Pushing Something Sweet partworks launch issue
My issues with the use of the N logo aside, we are promoting the launch issue of the Something Sweet part series on the lease line as a traffic driver for us.
The floor display unit is terrific – nice and strong and well branded. We expect to sell 120 copies of the launch issue and achieve additional sales to people attracted to the shop as a result of the new traffic.
DeAgostini TV ad misbrands newsagents
While I am thrilled to see Something Sweet Collection advertised on TV, I don’t understand their use of the N logo. They use one of at least three quite different N logos in use. I’d guess than less than a third of all newsagents use an N logo and that less than 10% of retail newsagents use the N logo in the DeAgostini ad – making its use redundant.
The N is not representative of this channel. It stands for nothing and is backed by no discipline. It’s value is represented by poor and undisciplined uptake by the channel.
I’d like to know who advised DeAgostini to use the N logo – whoever it is got it wrong.
My other frustration is that the N logo is placed to be recognised but the word newsagents is on a pale background and lost.
Despite sales failure Bauer continues to send discount magazine bags
Bauer Media continues to supply newsagents their bagged discount magazine bundles. What was originally pitched as a four times a year promotion is now promoted regularly.
I’d prefer magazines to be purchased for their content and not because of a discount to the cover price. Regular discounting is a slippery slope. People who purchase on price are, in my view, likely to only purchase again when there is a price offer.
I don’t understand Bauer sending discount magazine packs out when I see sales data. The image below is sell through data I received from one newsagent earlier this week. It covers some the packs they have received. Click on the image to see the detail.
On the basis of this data, the newsagent should not be sent more discount packs by Bauer Media as the packs clearly do not work in this shop, they are not profitable.
The thing is, I suspect the Bauer allocations people do not look at this data when allocating stock to this or other newsagencies. If they do look at the data and still send stock which will certainly not sell shame on them. What a waste of newsagent time, space and money.
Is News Corp. treating supermarkets differently to newsagents with the Disney promotion?
I was sent this photo yesterday of terrific floor display unit promoting the Disney Bring Home Some Magic promotion being run by News Corp. supporting The Daily Telegraph.
This is an excellent display unit. I wonder why Coles gets this and not newsagents.
Most newsagents I have spoken with were given posters, floor decals and blow-up figures – nothing for placing the product on the shop floor.
I expect Coles would have required a unit like this as they would not want to follow the approach newsagents have had to follow for years – carefully managing stock, checking coupons from behind the counter, imposing the rules.
This floor display unit is more space efficient and more effective than the bits and pieces newsagents have been given. It also makes it easier for people to purchase the Disney item without a newspaper – as many newsagents have found already from customers.
It is frustrating to see another example of double standards by a newsagency channel supplier. Such behaviour confuses shoppers and can only leave newsagents wondering why News Corp. is favouring Coles over newsagents.
Next time there is a promotion with a newspaper, I’ll be asking for a floor display unit like this.
As for this promotion, I will be looking at sales tomorrow, for justification of the considerable promotional space allocation.
APN disrespects newsagents with Daily Mercury promotion
The marketing and promotions department from the APN owned The Daily Mercury newspaper in Mackay has launched a promotion offering a $5,000 classroom makeover as the prize. Readers collect tokens for their school over the duration of the promotion (Feb. 14 – Mar. 16) and the school with the most tokens at the end wins.
A $500 prize is up for grabs for the newsagent with the best display / sales uplift combination.
What is dumb about this promotion is the connection with Staples as the provider of the prize. I am shocked that no one at APN realised that Staples is a giant US corporation which competes with local newsagents.
APN ought to pull the campaign and offer a prize which supports newsagents.
In Mackay of all places the folks at The Daily Mercury ought to understand the importance of small businesses like newsagencies to the economy, the role they play in supporting local schools and that what newsagents make stays in the area. What Staples makes from sales to the Mackay region leaves the region.
This campaign is socially irresponsible.
Why is this small outpost of APN supporting a giant of a business with no local connection like Staples? It does not make sense to me. Even if there is a good deal, it does not make sense for a so-called local paper to partner with a giant US business like Staples hell-bent on hurting local businesses.
APN expects newsagents to actively promote a fierce competitor, a business that is out to take everyday stationery sales from newsagents and, in the future, back to school stationery sales from newsagents.
If I was in Mackay I would not support this promotion whatsoever.
