Newsagents asked to promote newspaper iPad App?
Did I read that newsagents had been asked by a publisher to promote a newspaper iPad App?I wouldn’t do this if asked.
The Importance of promoting mobile phone SIM cards
Supermarkets promote mobile phone SIM cards at the checkout. The photo is of a display unit at a Woolworths outlet I saw a few days ago.. They do this because grabbing incremental business from such promotions works. It’s something we should do. We have excellent traffic, as do supermarkets, and if they can drive incremental business from such tactical placement then we should be able to as well.
Newsagents not sure how to get into this space should talk with Jenlist. They can help with product as well as visual merchandising material.
Feast launch issue selling well
The launch issue of Feast magazine has been performing well for us. In my own newsagencies it’s sold more than twice as many copies in the first week than we usually sell in a month of Delicious, Gourmet Traveller and MasterChef. Not that these comparisons are fair – it’s the launch issue, has been brilliantly promoted and it is targeting a different market, except maybe for Gourmet Traveller.
I could be wrong but I think that Feast will sell right through the on-sale. i.e. not in a burst with a sharp sales decay as we see for the higher volume monthlies. Frankie magazine is very much like this – selling well right up to the end of the month.
Titles which sell right through the on-sale are good as they provide us with impulse promotion opportunities which are not bunched up at the start of the on-sale.
I know of some newsagents who early returned Feast. It makes me wonder what they have missed. I can think of no reason to early return Feast yet.
Promoting Cleo with style
The creative team at one of my newsagencies has gone for a very stylish look for the latest display promoting Cleo magazine. I really like this less is more approach. I think it’s more includes to be noticed than a display which uses just the posters and magazine covers. It is the type of change which will drive more interest in the title.
Not giving up on a challenged product line
I wrote here recently about the challenges we are having selling the chess themed salt and pepper grinders. Not wanting to give up on a product in which they believe, our team found a way to make them look more appealing – by better connecting with the chess theme. This change in display has helped move some additional stock without deep discounting.
I was pleased to see the team try this more creative approach rather than the planned price reductions.
The Block magazine sells while some newsagents lose sales
The Block magazine is proving to be a runaway success in newsagencies based on sales reports I have received. I’ve heard of sales in the first two days passing 20% in many newsagencies and some selling out. This one-shot is a hit! Indeed, there appears to be a problem getting extra stock.
The bad news for The Block magazine is that some newsagents early returned the title on Monday. Seriously!
I can’t think of a single reason any newsagent would want to return this title, especially not on the day of on-sale. especially given that Nine is running a TVC telling shoppers to buy the magazine from their local newsagent.
Maybe I am wrong but from where I sit, early returning The Block magazine is a dumb move. It’s another reason to not trade with the newsagency shingle.
Hopefully, this lost opportunity stock returned by these newsagents will quickly get to newsagents who have sold out and have been told by the publisher that there is no spare stock left.
UPDATE: (10:17am) More stock is being sent as part of SBR to stores based on their sales data. Netonline also has more stock now available.
How are Your Sales of Commando Library?
I have been looking at sell through rate data for Commando Library, the small novella size magazines supplied through magazine distributor Gordon and Gotch. In one newsagency for which I have sell through rate data, this title achieves an average sell through of 40%. It’s a loss making title. Yet Gotch continues to supply.
The challenge with this title is the quantity supplied. The newsagency for which I have data (not one of mine) gets 2 copies of each issue. They never sell both and often sell none. I think that the newsagent needs to quit the title from the shelves and convert the regular customer, if there is one, to a putaway.
Newsagents need a way with which we can handle cutting a title like this and ensuring that a new title is not supplied to take its place – to help the magazine distributor to meet its financial budget.
So, how is Commando Library performing in your business? It could be a title you want to kill if your sales are like those in the newsagency I have just received data from.
Angry Birds plush selling well
We have been enjoying excellent sales with the Angry Birds plush range in my stores. It has worked brilliantly at the counter as well as part of a feature plush gift display. In the photo we have it in one of my stores as part of a Father’s Day promotion. This makes sense given that the Angry Birds game is being played by people of all ages including dads.
I love that we have such a trendy product in our mix as this demonstrates relevance. It also attracts shoppers to the newsagency who might otherwise pass us by.
We have gone for Angry Birds plush of different sizes so that we can pitch to different price points. This has worked a treat.
Promoting the Art of Knitting partwork
We are promoting the re issue of the Art of Knitting with this display which faces shoppers as they enter the newsagency.
