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The Hornell Industrial Development Agency touched on all the highs and lows of the past year at its annual meeting Wednesday afternoon.

The meeting began with some good news from Wayne Drescher of Drescher and Malecki, who conducted an audit on the IDA covering the past two years.

Drescher first pointed out the cash and cash equivalents, which increased from $783,738 in 2009 to $1,262,186 in 2010.

“Any business in today’s economy will look at cash and cash equivalents,” he said. “Yours is strong.”

Total net assets for the IDA increased from $5,248,101 in 2009 to $5,355,459 in 2010. Of these amounts, $1,130,821 in 2009 and $1,268,747 in 2010 were unrestricted net assets, meaning that these amounts were available for use in furthering the IDA’s mission.

“Despite the economy, you still had a successful financial year,” Drescher said.

Other good news included bringing in Lowe’s, the home-improvement store, to the area.

“The thing I’m most proud of is the Lowe’s project,” Jim Griffin, IDA executive director, said. He said Lowe’s officials considered the move a “dead issue” until IDA benefits were included in the offer.

“It was those incentives that put this thing over the top and allowed the (Lowe’s) board to approve it. It was an absolute truth that had the IDA not been involved in it, Lowe’s would not be here today,” Griffin said.

Other good news included expanding the Lin Industries building in anticipation of upcoming contracts; assisting Dr. R.S. Dhaliwal to obtain $1 million worth of new equipment for cancer treatment; as well as a new marketing plan plan for the IDA.

Then it was on to the bad news.

Griffin said the state allowed the Empire Zone program to expire in June, but the IDA is expected to provide the same administrative work without the state’s help.

“They expect us to do this over the next seven years on their behalf. It’s another unfunded mandate, if you will, by the state,” Griffin said.

He also touched on the Trikeenan Tileworks situation. The New Hampshire-based company is still in default of payments to the bank, and is struggling to make a profit. He added the company is examining closing shop at their Shawmut Drive building.

Then it was time for the ugly.

“As we enter our 36th year, we are faced with many difficult challenges as a result of the economic downturn, and our number one concern and disappointment is the lack of work for our major employer, Alstom,” Sam Nasca, chairman of the IDA, said. “We will continue to assist Alstom in their efforts and will insure that the tremendous facility that Alstom and our agency has put together continues to be an asset to the Hornell community in the years ahead and a source of good jobs for our workforce.

“They (Alstom) are looking forward to the future with continued support for the community, getting work down the road and providing jobs once they do,” Nasca added. “I don’t think, in any way, shape or manner, they’ve diminished their dedication to the facility. They have in no way indicated they’re downgrading this facility. That’s good news. It’s just a matter of they’ve got to find work.”
“It’s a difficult time right now with Alstom trying to get some work in here,” Griffin said. “We’ve had this problem before, and we’ve come out of them and been successful. We’re in a much better, stronger position today.”

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Companies that deal in shady free gift card offers have managed to game Google’s sponsored search results so they can pass themselves off as representing the official sites of such huge brands as Walmart, Best Buy, McDonald’s and Hooters, among others, PCWorld has found.

Google shut down the accounts responsible for the deception when PCWorld approached the search giant this week. Google representatives wouldn’t disclose how they were tricked into accepting the ads, which violate their guidelines. But a source within the advertising industry familiar with this type of scheme said he suspects that the rogue company or companies involved knew the Internet Protocol addresses used by the Google employees charged with checking the validity of new ads. (The source asked not to be identified to protect his position in the industry.) Using that information, the company could show Google employees one site, while anyone from the general public who clicked the sponsored link woulf go to a different page. (Click the image of the bogus Best Buy-sponsored link below to see the free gift card site that it led to.)

targeted response marketing expert Ben Edelman, an assistant professor at Harvard Business School. “These ads are clearly attempting to deceive the consumer into thinking the offers are from Best Buy or whatever the brand,” Edelman says. “A free gift card scam is innocuous relative to the harm that could be done by spoofing a financial institution.” But, Edelman says, “If Best Buy can be spoofed, why can’t Bank of America?”

