Digital Magazine Marketing Strategy Session
PROJECT: 60-MINUTE MARKETING SESSION
OVERVIEW:
Kathy came to me looking for help with her marketing to get more subscriptions for her digital magazine. They were on their second issue with their third launching soon and she was ready to take things to the next level. At the time she was only using Instagram to promote the magazine so it was time to create a more comprehensive strategy to kick things into high gear.
DURING OUR SESSION, WE DISCUSSED AND STARTED TO MAP OUT THE FOLLOWING STRATEGIES:
Website updates and changes: She had a great start to her website. Simple and really clean but I felt that she could add a bit more information to the site to help visitors learn more about the magazine and what to expect when they purchase. When someone lands on the website, I wanted it to be crystal clear how the magazine would help them (plus, more copy on the site helps with SEO too!). A few suggestions I made for the website included:
Adding some sort of short mission/purpose statement to the homepage so when people land on that page they know exactly what they’re getting.
Add some additional information to the team page (this is often one of the most visited pages because people want to learn more about the people behind the brand!) to highlight her expertise and experience in the industry. This helps build some credibility.
Add the topics covered in each issue of the magazine so people know what they’re getting prior to purchasing. This helps entice anyone that sees a topic of interest because they’ll then want more.
Social media tips and adjustments: Instagram is how Kathy has mainly been promoting the magazine which is great. Instagram is a powerful marketing channel but as always there is room for improvement. I have Kathy some direction on her visuals to help them be more cohesive with her website and overall brand. I also provided suggestions to optimize her bio and overall profile. She had just taken a free Instagram growth challenge with me so we didn’t need to dig into this strategy too much deeper.
Email marketing: While this wasn’t a huge focus of our conversation, I did think it was important to start collecting email addresses for her audience. The magazine is quarterly which means there is a decent chunk of time between each issue release so letting past customers as well as anyone that’s overall interested in the magazine know that a new issue is available is essential. To entice people to sign up for her list, I suggested she provide them with a little preview of the new issue. This not only allows her to collect their email addresses but then the preview gets them excited about the issue and entices them to purchase.
Encouraging unofficial brand ambassadorships: Kathy already has a built-in brand ambassador program because she has both writers for the magazine and people that are featured in the magazine. However, they weren’t necessarily helping promote the magazine the way she would have hoped so we worked on creating potential guidelines for both. This helps set the expectation that she would like them to share and makes it easier for them to share by providing suggestions for their posts and/or graphics.
FUTURE MARKETING PLANS:
During my sessions, I like to give clients as many suggestions as possible but I know that it can be difficult to implement them all at once. Because of this, I’ll help clients prioritize their focus for their marketing and then give ideas for them to grow into once they have a handle on the new strategies they implement.
Blog/Free Content: This is a great way to boost SEO in the niche that the magazine is in. It also allows for readers to get a “quick win” which in turn makes them want more so they’ll want to purchase the latest issue even more. It also gives Kathy some content to use on her podcast as well as in her social media to drive people to the website (for example, end the post with, “Want more of this? Check out our latest issue in the link in our bio.”)
PR strategy: While I didn’t give deep into the strategy during our session, I shared ways that Kathy can position herself as an expert thus making people want more from her and the magazine. This included pitching herself to podcasts, engaging in Facebook groups, and using services like HARO.
“Mallory provided crystal clear strategies to move my brand development and social media management in the right direction for optimum success!”
RESULTS:
Three days after our session, Kathy sent me a screenshot of her Google Analytics and her web traffic was already way up from implementing some of the suggestions from our session. Her homepage visits were up by 100% and even more exciting, the visits to the magazine subscription page were up 245%.
With the continued implementation of these marketing strategies, I know Kathy is going to continue to see a rise in her web traffic and her magazine sales.