While some newsagents are concerned about the reissue of partworks I’m not. We are now on our third order of the issue 1 of the reissue of Real Life Bugs. We expect to sell out of this – that will take us to sales of three times the initial allocation.
I expect the Art of Knitting to be a hit. It’s being backed by TV and it has excellent market awareness off of which to build from the first time around.
Promoting Real Living magazine
We are promoting Real Living magazine with this in-location display as well as a billboard display. The in-location display will be up for the entire on-sale and the billboard display will be up for a week. Real Living recorded a sales lift in the last audit. This should encourage newsagents to promote the title.
These in-location displays work a treat for us in driving incremental business. Indeed, they are my preferred magazine display given that the promote the usual location of the magazine and drive good sales – based on historic sales data.
The iPad and newsagents
The iPad and other tablet devices are impacting newsagency businesses in a number of ways operationally as well as at the sales counter.
In response to a comment here, here are my thoughts on the impact of the iPad and similar devices.
How the iPad can impact operationally on a newsagency:
- I know of newsagents who have been using their iPads as business tools since the device was first launched. They are using it for a number of purposes:
- To access the business from home or on the road and check sales and do back office work.
- To check inventory sales history from a supplier warehouse or a trade show floor.
- To use the iPad as an additional software access terminal without the need to purchase a full terminal.
- As a display device for newspaper delivery runs.
How the iPad is impacting on newsagency sales:
- More people are accessing news and information using mobile devices. This is leading to changes in how consumers access news and information and thereby changing the role of newspapers and magazines.
- More publishers are pursuing models whereby they nurture direct to consumer relationships through Apps.
- Some newspapers in the US have closed down their print editions in favour of and online only model. In Seattle, the publisher did this to the financial success of the business.
- Some magazine publishers have launched digital only titles.
- Many publishers are working on the reader experience to find magic which provides the reader with a better than paper experience.
- In books we are seeing booklets published for these devices, kind of novella in size and costing a few cents. This and other innovation is bringing more voices to the public arena.
- There is a move to freeing articles from mastheads, making them available for micro payments. Look at what happened when this move was achieved with music.
- I think that print sales will continue in slow decline. That said, I see opportunities with newspapers and magazines for proactive newsagents. This is why I will continue to champion the medium.
Ideally I would spend a couple of hours presenting about this at a conference or meeting, teasing out each of these and other points. The notes above are just some of the highlights. I hope they satisfy the interest of people here.
I’d love other newsagents to share here how they are using their iPad in their business.
How are you promoting Famous magazine?
Famous magazine had another good sales audit. Sales were up 2.2%. Sales of NW were down 13.14% in the same period.
I think that it’s reasonable for us to look at Famous and wonder what else we can do to boost the title. Clearly, it’s a favourite with shoppers. This makes it low hanging fruit in my view. So, what are you doing to grab your share of sales growth?
Co-location at the counter or with newspapers are two steps which you could easily take.
While there is also a reasonable case for us to push competitor NW (and we do), it’s easier to promote a title already enjoying growth.
Well done Australian Women’s Weekly
Kudos to Helen McCabe and the team at The Australian Women’s Weekly for their latest sales audit result.
To achieve a decline of only .4% in a market which recorded an overall decline of 5.3% is an excellent result.
It is challenging to change a product as well established and loved as The Australian Women’s Weekly. The sales numbers suggest that the editorial and publishing team are heading in the right direction.
They have made some non-traditional cover choices recently as part of their pursuit of younger readers.
Accounting for close to 500,000 copies sold per issue, we need AWW to be strong and healthy. This latest audit is a good sign.
Promoting Cycling magazines
We are leveraging the continuing glow of the Cadel Evans win of the Tour de France with this co-location promotion of cycling titles at the sales counter.
Cadel’s visit to Melbourne late last week extended the interest in all things cycling from what my friends in bike shops tell me so it makes sense for newsagents to pitch cycling magazines at the counter to drive sales.
We will continue this support for cycling titles for a while – until it ceases to work for us in terms of incremental business.
Promoting The Block one-shot
We are promoting The Block one shot in each of my newsagencies. The respective teams have done a terrific job – if I do say so myself. They are using the title to leverage advertising and pull traffic and to drive impulse business with high impact as well as tactical displays.
In this terrific display, one of my stores is promoting The Block on the column facing into the shopping mall, leveraging excellent out of store traffic. Click on the image for a larger version. I love the additional visual merchandising materials they have employed (from the Reject Shop) to bring the display to life.
