Magazine Advertising Trends
The story so far.
I was always fascinated with magazine advertising. In the late 1980's I worked for a traditional media publisher in London and there were only two real buzzwords in the advertising industry at that time - Saatchi & Saatchi.
They were an iconic figure as far as advertising agencies go and their overall domination of looking after the big consumer brands left me with a very simple decision - advertising was to become my life!
At that time, magazine adverts were art forms to me and I would try to get my head around the way the top creative minds were coming up with these almost surreal and very intelligent forms of advertising expression.
In the recession of the early 1990's things seemed to change and magazine ads were to take on a different perspective. The idea of magazine advertisements as art forms almost went against the way that people should be thinking in a recession and things seemed to revert back to mainstream simplicity - albeit with clever messaging.
As we are now in 2007, magazine advertising rates have not increased in twenty years - if this were relative to house prices, we could all be lounging around the pool in our own back yard about now.
However, the whole concept of this print media advertising format has changed dramatically from a thing of clever art to a thing of corporate identity and branding - or can this be the same thing?
So, do you remember bingo cards and reader enquiry forms in magazines? I remember we'd get around 350 cards per month into the advertising department and some cards would have 20 separate enquiry number circled. I suppose people are requesting information about things in different ways these days.
However, one of the advantages of print media (especially magazines) is the way they can attract the attention of the reader for long periods of time. Sure, we go on the internet to find information quickly when we need it, but there is still nothing like a good read without the need for electricity. It is for this reason that print media advertising still has a future and magazines should work alongside other forms of advertising media with the respect they deserve.
Why not view our media database and view a range of business magazines and consumer magazines.
See our full list of Advertising guide pages