Gilbane Research Report - Digital Magazine Editions - (Page 18)

Digital Magazine and Newspaper Editions: Best Practice Cases Vertical had originally planned to charge for digital edition subscriptions, but they decided to offer it for free to both print subscribers and non-subscribers. The magazine also does not charge advertisers extra for their ads in the digital edition. Digital edition subscribers sign up with their email addresses and are not required to convey any other personal or professional information. Advanced Publishing stores email addresses and handles all distribution and email messages. Results Readership of the digital edition is now 6,200, which is about 26% of total circulation of 24,000. For those digital subscribers, Vertical was able to save the vast majority of the $7.50 per issue it costs to mail the print publication outside of North America. Lessons Learned Digital circulation has grown much faster than anticipated. Vertical’s competitor Rotor & Wing launched its own digital edition in March 2006, so Vertical is looking to add more features to differentiate its digital edition from the competition. Vertical intends to capitalize on the opportunity to add more timely content, because the digital edition reaches readers immediately, instead of the two weeks it takes for the print publication to come back from the printer. For example, Vertical’s photographers produced extensive coverage of the Southern California wildfires in late 2007; future digital editions could include more such photos than could be placed in the print edition. Mike Reyno, Vertical’s Editor-in-Chief and Co-Publisher, believes that the helicopter industry will eventually move to digital editions; the industry tends to be about a decade behind the technology curve. He is finding some resistance among advertisers that typically place ads in trade publications, so Vertical is starting to push harder in their marketing efforts, stressing the searchability and immediacy of the new product. Gilbane Group Conclusions As with several other case studies in this report, Vertical’s experience shows how effective digital editions can be for small B-to-B publishers with geographically diverse readerships in increasing immediacy while cutting distribution costs without the capital investment required to build sophisticated Web sites. The digital edition of Vertical shows off the magazine’s high-quality photography better than a traditional Web site can. Publishers that generate lots of high-quality images should consider digital editions as a way of showing their images off while still retaining the immediacy of a digital format. ©2008 Gilbane Group, Inc. 18 http://gilbane.com http://gilbane.com

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Gilbane Research Report - Digital Magazine Editions

Gilbane Research Report - Digital Magazine Editions
Table of Contents
Introduction
Section One: The Data
Section Two: Best Practice Cases
Nxtbook
Bentley Systems
Graduate Prospects
Hearst
Information Today
Marine Log
Vendor Description
Section Three: Buyer’s Guide
Section Four: Visionaries
Section Five: Conclusions
The Authors
About the Gilbane Group, Inc.
Our Sponsors

Gilbane Research Report - Digital Magazine Editions