The launch of Condé Nast Portfolio

Two quotes from David Ogilvy** help explain some of the brilliance behind the launch of the exciting new business magazine, Condé Nast Portfolio.

“Only first class business, and that in a first class way…”

In the world of magazine publishing, nothing describes Condé Nast Publications better. And this second quote describes some of the secrets to Condé Nast Portfolio’s circulation marketing success:

“It has been found that the less an advertisement looks like an advertisement, and the more it looks like an editorial, the more readers stop, look and read. Therefore, study the graphics used by editors and imitate them. Study the graphics used in advertisements, and avoid them.”

As you can see from the screen capture below, Condé Nast Portfolio is following that advice, promoting itself in the style of the Drudge Report on the Drudge Report. The magazine is drawing on its own content to create putative “news items.”

A click on the teased item takes you to the full article and not—as is so typical of (ever-grasping) circulation marketing—to a subscription offer landing page. Condé Nast Portfolio’s idea is bigger: Get readers interested in the magazine itself. Quelle chose! This is a clever and sophisticated way to qualify casual readers and build their commitment to the magazine. Of course the chance to sell is not forsaken. Banners next to the article promote subscriptions. There’s an offer on the top right, and another in the right sidebar.

A click on one of these subscription banners then takes the reader to the subscription landing page in the usual way. And the offer includes a popular premium—a free flash drive. The kind of put-in-your-pocket subscription swag that proves popular with professionals (or at least doctors, as I learned working for the New England Journal of Medicine).

To be sure, this campaign on Drudge is not the whole of Condé Nast Portfolio’s launch. Classic direct mail and newsstand promotions undoubtedly are at the heart of their efforts. And I would bet they are working Google Adwords and the like as well. But Condé Nast Portfolio is playing things close to the vest, perhaps taking a lesson from former CN-er, Tina Brown, and her splashy Talk debut.

And while I certainly don’t know the attendant metrics, or what Condé Nast Portfolio is seeking to achieve in their numbers, I do know placements on Drudge are not cheap. Nevertheless, I bet the publisher is judging the efforts effective. Not just in the subscription sales they make. But in the awareness they get (=more ad sales and pages). The buzz they generate (=more earned media and blogged commentary). And in the brand image they establish (=credibility across industries, across borders, and across print, digital and web 2.0 platforms).

Of course this kind of old school rule breaking, and new economy rule making is “drudge” work in that it requires item-by-item, issue-after-issue attention. And unlike traditional mail escargot, it also requires quick thinking and even quicker evaluations of results—day-by-day, if not hour-by-hour circulation management. Which fells the old goal of evergreen controls that could run largely untouched for months and, with luck, trouble-free for years of predictable response. (“Two men graduate college”—indeed!)

But because this innovative launch strategy is so fundamentally sound, it is still possible to cast it in traditional subscription marketing terms. Just think of it as Condé Nast Portfolio launching from a newsstand called Drudge.
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God-is-in-the-Details Dept.

Notice, at the foot of the landing page, the continuous service offer (which is, after all, the very definition of a subscriber). And look at the immediate cross-sell and up-sells here at the point of purchase. Gift subscriptions and sister (brother?) magazines sold on the come. Hard-working fundamentals that show Condé Nast Portfolio intends to be more than just a pretty face.
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** I had the stupendous luck of starting my career at David’s Ogilvy’s advertising agency in New York—hired on by Creative Director, Stan Winston, for their direct response division (which was a pet interest of D.O.) Considering what I wrote and created for the likes of American Express and Sears, Ballet News and Audubon versus what I learned and took away—especially from my immediate boss to whom I owe so much, Creative Group Supervisor, Robert Chambers [2] [3]—I’m surprised Ogilvy isn’t still billing me later from his grave.

Later, when out on my own, I was given a taste of working Condé Nast style—a small double postcard project for GQ. And no, thank you for asking, I did not beat their control.

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