I see regional newspapers run marketing campaigns that support local businesses all the time. It’s not hard. Many newsagents I know support their regional newspapers for mutual benefit. The disconnect with this APN promotion does not make sense.
I’d be interested to know if other APN regional newspapers are running a similar promotion.
Is this why magazine distributors are pushing to stop newsagents labelling magazines?
There is discontent in magazine distribution and publishing businesses about the push by the distributor-controlled XchangeIT to promote the elimination of labels on magazines in newsagencies.
I am told that promoters of the plan in a distribution business see it as a means for reducing newsagent early returns. It would appear push has nothing to do with the benefits claimed by XchangeIT in their promotion to newsagents.
Given the continued oversupply of magazines to newsagents and a greater disconnect between supply arrangements for us versus our competitors, newsagents need the data on the labels so they can early return – as it is supply outside weeklies and top selling monthlies where we suffer the most.
This project by XchangeIT is a distraction. It shames those who are supporting it in distribution companies an in XchangeIT.
The only project that ought to matter is the efficient supply of magazines – based on the prospects of sale as indicated by newsagent sales data provided to the magazine distributors.
Efficiency is achieved when we are supplied close to what sells. A sell through of 50% is a failure. Sadly, many titles have a sell through of less than this.
Instead of addressing magazine supply inefficiency which makes newsagents less competitive than supermarkets, people in companies like Network Services want to make it harder for us to manage our own situation. Their actions show them serving only their own needs, needs which are not aligned to ours.
Fixing the broken magazine supply model is the issue which matters most to newsagents yet it is the issue those representing the channel have failed to deliver on for years. We have seen newsagent associations pitch the XchangeIT label project to newsagents without critical assessment.
As newsagents recently indicated at this blog in response to Newsagents: have your say about a possible fresh approach to magazine distribution they want more control over supply. The cost of the failure of XchangeIT and its controlling shareholders to deliver this disadvantages our channel and makes us uncompetitive against supermarkets, convenience stores and petrol outlets.
Understanding The Saturday Paper shoppers
The press release I received yesterday about the first year of The Saturday Paper is interesting not only because of the success of the title but also because of the insight it provides to the reader. Insights like these from suppliers can help us make more from products people come to our shops to seek out.
Read paragraph five of the release and think about what else you can pitch to shoppers who come in to seek out The Saturday Paper and thereby make carrying the title more valuable.
THE SATURDAY PAPER
February 9, 2015
Press Release: for immediate release
The Saturday Paper launched in March 2014, with publisher Morry Schwartz and editor Erik Jensen at its forefront. The Saturday Paper was founded on a belief that newspapers are not dead, they just stopped doing their job well. The Saturday Paper was a brave voice then and now.
In 2015, The Saturday Paper is pleased with the growth and progress reflected in the release of Roy Morgan research data. Within its first year of publishing, The Saturday Paper has established a readership of 99,000 in New South Wales, Victoria and Australian Capital Territory alone, not including their presence in Queensland and South Australia. (Roy Morgan, December 2014)
In its surveyed regions, The Saturday Paper has a readership 24% bigger than the Weekend Australian Financial Review.
Within its first year, The Saturday Paper has established a loyal readership, holding a 60% subscription renewal rate. Sales are currently averaging 60,000 copies per week nationally. In 2015, The Saturday Paper will be expanding its reach and planning a highly-anticipated launch in Tasmania.
The Saturday Paper’s AB demographic is 46% (Roy Morgan, December 2014). Research conducted by MediaCom revealed that 55% of The Saturday Paper’s audience holds a postgraduate degree. The Saturday Paper’s audience is highly engaged, with 54% of the readers spending more than one hour every week reading the print edition. (MediaCom Survey October 2014)
“It’s been extraordinary to watch The Saturday Paper grow,” said editor Erik Jensen. “We have found the audience we knew was there, an audience of readers longing for seriousness and sophistication.”
The Saturday Paper has provided quality and industry-recognised content. In 2014, The Saturday Paper was nominated for two Walkley Awards: Erik Jensen for ‘all media headline journalism’ and Luke Williams for ‘feature writing short’.
Australian Family Tree Connections shows how to support newsagents
The publisher of Australian Family Tree Connections is a regular commenter here, especially on the challenges of our broken magazine distribution system and the unfair treatment of newsagents and small independent publishers. Click on the image to see their active support of newsagents – tweeting that the latest issue is out now. Great stuff.