Google spokesperson Jim Prosser says that several advertisers’ accounts had immediately been shut down as a result of PCWorld’s inquiries. “We have engineering teams and systems that work to proactively prevent violations of our advertising policies, and we work quickly to review, suspend, or remove ads when we are notified of potential violations,” Prosser says. “That’s what we’ve done with the accounts you’ve mentioned. We also take strong action to inform authorities, and have taken legal action ourselves against scams that attempt to trick users.”

PCWorld attempted to contact the companies listed on the gift card offers that we found over the course of this investigation. The companies listed on the ads were Better-Gifts.net, DirectSurveySolutions.com, Tester-Rewards.com, eSolutionsMedia.net, FoodCritic101.com, I-Deal Direct, and Top Notch Media.

Only Top Notch Media–which was tied to free gift card offers associated with bogus Google ads for the brands Hooters, Ikea, and Whole Foods Market–replied to our inquiries. The company’s e-mail response states: “We have identified this traffic partner and subsequently terminated this traffic source to all of our Topnotch-media.com websites. Please note this ad placement is in violation of our traffic agreement and we do not want traffic generated in this manner.” The company did not identify the “traffic partner” involved.

Why are free gift card offers a danger to Web consumers? Because they’re often used to convince people to give out valuable personal information–data that they sell to marketers who use it to inundate the unlucky consumers with targeted advertising. In many cases, the consumers never receive the gift card that they thought they were in line for. If the offers come from large brands that people trust, individuals are likely to be more inclined to participate.

Google specifically bans free gift card offers from sponsored search ads, Prosser says. The Better Business Bureau has warned consumers about them, and Walmart tells its customers that such offers are a “scam.”

Deceptive Links

The gift card deception took advantage of a common practice by big retailers. The targeted response marketing companies know that many Web users who don’t know the exact address of a company’s Website will search for it in Google, using the company’s name as the search term. To ensure that searchers find their main site, reputable companies like Walmart or Best Buy may pay Google to have a sponsored link to their site appear at the top of search results for their name.

For instance, Visa purchased the top Sponsored Link when you run a search for “Visa” on Google, delivering an ad that reads “Visa Official Site.” Clicking the ad takes you to Visa’s corporate home on the Internet.

But this past week, similar queries on Google’s search engine for major brands delivered sponsored ads that claimed to link to official big-brand sites, but in fact led to sites that had no connection to the brands listed. For example, when I searched for “Best Buy” on Google from Boston on Monday, the top sponsored ad accompanying the search resuls was headed “Best Buy Official Site” and displayed its URL as “www.BestBuy.com”; but when I clicked the ad,I was taken to a site called Tester-Rewards.com, which used the Best Buy logo to promote a “free” $1000 Best Buy gift card promotion not authorized by Best Buy.

Search results varied depending on where the person submitting the search request was located. PCWorld spotted bogus Google Sponsored Link ads through searches in a number of different East Coast cities. Identical searches undertaken in other parts of the United States didn’t deliver the same results. Advertisers can target sponsored links shown in Google search results to certain areas of the country or the world.

Best Buy says that Tester-Rewards.com is not affiliated with it in any way. Tester-Rewards.com did not reply to repeated requests for comment for this story. In the fine print below the Best Buy offer, Tester-Rewards.com offers this disclaimer: “Tester-Rewards.com is not affiliated with Best Buy…”

Clearly the ads would not have been allowed if Google had understood how they operated. Prosser says that it’s impermissible for a Google AdWords ad to claim to be the link to an official company Website and then deliver you to an unrelated site.(Click the image below of a bogus Walmart Official Site ad to see the gift card page that it led to.)

