New Research Looks At Increasing Customer Magazine Success
Companies can significantly increase the effectiveness of their customer magazines by altering frequency, pagination and distribution methods, according to a new study from Royal Mail.
The study found that currently the average number of pages for a customer magazine is 36 and the most popular frequency is quarterly.
It also found that when pagination is higher than average, 63% of recipients read half or more of the magazine in comparison to 47% when the number of pages is lower. Sixty two per cent of those surveyed read half or more of the magazine if the frequency was more regular than quarterly – an uplift of over 10% – and nearly double the number of recipients picked up the magazine more than five times.
Pagination has a significant effect on active response, with over half of individuals surveyed (54%) responding to calls to action when there are more than 50 pages – a 23% increase on titles with fewer pages.
Customers respond more favourably to customer magazines, claiming they think it is “excellent and like it a lot”, when a title has more than 50 pages and a frequency higher then biannual (28% and 27% respectively).
The research also shows that posted titles command an average of eight minutes more attention than their picked up counterparts.
Posted titles are kept for longer than picked up titles, the study found. A quarter of readers keep a posted title for over a month, while just 16% keep a picked up title for the same length of time.
The average time spent with a customer magazine is 25 minutes. However, a quarter of recipients will read a magazine with more pages for longer than 30 minutes.
Emily Fovargue, head of publishing at Royal Mail, said: “This in-depth study shows that frequency, pagination and distribution methods can have a significant effect on the success of a customer title. By focusing on key elements such as increasing pagination, or by adding an extra issue a year, brands can significantly raise response rates, engagement levels and rating of the title, often resulting in increased loyalty and a boost in ROI.”
Julia Hutchison, COO of APA, said: “Customer magazines have long been proved as an extremely effective way of communicating with customer, stakeholders or prospects.
“However, this research now demonstrates how marketers can squeeze even more value out of their titles and shows how frequency, pagination or distribution method can boost engagement, which is invaluable insight for the customer publishing industry, particularly for new business.”
Recent research from Contented claimed that digital agencies have misjudged the threat posed by customer publishers and the growing trend for “editorialisation of brand” in the digital arena.
The research, commissioned by the APA, included in-depth interviews with digital agencies, brands and customer publishers and shows that 10% of customer publishing revenue is now attributed to digital activity including podcasts, RSS feeds, ezines, microsites, hosting and transactional sites (see Digital Agencies Misjudging Customer Publishing Threat).