Sen speak:
This is more for Robin, than anybody else!You have really managed to nail down the "circulation" guy Sir & rightfully so.
After spending half my life with very successful FMCG giants, it was a huge shock when I took over circulation for a leading print media house! At times I really felt like I was losing it.However, in spite of the corinthian conservative pillars who managed to bludgeon everyone looking outside the beaten path, things changed.Albeit for a limited period.Fortunately non-lifers like us (who had little to gain from getting "personally" close to the leviathans) managed to pave fresh new roads & fly-overs on record time, to make the elephant zoom ahead on.
The mammoth has, however, settled down again.Alas, the systems & approaches (to circulation) is not very different with other publishers either!The "institutional" sales manager (circulation) remains the blue-eyed resource, thanks to the "significant" contributions to copy growth.As to who "reads" them is beyond me. May be that's the reason I decided to step out of the vicious "circulating" circle.
Incidentally, last weekend, about "4- FOUR" copies of a prominent tabloid were thrown in, deftly through my car's rear window. As it was already dusk, I naturally asked why this exercise was still being done! The answer is given below, verbatim:"We have a target of throwing IN (thankfully not OUT) 3 thousand copies per head. Now the copies reach us at this mall only at 3PM. Most cars drive in with AC on till 6:30. So we start to throw around 6:30 & manage to cram in as many copies as possible, into each vehicle".Have you caught some, lately?
Robin speak:
Hi,There are issues on both sides of the LOC, let me start with the editorial side, the other side, as they always behave like mujahideens ready to blow themselves up for reasons we will never know.
Editorial:(1) Their greatest joy comes from peer feedback, which ( as quoted to me) is always like this..WOW that was a great story. You brought out some really interesting insights. BOY you've hit BULLS EYE. I thought that the design team should have done a better job with the layout. If other articles in the same issue were of this calibre, then this would have been a collector's issue. Which they normally agree to( though it is likely that they have not read any article in the magazine other than their own).
This is more for Robin, than anybody else!You have really managed to nail down the "circulation" guy Sir & rightfully so.
After spending half my life with very successful FMCG giants, it was a huge shock when I took over circulation for a leading print media house! At times I really felt like I was losing it.However, in spite of the corinthian conservative pillars who managed to bludgeon everyone looking outside the beaten path, things changed.Albeit for a limited period.Fortunately non-lifers like us (who had little to gain from getting "personally" close to the leviathans) managed to pave fresh new roads & fly-overs on record time, to make the elephant zoom ahead on.
The mammoth has, however, settled down again.Alas, the systems & approaches (to circulation) is not very different with other publishers either!The "institutional" sales manager (circulation) remains the blue-eyed resource, thanks to the "significant" contributions to copy growth.As to who "reads" them is beyond me. May be that's the reason I decided to step out of the vicious "circulating" circle.
Incidentally, last weekend, about "4- FOUR" copies of a prominent tabloid were thrown in, deftly through my car's rear window. As it was already dusk, I naturally asked why this exercise was still being done! The answer is given below, verbatim:"We have a target of throwing IN (thankfully not OUT) 3 thousand copies per head. Now the copies reach us at this mall only at 3PM. Most cars drive in with AC on till 6:30. So we start to throw around 6:30 & manage to cram in as many copies as possible, into each vehicle".Have you caught some, lately?
Robin speak:
Hi,There are issues on both sides of the LOC, let me start with the editorial side, the other side, as they always behave like mujahideens ready to blow themselves up for reasons we will never know.
Editorial:(1) Their greatest joy comes from peer feedback, which ( as quoted to me) is always like this..WOW that was a great story. You brought out some really interesting insights. BOY you've hit BULLS EYE. I thought that the design team should have done a better job with the layout. If other articles in the same issue were of this calibre, then this would have been a collector's issue. Which they normally agree to( though it is likely that they have not read any article in the magazine other than their own).
Note: Incidentally their peers never include their colleagues in that publication
Consumer (Reader) to them does not exist, it's only role in their mind is to ensure that when the NRS/IRS surveyors come. then they should report that I read the magazines/ newspaper religiously. And that is why there are a lot of so called great products out in the market, which are doing poor business.
Circulation Sales (2):Sales: Ask a sales guy, when did he last read an issue of the magazine he sells, and chances are that he will not know. As far as he is concerned the centre spread in the magazine every week/fortnight should be from PLAYBOY so that he gets very few unsolds from his agent. Hopefully this will help the ABC circulation figure to improve every 6 months.
Circulation sales is about three things (a) Supply Chain (b) Visibility at the retail counter (c) Availability in more places then your competition. But a typical circulation person has very little idea on how to manage these three issues.
Let me start with the first point (a) Supply Chain: All they are keen on is to make sure that the issue reaches their agents in time on Friday/ Saturday. After that it is on god's mercy ( most of the times).
(b) Visibility - Some magazines do a better job at this purely through spending loads of money in this area, but a typical circulation sales person, will not do much about it. Contrast this with an FMCG sales scenario, where there are strict norms on visibility and are measured pretty regularly
(c) New Outlets: Increasing distribution and reach, though talked about furiously is usually never done with even a basic level of commitmentTherefore one will always find circulation people hoping for more speacial issues and freebies in the magazine(booklets et al).
My friends in circulation will call me a turn coat, but I strongly feel that if they did a better job at this, then most magazines will be able to charge more for their product and not give it away for pennies like in most cases in India, and thereby making the circulation sales a department as important as Ad Sales and not treated like a 'step child'.
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