In this display, in another of my stores, they have a main counter based display for The Block which they have kicked up with additional creative collateral created in-store to connect with the theme of the TV show (a block of homes) and the magazine. Again, click on the image for a larger version.
Given that ACP is promoting that this title is available in newsagencies, I’d encourage all newsagents to get behind it.
Customer anger at bagged magazines
Just went into the newsagency and yelled at the girl. She had all the dolly mags in plastic, so i couldn’t see what btc poster was in there
This was posted on Twitter on Saturday. I found the comment when searching tweets this morning with the word magazine in them. It was timely finding this because of my post earlier this morning about our own Dolly display.
Dolly isn’t the only magazine which is bagged at present. There are plenty including its direct competitor – Girlfriend magazine.
The tweet is good evidence for publishers that there are shoppers out there who do not like bagged magazines … and some of these shoppers will take it out on newsagents and their employees.
Just went into the newsagency and yelled at the girl. She had all the dolly mags in plastic, so i couldn’t see what btc poster was in there
yelled at the girl … this happens regularly to newsagency employees for things completely outside their control, like bagged magazines.
I understand why publishers bag magazines – in the case of the current issues of Dolly and Girlfriend it is to keep in a presentable package their premium offer. Personally, I am not against this bagging. However, it dies get in the way of the consumer experience. This is what must be considered, especially given today’s retail climate.
Retailers want and need experiences which are unique to the physical retail situation. This is why browsing is vitally important. Bagged magazines are not browser friendly.
As for the Twitter user who posted the Tweet, I didn’t comment to them and I don’t intend to out them. I suspect that criticism would get nowhere.
Featuring selected food titles
We have been featuring this selection of food magazine titles facing the front of the store – seen by shoppers as they enter. We have gone for half waterfalls of five titles to give them an opportunity to achieve an impact. Yes we have included MasterChef. While I am frustrated with their rock bottom discounting of subscriptions, I am not going to cut myself out of sales.
This is a pretty simple display. It took a couple of minutes to select the titles and create. We know what we placed here so we can easily measure if the display generates the necessary sales. It’s the type of display, whether for food or some other category, which I think every newsagency should have every day. It reinforces our point of difference.
Promoting Diabetic Living
We are promoting the latest issue of Diabetic Living with this tactical placement next to newspapers in one of my newsagencies. This high prrfile placement is deserved because of the free sachet of Carman’s porridge free with this issue of Diabetic Living. It’s an excellent free gift – ideal for the target market.
Promoting Dolly magazine
We are promoting the latest issue of Dolly magazine with this display facing shoppers as they leave the women’s section of the newsagency. It’s an attention grabbing display with nothing around it competing for attention. The display has been up since this issue went on sale and have a few days left to run. Click on the image for a larger version of the photo.
More promotion of New Idea Masterclass one shot
We have moved the impulse purchase stand promoting the New Idea Masterclass title to the women’s area of our newsagency. We had it at the front of the store for a couple of weeks and now have it toward the back. We ave a plan for another location next week. By moving the stand around we get the title in front of different shoppers and create for ourselves more impulse purchase opportunities.
Leaving a stand like this in the one location for the entire period is a waste of time and money.
Productivity Commission calls on retailers to work smarter: here’s how newsagents can
Buried in the recent draft report, Economic Structure and Performance of the Australian Retail Industry, by the Productivity Commission is a call on retailers to improve productivity.
Newsagents can improve productivity and cut wages, cut waste, reduce theft and drive better business decisions.
Hang on, think about that last sentence. Don’t move on until you go back, read it again and think about how you would feel if you really did achieve these benefits in your newsagency.
Seriously. I mean it. Read the sentence again. Here it is…
Newsagents can improve productivity and cut wages, cut waste, reduce theft and drive better business decisions.
Too many newsagents do not have these as goals. Too often they blame others when they realise that they want and need the benefits embedded in the goals.
So, here are some productivity gain ideas and opportunities for newsagents:
- Cut magazine returns time. Take the returns out of the back office where it is a specialist function and move it to the front counter, being done every day by any employee. A newsagency with $500K a year in magazine sales should spend no more than two to three hours a week on magazine returns including counting, topping, bundling and dealing with distributors.
- Cut other labour intensive work. Stop manual reordering of stock. Use your computer system. In an average newsagency, going from manual reordering to computer based reordering usually saves between four and six man-hours a week. Eliminate all manual business performance reporting. Get rid of your manual roster – do it using the roster facilities in your software. Stop manually managing magazine putaways. There are plenty more ideas like these. Use integrated EFTPOS and save time on every sale.