Many Brands Involved

PCWorld found that the deceptive marketers have targeted a large number of big-name brands–including Bed Bath & Beyond, Best Buy, Hooters, Ikea, Martha Stewart,McDonald’s, Petco, Walmart, and Whole Foods Market–for this type of misleading advertising on Google within the past week. (Click the image below to see a full-screen version of the fake McDonald’s ad.)

bogus Ikea gift card offer on Facebook took in 40,000 victims earlier this year. Facebook promised action against the fake gift card offers this past April.

The site (maintained by Tester-Rewards) that offers an opportunity to receive a Best Buy gift cards reads: “Congratulations! Get a $1000 gift card free!” To become eligible for the $1000 Best Buy gift card, you must share personally identifying information, including your phone number. According to the site’s terms of service, registering with the site is the same as “expressly requesting a phone call, pre-recorded message, SMS text (std msg rates may apply) and/or email from this list of targeted response marketing Partners: WCA, NationalCashFinder, Debt Reduction Experts, YourDiabeticSavings, MyEducationAdvisors or Automobile Protection Plus.”

Offers for free gift cards have been the bane of both consumers and the companies whose brands are used lure consumers. Walmart has set up an informational page called “Gift Card Sponsor Scam,” warning people against the targeted response marketing tactic. The Better Business Bureau has notified consumers of shady gift card offers, too.

Walmart warns: “The goal of this scam is to encourage consumers to spend money on ‘sponsor offers’ in the belief that they will eventually receive a high value gift card. However, after fulfilling the ‘sponsor offers’ the consumer may never even receive the gift card or will have spent more money on the offers than the worth of the gift card.”

Protecting Yourself From Bogus Ads

Using advertisements to make services look legitimate is nothing new, says Paula Greve, director of Web security research at McAfee. “They have been used to drive traffic to free product and gift card offers, malware-laced Web pages, and phishing scams,” Greve says. She says that McAfee has noticed more attempts at fraud within search engine ads because it’s getting harder to manipulate natural search results to make shady pitches rise to the top of results.

What’s unique in this instance, she says, is the fact that shady marketers were able to pass themselves off as official Web sites of large brands in Google Sponsored Links. Usually, questionable ads refer to brands, but stop short of claiming to be those brand.

Many people use tools like McAfee’s free SiteAdvisor utility to alert them to suspicious links in search results. SiteAdvisor flags sites with red, yellow, or green markings, with red indicating the most dangerous sites.

But SiteAdvisor wouldn’t have helped searchers avoid these bogus links. Greve says that Google Sponsored Links aren’t scanned for safety. But while the tool won’t warn you before you click such a link, it will warn you once you arrive at a questionable site.

Online advertising expert Edelman of Harvard Business School says that Web users should be able to depend on Google for better protection. “Google should be checking ads more vigorously to prevent this type of scam,” he says. “This doesn’t seem to be a particularly sophisticated scam. Google owes it to its users to be a little bit smarter than the dubious marketers.”

MONROEVILLE, Pa., July 28 /PRNewswire/ — InventionHome today introduced the North American Product Innovation Network(SM), a first of its kind gateway for providing inventors easy access to North American companies seeking innovative products and inventions available for wholesale, license or acquisition.  North American Product Innovation Network(SM) also provides companies across North America with a centralized source for finding innovative products within the United States and beyond.

“Our goal is to create a single point of entry, or gateway, into every North American company interested in product innovation,” said Russell Williams, President of InventionHome. “We have created the network and system for sharing and submitting new products and inventions with companies in a more efficient and effective way than ever before.”

North American Product Innovation Network(SM) consists of thousands of companies seeking innovative products available for wholesale, license or acquisition as well as the system for submitting innovative products and inventions to those companies.  These companies include manufacturers, distributors, DRTV / infomercial companies and retailers that have registered with InventionHome or its affiliate MatchProduct.com to receive new invention opportunities.  The system for submitting and sharing innovative products and inventions includes targeted product alerts, online search functionality, and/or an electronic submission management system for automating the overall submission process for companies.

