Can magazines help newspapers navigate Web 2.0?

Newspapers navigating the tricky Web 2.0 Age should look to the magazine industry for some coordinates, Alan Moore suggested at the 5th Journalism Leaders Forum in Preston last week:

"Trust, engagement, connectivity, life-enhancement, life-simplification and navigation sums up magazines and their current success, not least through internet contact with their readers."

Perhaps Moore is on to something. A look at the 2006/2007 World Magazine Trends report from the International Federation of the Periodical Press or FIPP (Fédération Internationale de la Presse Périodique) certainly suggests rather more optimistic figures than those typically reported in the newspaper sector:

The [UK] consumer magazine industry was valued at £2,984 million in 2005, up by £135 million on the previous year. Consumer expenditure increased by 6.2% year-on-year to reach £2,157 million while advertising expenditure rose by 1% to £829 million. Total annual sales increased by 7% to 1,438 million copies per annum which means that since the year 2000, consumer magazines have enjoyed continuous year-on-year growth in both annual sales volume and purchasers’ expenditure. The number of consumer titles published rose by 42 to 3,366 between 2004 and 2005, the fourth consecutive year of growth.

The magazine industry is certainly not suffering the declines that are so typical of newspapers, but the extent to which that is due to that's because the magazine industry is Net-savvy isn't obvious. And listening to Janice Min, editor-in-chief, Us Weekly, at the Media Summit New York last week (see below), it’s clear that her magazine, at least, is still ‘trying to figure out what is going to make people come to the website in addition to buying the magazine”. (Sound familiar?)

So, if the magazine industry's edge isn't digital, perhaps it's worth examining how the industry's practice as it relates to the other issues to which Moore points: 'Trust, engagement, connectivity, life-enhancement, life-simplification and navigation".

Replay the 'Media Mashups' Forum debate - and keep the discussion going

After more than an hour and half, we hit ‘pause’ – not ‘stop’ - on the provocative 5th Journalism Leaders Forum discussion on the challenges facing traditional media in the Web 2.0 Age.

At the time, the distinguished panel - Jane Singer, Alan Moore, Heather Hopkins and Mark Tungate – were responding to this question posted online by Mark Comerford from Sweden:

still talking to a large extent about your "traditional" base. How do you extend your brand to audiences you dont traditionally reach?

Afterwards, Jane Singer, the new Johnston Press Chair in Digital Journalism at UCLan, had this to add in response:

One of the advantages that traditional media have in the online world is their
'institutional memory' of their own communities, commonly stretching back through
many years and many generations -- which they can draw on in a variety of ways
and in combination with the new voices of users (including those both new to the
community and those with their own long-term knowledge and connections with it
as their home). None of the other companies jumping online and providing content
have a comparable capability that comes from long-term association with and deep
knowledge of a particular place, its people and its issues.

You can review a (unedited) recording of the Webinar here - and join the discussion by posting your comments on this blog. Or you can joining us for the 6th Journalism Leaders Forum scheduled for 15 May 2007. Better yet, why don't you do both?