Check out the damage to the free cookbook stuck on the front cover of the latest Health Smart magazine. Someone has browsed the title and shoved it back into the magazine fixture and bent the cookbook out of shape. We will only be able to sell this copy if it is the last one left. This is a problem for many magazine titles, not just Health Smart.
Right now publishers are addicted to these small stuck on bonus publications – cookbooks, garden guides, fashion guides, health guides. They are designed to give off the impression that the customer is getting more than they paid for, bonus content. The problem is that the stuck on gift is often damaged when shoved back into traditional newsagency magazine fixturing.
To this non publisher, the answer appears to be investing in better content between the covers. Look at the stand out magazine this year in terms of sales growth. Frankie does not use devices such as this. The publisher’s focus is on the best possible magazine for its demographic. Each issue is a sell out because of the content of the magazine itself. Now that’s the kind of magazine I love.