September Fashion Bibles are Being Reduced to Magazines
For September, every major fashion magazine releases an Issue thick enough to be a Steven King Novel, but, that may be so last year. This years coveted September issue is expected to appear as skinny as the model on the cover.
In an attempt to save recession dollars, fashion marketers are turning to the web for a hopefully better place to spend their advertising budget. Already in effect, some September issues are showing up on the news stands, about a third slimmer than last year.
Ad pages in Vogue tumbled 36%, to 429. That’s a far cry from 2007, when Vogue trumpeted its September issue with a total of 840 pages.
As they spend less on magazine advertising, fashion marketers are testing lower cost and possibly more measurable outlets offered on the web. Included are YouTube, Twitter, DailyCandy.com and more to come. Re-allocating money to buy add space and on top web magazines may be money better spent now the people spend more time reading on the computer than out of magazine and newspapers.
Many designers resisted Internet marketing in the past, with the excuse that they could not properly display their product or message and that they would not be able to reach their real target audience. But with the times’a'changin technology can showcase almost anything on the computer as though you were looking at the real thing. We have Large High def screens on our desks that can watch beautiful video in real time.
WPP’s ad tracking firm TNS Media Intelligence reported that Louis Vuitton North America more than doubled its digital ad spending in 2008 to $286,000, from $107,000 in 2007, and Diane von Furstenberg boosted its Web spending from nothing to $43,000 last year. This data tracks spending on display ads but does not account for other types of digital ads, such as search and online video or the cost of creating a Web site.
Being online is now considered and investment, entire marketing campaigns are being launched digitally. Chanel used social media by posting a short film to YouTube, starring French actress Audrey Tautou, and promoted the video with search ads and other ads on the site.
To capture some of the dollars flowing to the Web, traditional magazine companies are introducing new features. The e-commerce initiative launching on Condé Nast’s Style.com in September lets users shop for trends they see on the runway. Net-A-Porter, Nine West, Neiman Marcus and New York & Co. all are advertising on the site at launch.
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