E-Commerce Turning to Print Marketing to Boost Sales
While newspapers and magazines transition from print to digital, e-commerce is expanding print marketing by sending customers catalogs with a multi-touch approach towards reaching customers. Josic Media shares more details on the upswing in print marketing through e-commerce.
Magazines and newspapers all over the country are turning away from print and moving towards digital because they are realizing a huge loss in revenue. Major media companies all over the country have been announcing layoffs and transitions towards more digital content.
Ironically, e-commerce companies have started turning towards print media to boost their revenue. While this may seem contrary to the major trends, it is actually growing. Online retailers like Rent the Runway, JackThreads, and Birtchbox have started sending their customers actual catalogs. Printed catalogs sent in the mail.
According to Ethan Trask, from One King's Lane, "Putting money behind print doesn't necessarily seem like the first thing you'd think of doing, but we all love products here, we love magazines and books, so I think that bringing our brand into the physical space is really important." He went on to say, "It helps people become more active with our brand."
Another way in which e-commerce stores are turning to print media is through the production of ad-supported magazines. These are magazines that feature mostly items available through the website. Net-a-Porter, a luxury e-commerce website, recently launched Porter. Porter is their new bimonthly fashion magazine. Priced at $10 an issue, it is filled with items that can be purchased through Net-a-Porter.
According to Kate Davidson Hudson, co-founder of Editorialist, "We were making an effort to find out how we can be at all of our users' touch points throughout their day"...the big missing piece of that puzzle, ironically, was having a tangible medium to connect with them on."
Despite these recent moves, many are wondering what the ROI is for these ventures. An analyst from Forrester Research, stated, "There is a case to be made that print marketing still has a place"...as a lot of other marketers cut back on print marketing, there's an opportunity to stand out more. It's not perceived as clutter p nobody has a bad impression of magazines - and it can be a very useful way to drive traffic to your core property."
