fun and unique tone that resonated with the readers of Grazia and led to an uplift of 200% in the sales of some footwear.

Chambord was another brand who, facing the issue of extremely low brand awareness among 25-34 year olds, collaborated with Stylist to help promote their new summer product, Chambord Royale. The ensuing campaign This French Life was a perfect example of how brands can creatively engage with the magazine's curated audiences. Finding that the Stylist audience had a long-held fascination with the chicness and confidence of French women, a fully integrated yearlong campaign involving a dedicated feature written by Stylist France's editor, a 32 page mini mag and a dedicated This French Life digital channel on stylist.co.uk.

The pinnacle of the Chambord campaign was Chateaux Stylist, an innovative live experience where winners of a Stylist readers competition could meet and mingle with other readers, bloggers, writers and key figures from the editorial team at a luxury venue in rural France. The campaign was a huge success, reaching 202% more users than the target whilst contributing to a 27% increase in sales.

The creativity magazine media offers is by no means limited to print – in fact, it would be naive to think so. We’ve seen some truly innovative brand led campaigns – for example we recently saw Time Out London launch a special edition issue that featured an embedded screen previewing snippets from Netflix. 

The difference between Chuck’s Action Jeans and Chambord’s This French Life is marked – advertising has come a long way and today’s magazine media offers more than a back page picture of a groin-defying volley. As This French Life proved, magazine media can offer fully integrated, tailored, cross channel campaigns which provide real results. But what hasn’t changed is the nature of the medium in which these brands were allowed to flourish. Each of these cases demonstrate the success brands can have by identifying a specific readership to engage with and utilising the editorial expertise available in magazines.