Categories
Archives
Sign up to our Newsletter
This week in branded content
APA confirm PWC's Phil Stokes as key note speaker for the Content Summit, new magazine wins, reports of a one-stop e-magazine shop, and more iPad magazine updates.
With only two weeks to go the APA is gearing up for the inaugural International Content Summit 2010, which takes place on 24th November at Old Billingsgate, London. Featuring an impressive line-up of high-profile speakers, it promises to be an exciting day which will cover future content trends, the effect of customer demands on content, distribution platforms, and more. The latest key note speaker is Phil Stokes, EMEA Leader, Entertainment and Media, PwC LLP, who will look at how the economic slowdown accelerated the pace of change towards digital technologies and changing consumers' behaviours.
The summit will be followed by the APA International Customer Publishing Awards Ceremony, which is set to be a brilliant end to an enlightening day. Tickets for the summit are still available and can be purchased through iloveed.co.uk.
Ahead of the summit, media production agency FMG has produced an exclusive video that highlights the importance of content in every form. The animation features a voiceover from legendary actor Alan Ford, and explains what content is and how it can be used to boost a brand's power and reach. View the video here.
Following a competitive pitch, Think has announced it will be working with train operator First Great Western, designing and producing its new look on-board customer magazine, Escape. The first issue of the quarterly, 52-page magazine with a print run of 75,000, will appear on-board in January 2011. Think also had reason to celebrate after Tom Stainer, the editor of BEER magazine, designed and produced for CAMRA, won the Editor of the Year in the Customer Magazines/Customer Readership category at the British Society of Magazine Editors Awards. Tilly Boulter, Think's CEO says "I am so thrilled that Tom's creativity has been rewarded in this way. This BSME award recognises all his hard work and determination to make BEER an outstanding."
The company has also announced that it has won the Society of Trust and Estate Practitioners (STEP) account to redesign and relaunch all of the Society's publications, as well as manage all STEP advertising and sponsorship opportunities, strengthening the leading independent customer publisher's position in the professional, legal and membership sectors.
Think will be working with STEP to produce the STEP Journal ten times per year, the Trust Quarterly Review and the STEP Directory and Yearbook. Think has been asked to create a new visual identity for the publications, which will be distributed to members as well as non-member subscribers and key regulatory, government and industry figures.
Adding to its portfolio, River Publishing announces they are extending their relationship with Weight Watchers into France, with the launch of a French edition of Weight Watchers magazine. Launching in January 2011, the bi-monthly title will be on sale in Weight Watchers meetings as well as national distribution at retail, with a minimum of 120,000 copies per issue. Jackie Garford, River's Publishing Director says, "We hope to emulate the success of Weight Watchers magazine in the UK, which currently sells over 2.2million copies per year." River has also partnered with Simon Tapscott to launch Jack, a new conversation agency specialising in content and social media.
NewMediaAge reports that Bauer Media, has plans to shift its commercial model towards content creating and partnerships. Part of this process is to offer brands increased access to its editors and producers. Rolling out in January 2011, Bauer Access; a series of open-access sessions with Bauer editors and producers; will target both clients and media agencies around cross-platform and cross-brand investment.
Reports claim that a single online e-magazine shop is one step closer to reality, but only for Google Android device owners. All Things Digital says that the Next Issue Media ‘digital storefront' will arrive early in 2011, but will not be available to iPad owners initially.
This comes as Wallblog reveals that UK consumers are reluctant to pay £400 for an iPad. Good news though for consumers that feel Samsung's Galaxy Tab or Apple's iPad are a little out of their price range; Linx has started selling its Commtiva N700 tablet for £329.99.
After a year's worth of tweaking, Google is rolling out a new interface for its AdSense contextual advertising platform, and Econsultancy takes a look at the early reactions. The goal is to help publishers "make more money" and changes include; better options for segmenting ad performance data; more control for publishers to prevent poorly targeted ads from appearing on their sites; and a more streamlined interface.
Econsultancy also looks into the effectiveness of images and video and why online retailers need product videos.
YouView, the joint venture between broadcasters BBC, ITV, Channel 4 and Five, ISPs BT and TalkTalk and SeeSaw-owner Arqiva, has called on content providers to submit their interest in joining the platform. Richard Halton, CEO of YouView, said, "Our ambition is to open up the TV screen to content providers that until now have been unable to build an audience." YouView is set to launch next year.
Online video host giant YouTube announces that 35 hours of video content is uploaded to the channel every minute. That breaks out to 2,100 hours every 60 minutes, or 50,400 hours every day. The company mentions mobile phones as one of the factors contributing to the growth, as they have drastically improved how quickly and easily videos can be uploaded. T
Chocolate brand M&M, no stranger to online activity, launches a new digital project for the Canadian market. This time is sees players embarking on a scavenger hunt to find the missing ‘Red' character across multiple platforms; bridging offline, display, web, social and more.
In other news, News International claims that the paywall around its The Times and Sunday Times sites has created a more affluent and more engaged digital audience, with 75% accessing the sites from the UK; Tesco launches a mobile version of its Direct site in response to growing levels of mobile phone visits to Tesco Direct; there is a new Print Proof app available that promises to take the headache out of preparing artwork; and Vogue UK launches its iPad app. The app is free to download; however, each dowloaded issue is priced at £3.99.