North American Product Innovation Network(SM) also consists of an indirect “partner network” for sharing new inventions with companies that are not directly registered with InventionHome or its affiliate MatchProduct.com.  This partner network consists of a growing list of prominent product associations and tradeshows who will be utilizing an integrated search portal on their websites to enable site visitors to search the InventionHome and MatchProduct.com databases for non-confidential invention opportunities.  These organizations currently include the National Hardware Show (produced by Reed Exhibitions), International Housewares Association (IHA), National Retail Hardware Association (NRHA) and Response Magazine / Direct Response Manufacturers Association (DRMA).  The search portal enables these organizations to offer their members quick and easy access to new products and inventions directly from their websites, thus enhancing their member benefits while expanding the network reach to thousands of additional companies using their websites.  

Pricing & Availability

For companies seeking innovative products, the North American Product Innovation Network(SM) is FREE.  To learn more, email member@inventionhome.com. 

For inventors seeking companies to wholesale, license or acquire their inventions, the North American Product Innovation Network (SM) offers various submission / targeted response marketing program options through affiliates InventionHome and MatchProduct.com, depending on the development status of the particular product / invention.

Inventors with fully-developed, manufactured products may select the free listing option on www.MatchProduct.com, which provides a listing on MatchProduct.com and “partner network” sites.  These inventors may also select a proactive submission / targeted response marketing program option that expands the program to an outbound, proactive approach for a modest fee.  The program fee structure is $39 per month / $139 setup / royalty share / cancel at any time.

Inventors with inventions that are not fully-developed may also utilize the proactive submission / targeted response marketing program to pursue licensing / royalty opportunities.  The program fee structure is $599 setup / $14.99 per month / royalty share / cancel at any time.  The program setup fee also includes the creation of a sales and invention portfolio webpage, product due diligence management and contract negotiation management.  Patent, design and virtual prototype services are sold separately.  The free listing option on MatchProduct.com is not available for inventions that are not fully-developed and manufactured.  To request additional inventor information, call 1-866-844-6512 or email info@inventionhome.com.

InventionHome and MatchProduct.com are divisions of Jacob Enterprises, Inc. headquartered in Monroeville, Pennsylvania.  Since its inception in 2002, Jacob Enterprises has been a product innovation resource for manufacturers, wholesalers, retailers and other companies seeking to add or expand products (or lines) through product distribution, acquisition and licensing.  For information call 866-844-6512 or visit www.inventionhome.com.  Additional information is available at www.inventionhome.wordpress.com, www.twitter.com/inventionhome and www.inventionhome.blogspot.com.

If advertisers are to be believed, the perfect man has tree-trunk legs, abs that double as a bomb vest and a shoe size that exceeds his percentage of body fat.

But for all that flawlessness, a new study finds male consumers are equally responsive to ads featuring ordinary-looking guys. And given the choice between an Adonis and no model at all, men rate the latter ads as more effective.

The research, which appears in the journal Body Image, supports arguments that idealized physiques aren’t needed to make an ad successful, and may in fact cause diminished response among consumers.

“They can much better relate to everyday guys because it’s easier to imagine themselves using that product,” explains study co-author Phillippa Diedrichs, research fellow at England’s Centre for Appearance Research. “But at the moment, ads are so dominated by muscular images that people don’t actually have the opportunity to vote with their wallets.”

Researchers from American University report that Playgirl centrefolds lost 5.4 kilograms of fat and gained about 12 kilograms of muscle between 1973 and 1997.

Similarly, a study in the International Journal of Eating Disorders finds boys’ action toys such as G.I. Joe have, over a 30-year period, come to boast muscularity not seen in “even the largest human bodybuilders.”

This cultural bias is in direct conflict with research that shows women typically desire male bodies that have nine to 14 fewer kilos of muscle than most guys think — a conclusion that appears to be supported by Diedrichs’ study.