AFL Record publisher supports newsagents
The publisher of the NAB AFL Fantasy AFL Record has promoted newsagents on Twitter tweeting that it’s out now at newsagents and Coles nationally. While I’d prefer them to only promote newsagents, getting mentioned along with Coles is better than not being mentioned at all.
I responded to the tweet with: But buy it from your local newsagent. Support small business and not the giant Coles. Other newsagents on twitter could do this too and gain more attention for our channel. It’s not a rude response – merely a reminder that newsagents are the retailers to visit for this title.
Supermarket access slows newsagent traffic for Disney promotion
Traffic in newsagencies for the first part of the Disney book promotion supporting News Corp. newspapers was down on previous promotions according to newsagents who have contacted me. They say the availability of the books in supermarkets slowed newsagent traffic.
While it is too early for an assessment, my own experience is that for part one there was not the frantic rush we have seen in the past. I’m not concerned about as shoppers purchasing a newspaper elsewhere and coming to us for their freebie or subsequent low-cost parts were not commercially valuable. Indeed, some were angry that we had somehow forced them to walk the extra distance to our shop.
WH Smith take over of Kennys Cardiology incomplete?
The take over of Kennys Cardiology by the UK WH Smith group appears to not have been as complete as first thought. This photo is from the Kennys store at Westfield Southland in Victoria from the weekend. The card display has looked like this for several months. The gaps are not something WH Smith would have allowed to continue – especially in such a high-profile location. I suspect we will hear more about this at some point.
How are your One Direction themed titles?
I’m finding One Direction is not selling magazines like they used to. Right now, however,we have four titles with One Direction on the cover – so magazine editors disagree. Maybe sales will pick up. I’d like to be back at the peak when we could sell 150 copies of a 1D featured title. How is the band performing for other newsagents?
What small business can learn from #libspill
For all their talk about leadership, politicians rarely demonstrate this trait. Instead, they focus selfishly on themselves ahead of the needs of those they claim to serve.
This focus on self preservation is evident in Australia this weekend in the lead up to the vote on the spilling of leadership position of the parliamentary Liberal party. Watching it unfold yesterday and today on TV and online, I have been thinking about what we in small business can take away from this. Not much I think.
The same is true of the the various leadership challenges in the Labor party over their recent years in government.
Our ‘leaders’ are not leading. Despite their spin, they look after themselves first and in doing so lose direction. Here’s my small business perspective on #libspill:
- Knowing what you stand for and clearly articulating this and why is vital. You need to know why you are in business, what your business stands for and to speak to the narrative supporting this. In business, this is your USP (Unique Selling Proposition). What sets you apart from the others. Taking others ion your journey in pursuit of this is even more vital.
- Disunity is death. This is as true in politics as it is in business. If everyone on your team is not behind your mission they put your mission at risk.
- This is the era of conversations. We are talking with each other more than ever, especially in business. Yet the Prime Minister through #libspill has held one-way press conferences with no two-way communication.
- The world has changed. Tony Abbott referred to social media as graffiti. Some newsagents mock social media. Anyone dissing social media is out of touch with the people and ignoring how people communicate today.
- Trends can start anywhere. A good hashtag on Twitter is all you could need to get noticed. Social medial is a platform where small businesses can be as noticed as big businesses – yet it is a platform many small businesses do not use. Hashtags take on a life of their own – #ImStickingWithTony
- People know what they want. Whereas in the past you would pitch or offer something and people would respond. The world today is about giving people what they want and this starts with them engaging with you before you even have your products in-store. This is a consequence of a more connected world. Success will come sooner to those connected with this world and giving people when they want. No, that does not mean turning at every demand. Good leadership is about communicating so people learn what they need which may different from what they want.
- People appreciate strength. Like him or not, John Howard commanded respect. This is vital to leadership. A small business that leads will be more noticed and respected than the small business that follows. While leadership has risks and challenges, it is the place from where you can set the agenda.
What we are seeing among the federal Liberal politicians is poor leadership, self interest and ignorance of the world today. I suspect these are reasons for poor polling. In small business if we lead well, focus on our customers and connect with the world we are more likely to be successful – and show the politicians how it is done.
Footnote: I am frustrated with the business representatives media outlets interview at times like this. They claim to speak for business yet rarely do they say what I would like them to say. They should clarify their statements with a disclaimer that they represent the big business end of town and not the vast majority of business owners.