In experiments with more than 600 men and women, aged 17 to 25, participants rated ads featuring average-sized male models as being equally effective as those depicting muscular models (the study controlled for facial attractiveness and expression). This evaluation was consistent across both genders.

Furthermore, the male participants considered ads featuring no model at all to pack a bigger commercial punch than those featuring models that looked as though they could open a beer bottle with their pecs.

Diedrichs suggests stereotypes linked to good grooming may be a contributing factor. In a previous U.K. study, she says, young men confronted with images of male muscularity perceived the models to be vain — “a trait which is commonly perceived to be feminine or homosexual.”

Michael Kaufman, a gender-issues educator from Toronto, believes the new findings are largely the result of heightened media literacy. A recent 1,000-person survey for Dove found 80 per cent of Canadian males feel ads stereotype their gender.

“Men are benefiting from 20 (or) 30 years of discussion among women about all these issues of body image and depiction in advertising,” says Kaufman. “They know most men don’t look like (professional models). And the fact they can joke about it, and distance themselves, means that those types of ads are going to have less impact.”

When it comes to images that sell products, however, a Canadian targeted response marketing expert says the issue is complicated by everything from consumer age to the body types in vogue at a given time.

“We all know that we’re supposed to say: ‘Oh, it’s terrible they use all these attractive people; they should show regular people. Blah, blah, blah,’” says Barbara J. Phillips, a professor at the University of Saskatchewan. “But the truth is that we’re very poor at judging how effective an ad is on ourselves.

“You have to remember that advertisers aren’t trying to oppress anyone. If they knew for sure that regular men were the best way to sell products, you would only see regular men.”

YouTube: Old Spice commercial

Old Spice’s “Smell Like a Man, Man” campaign has been a huge viral success, but has it increased sales? The answer is an emphatic yes, according to The Nielsen Co. and new data from SymphonyIRI Group.

According to Nielsen, sales of Old Spice Body Wash—the line touted in the Wieden + Kennedy-created campaign—rose 11 percent over the past 12 months and since the effort broke in February, sales seem to be gaining momentum.

Over the past three months, sales jumped 55 percent and in the past month, they rose 107 percent, also per Nielsen. Recent sales figures from SymphonyIRI  also show a lift for Old Spice Body Wash products. The disclosure of Nielsen data, which is usually not made public, came after a report in Brandweek that cited SymphonyIRI data for the product featured in the campaign, Red Zone After Hours Body Wash. (At the time of the article, P&G and Wieden declined to give out any information about sales of the product, even in a general way.)

Sales of Red Zone fell 7 percent for the 52 weeks ended June 13, according to SymphonyIRI. (Dollar sales for all Old Spice Body Wash products rose 8.2 percent for that period, also per SymphonyIRI.)  

According to Shelley Hughes, a rep for SymphonyIRI, those numbers are wholly based on scanner data from all the major U.S. retailers, except for Walmart and warehouse clubs. SymphonyIRI tracks about 25 Old Spice branded products.

Newer data from SymphonyIRI measuring sales since Feb. 21—roughly the time the campaign launched—show a definitive increase for Red Zone, the product that Isaiah Mustafa clutches in the initial TV spot (though subsequent ads feature a broader array of products).

Sales for Red Zone hit $1.6 million  for the four-week period ended July 11, a 49 percent jump over the four-week period ended Feb. 21, SymphonyIRI’s data shows. The other four Old Spice Body Wash products also show a lift. Overall sales for Old Spice Body Wash rose 105 percent for that period [see chart].

Nielsen’s figures are also based on scanner data from retailers, also not including Walmart. P&G rep Michael Norton said he believed Nielsen’s numbers were conclusive.

“Since the ‘Smell Like A Man, Man’ campaign broke in February, Old Spice has month-over-month strengthened its market position,” said Norton in an e-mail. He  added that Old Spice  is now the No. 1 brand of body wash and anti-perspirant/deodorant in both sales and volume with growth in the high single/double digits.

Nielsen, however, did not provide sales figures for the latter. Old Spice deodorant sales rose 30 percent since February, according to SymphonyIRI.

Gary Stibel, CEO and founder of The New England Consulting Group, said his data also shows a lift for Old Spice. “We think that Old Spice is up. We don’t think it’s up in the double digits, but it’s up meaningfully, and we think it’s driven 100 percent by targeted response marketing.” Stibel scoffed at speculation that the campaign might not be effective because it attempts to appeal to women rather than men.

“We think it’s targeted to both sexes,” he said. “It’s targeted to people who are attractive or want to be attractive.” In fact, Stibel says that according to his research, many Old Spice buyers are divorced men. Said Stibel: “A lot of people are buying Old Spice now and it isn’t because they’re young.”       

On the engagement front, the campaign, which was enhanced by a real-time component earlier this month in which Mustafa personally responded to blogger and Twitter-based comments about the campaign via video, is also a clear success.

The response videos have been viewed more than 40 million times. Total brand views on the Web are estimated to have surpassed 110 million.

Still, Stibel said without a strong correlation to sales—which is obvious in this case—it’s hard to consider a campaign a success. “Good campaigns can take a while to take off,” said Stibel, “but great campaigns have an impact right away.” —with Elaine Wong

Acclimating to the constant evolution of reading channels, like Kindle, iPad and online, experts talk about how their circulation strategies attract new readers and retain current ones in the e-reader age

Kenneth Sheldon
Director of circulation, New York magazine

New York magazine’s circulation showed continued strength in recent years and is poised for profitability growth this year and beyond. These gains are primarily being driven by price increases coupled with more efficient expense allocation and management.

For direct-to-publisher acquisition sources, neither price increases nor trimming expenses selectively has had an adverse effect on subscription order volume (actually up 3% this year). New York magazine’s direct mail campaigns are achieving record response rates and are profitable within the first subscription term. Internet orders are growing as the magazine is becoming more sophisticated with leveraging e-mail files and targeting conversion efforts more effectively on Nymag.com. Subscription prices were raised for agent and other external sources, and the magazine has seen stability in order volumes there via gains in market share. Internet agent volume has almost doubled as targeted dedicated efforts for the magazine have been secured.

Moving beyond new business subscription sources, renewal rates have climbed nicely, and there has been no decipherable recessionary impact. Leveraged opportunities that have helped renewal performance include the increased use of e-mail promotions and growth in the portion of subscriptions on automatic renewal platforms. For the newsstand channel, the magazine has taken deliberate steps to reduce expenses and increase profits. Significant cuts to draw (the number of copies sent to newsstands), reduced newsstand advertising spend and a 25% cover price increase have impacted average sale levels but have had a positive impact on profitability.

New York magazine is testing sources such as SEM and promoting in social media to hopefully replicate successes seen there with growing Web audiences. While social media will undoubtedly be a big part of future subscription production, it’s the strategic decisions the magazine has made with traditional sources that are responsible for the current momentum. Adjusting pricing and minimizing targeted response marketing costs aren’t new ideas, but New York magazine is reaping nice rewards from being aggressive on those fronts.

The Takeaway
Strategic price increases can boost revenues with limited impact on circulation numbers

Jeanniey Mullen
Global EVP, CMO, Zinio LLC and VIVmag

Three years ago, if someone asked me what the circulation management strategy for our all-digital magazine VIVmag was, I would have sounded just like anyone else: Leverage direct mail for circulation growth, focus on e-mail as a way to engage readers and drive interest, and publish sales as a standard page or spread rate. Looking back at our consumer targeted response marketing plans now always makes me laugh.

In three short years, the intersection between customers’ demands for convenience and technological innovation, has left us no option but to rethink every single way we build relationships and communicate with our customers. Our magazine and many of our publishers on the Zinio side of the house have been able to build a better future for their business. Three of my favorite changes are:

Twitter — Twitter was built by an older community as a networking tool. Twitter drives sales, and it has become a key element of circulation growth. Building a content distribution strategy across this network will pay major dividends. Facebook is great, but it was built by a social generation to connect socially, so I have found it doesn’t always drive droves of business.