Position vacant: newsagency staff at Knox
We have a vacancy for a casual employee – offering good hours each week – at our newsagency at Knox City Shopping centre. While we have a sign out the front, I figured it’s worth mentioning the vacancy here. Click on the image for how to apply. It’s a busy shop with a non-traditional newsagency offer … a great place to learn innovative retail.
Sunday newsagency management tip: think before accepting the hospitality of coffee and lunch
I’m not a fan of business lunches and meetings over coffee. I’m more practical in how I like business to be conducted – straight to the point, based on the facts, make decisions and implement.
Some people think this approach is aloof, rude even. Maybe so. However, business efficiency involves efficient communication. I have found the most efficient and honest communication is that which is not sugar-coated with coffee or a meal.
While I accept there can be a place for relaxed discussion between newsagent and supplier, too often in the newsagency channel I see suppliers treating newsagents to hospitality and the decisions made during or as a result of this not as in the interests of the business as they could be.
For the benefit of clear-headed business outcome focused decisions, my management tip today is to say thanks but no thanks to hospitality invitations an that you instead focus 100% on business. Let any decision you make be made on the facts rather than in appreciation of a mean, a nice bottle of wine or the hope of more hospitality.
I keep hearing that business is tough for newsagents and for suppliers. If this is the case we should all walk that tough road and spend less time and money on hospitality and more on building better businesses.
Back when I was a director of the ANF (Australian Newsagents’ Federation) for a year I was critical at a board meeting about the money the directors spent on a bar tab. Most other directors disagreed saying the $400+ bar tab at dinner was justified to facilitate their discussions with each other – doing good work for newsagents. One director privately said to me I was a wowser for complaining – saying newsagents should take all hospitality they can get. I resigned from the board shortly thereafter.
Maybe it is wowser-ish to we should push back on hospitality offers. The point of this post is to say – don’t expect it, don’t seek it out. If business can be done faster and with less cost than with hospitality then do so and expect to see a benefit on your business bottom line.
Sunday newsagency marketing tip: your counter is the most impulse purchase location in-store
What are you pitching to your customers when they are at your main sales counter? What is it they see in those seconds prior to and during the sale transaction?
Go on, take a look from your customer’s perspective.
This photo shows what we have behind the counter at the moment. We’ve had this up now for a few weeks. last week, this range generated close to $1,000 in revenue. Around 30% of those purchases were as a result of the counter display. However, since the counter can be seen from the mall, we think it generated traffic beyond the purchases we noticed.
Two of the items we are promoting are exclusive so the collector will be especially attracted. Collectors talk and that drives word of mount. So, the promotion behind the counter generates results beyond the immediately obvious.
We prefer to use the counter for brand-focussed offers that are easily understood and highly appealing. The return on space, time and inventory investment is excellent.
Take a look at behind your counter – is it pitching a valuable marketing message for your business?
The Liberal leadership spill shows how much newspaper reading habits have changed
One customer commented to me today that they are not buying the paper for the news as they’d read that already. They wanted one of the lift-out sections. They said they were more up to date on the Abbott leadership woes than they paper could be – holding up their phone to illustrate the point.
Following the hashtag #libspill you can be served news, gossip and opinion in a stead stream of tweets, some of which have links to more in-depth reporting and analysis. Print newspapers can’t keep up with such a fast moving and multi-faceted story. Their best opportunity is at analysis, as is the approach of The Saturday Paper. But even analysis is readily available on mobile devices and from people not previously published in mainstream news but getting attention as commentators of interest.
This morning over breakfast and using my iPhone I was able to get a more up to date and diverse perspectives on the #libspill stories and opinions than I could have got reading two or three newspapers.
Timely relevance is an extraordinary challenge for the old print medium. This is where promotions play a crucial role to reconnecting people with the habit-based purchase. It is also why we need to embrace change to drive our own relevance.
Set to go with Disney promotion
We have the first part of the Disney book set News Corp. promotion ready for tomorrow. The stock is unpacked, ready for what we expect will be a rush from when we open. We are used to leakage from supermarket newspaper sales so it will be interesting to see how it plays out this time. It all depends on how well others with this in our shopping centre are prepared. Our stock is behind the counter so customers can see and to make it easy to show a sell-out if that is what happens.