In-person events — hosting reader events has become a huge hit for VIVmag. It enables people to come to the event and take out all of their new devices — iPhones and iPads — to show what and how they read VIVmag. You can’t ask for a better technology focus group than these events. Readers also usually bring prospective subscribers with them.

Good old analytics — as a final favorite, we have seen the use of the traditional data overlay as an element of our success. Our demographics and targets have shifted as the devices VIVmag is available on have changed. Keeping up to date with the insights on who our reader is remains essential to our successful growth.

The Takeaway
Embrace new technology (e.g., Twitter, the iPad) to replace old circulation tactics

Greg Wolfe
President, Circulation Specialists, Inc.

For most of our clients, print magazines and traditional media make up the vast majority of the circulation, targeted response marketing dollars and revenue.

In terms of circulation targeted response marketing, the volumes we are getting from online sources are still modest. I think for most magazines they are in the 10% to 20% range of total circulation. This is a growing and important source, but it is not dominant in the way direct mail has been. Paid search is not very effective for magazine targeted response marketing, and e-mail lists tend to be small compared to postal lists, with response rates often only one tenth as good as direct mail. However, e-mail has become a standard, effective part of the circulation targeted response marketing mix, particularly to house names for renewals and gifts.

Response rates to direct mail continue to be much higher than for online media; cost per order is often lower and the volume opportunities are much greater in most situations. In addition, with more cooperative databases coming into play and ever improving modeling techniques with lower costs for use, we are seeing strong results with our direct mail campaigns.

We are still in the very early stages of magazine content being read on mobile devices such as iPhone, Kindle and iPad. This is a very exciting area of opportunity for magazines, but it is not a significant part of the business model in terms of circulation or revenue at this point. We have found ways to effectively use “flip-book” digital replicas of our print magazines, but these are mostly for nonpaid sampling, added value or sponsored paid circulation. It is pretty clear that most consumers do not want to pay for digital replicas of print magazines that they read on their computer.

This will quickly change over the next few years as the reading experience becomes better, cheaper and faster on digital devices. It will dramatically alter the way circulation is sold. If the majority of reading is done on electronic devices, the majority of circulation will be sold online at publisher’s websites, through e-mail and at third-party sites like iTunes.

The Takeaway
Response rates to direct mail remain higher than online tactics

Teresa Perry
SVP of publisher member audit and report processing services, ABC

ABC (Audit Bureau of Circulations) receives numerous queries from publishers who want to understand how to qualify and report digital editions on their ABC statements.

At its March meeting, the ABC’s board of directors modified the guidelines surrounding magazine digital editions to be more accommodating to new technologies. Now, to qualify an e-reader or mobile editions as paid circulation and have them count toward rate base, that digital edition no longer needs to be an exact copy of your print edition.

There are still a few guidelines that magazine publishers must follow.

First, your editorial and advertising content must be integrated throughout the digital product. Don’t try to hide advertising content behind a separate tab or section of your digital edition. It needs to be a part of your digital magazine, just like it is part of your print magazine.

Next, include all of the editorial and advertising content from your print magazine in the digital edition. The digital content doesn’t need to be presented in the exact same manner and layout as the print publication, but the same information must be presented in both versions. If advertisers opt out of the digital edition, you aren’t required to include their ads but you can substitute other ads or sell additional advertising in the digital edition that is not in the print version.

Also, try to incorporate additive content, such as additional advertising, hyperlinks, video, audio, slide shows and other technologies. Adding this information does not impact your ability to qualify the digital edition circulation as paid and count it toward your rate base.

Finally, make sure you charge your subscriber at least 1 cent for the digital edition, and make sure the subscriber specifically requests that your publication be delivered in the digital format.

The Takeaway
Qualify both your print and digital editions to demonstrate full circulation