- Cut waste. Reorder stock using your computer system (yes, this is a repeat idea) and find that you will have less stock which does not sell. Look at your sales by time and roster accordingly. The roster often has wasted hours. Look at product sales and quit what’s not working before it becomes a loss making boat anchor. If a rep says you need more of a product, check their claim with your business data, let your data guide your decision.Reps want to get stock to your store, they are often paid to achieve this.
- Cut theft. Use employee initials or a code for every sale. Balance your cash every day. Have a zero tolerance policy (I’ve written about this before here and elsewhere). Do spot stock takes. Use the theft management tools in your software. Use stock control throughout but especially on cigarettes, greeting cards, ink, phone cards and other highly negotiable items. A newsagency without professional theft management processes should be able to increase net profit by as much as 10% in the first year.
- Make better business decisions. Make more fact based decisions based on accurate business data. Stop gut feel decisions. Your business data can guide you to more profit than how you feel at any time. Stop using department keys to record sales – scan everything. No excuses, scan everything. Build better data and use this to improve your business.
I know of a newsagent who has just successfully cut $34,000 from their annual wages bill by switching software systems (yes, to my Tower Systems) and implementing our time focused approach to magazine management. There are plenty of other examples like this one.
I am confident that every newsagency business in Australia can improve productivity. Yes, it’s a challenge. The benefits are substantial: reduced wages, reduced waste, reduced theft and better quality and more valuable business decisions.
Imagine how powerful our newsagency channel would be if we all did these simple things. I do. I imagine a strong, growing and productive newsagency channel leading small business retailers and powering ahead against the reports of tough times.
We can do this. We can improve productivity – individually and as a channel. We have the tools. All we need is the will.
I have been sharing specific advice with newsagents using the Tower Systems newsagency software – I have written a 2,300 article with specific business building tips and I share this with newsagents who ask. Email me at mark@towersystems.com.au if you would like a copy.
As I noted earlier, these are some ideas. Share yours with your fellow newsagents.
Internet cafe in a supermarket – go figure
I was up in Cairns this morning and noticed this internet cafe in the front corner of a Woolworths supermarket. To me, this indicates how resourceful the supermarket giant is in chasing revenue. It’s a Global Gossip store within a store. I found this interesting because an internet cafe is not something you’d usually see a major supermarket group take on, even in a major tourist destination – unless they can make money out of it. That they have an internet cafe in a supermarket in cairns says something about the flexibility of Woolworths with their model. It is a reminder of their relentless pursuit of revenue.
Looking at the internet cafe inside the walls of Woolworths reminded me that we need to go where the money is and that we need to be commercially flexible with our model.
Just because much of what we sell today is low and fixed margin does not mean we need to stick with.
We need to be as commercially opportunistic with our businesses as Woolworths is with theirs.
Good August sales numbers already
We are seeing some excellent sales numbers for August. Card revenue is up, so are sales of gifts, magazines, stationery and ink. It kind of makes me question all the doom and gloom people talk about.
We are making our own success through a number of campaigns driving traffic and some excellent in-store promotions running to drive not only traffic from the mall but also incremental business from shoppers in-store.
For magazines, for example, we are doing a lot of work around categories of titles, categories such as food, men’s, music and wedding. This category wide work helps drive the purchase of multiple titles in the one sale. This, coupled with our successful loyalty card, is driving a good magazine outcome for us. We are obsessive and opportunistic about magazines, taking every chance we can to sell a copy.
Being average will produce average results.
We are not running sales, no we refuse to get sucked into that game. Instead we are looking for ways to offer value and to leverage our customer service point of difference. Doing these things and using excellent traffic freeways to build a deeper basket works. Yes, it’s hard work. But it pays off.
$12,000 in excess magazine stock found
A newsagent who had not early returned, who had left the magazine distributors to manage their supply, discovered more than $12,000 in cash tied up in gross magazine oversupply. These were mainly titles supplied which never sold. This was a terrific discovery as it provided evidence on how magazine distributors behave when left in control of supply. Well, they misbehave. $12,000 worth of stock was removed for early return based on conservative guidance. Had the culling been in line with what I would recommend, this store would have early returned closer to $16,000 in magazine stock.
For years magazine distributors have been great with words and weak on action. We continue to pay the price.
Promoting the Symply Too Good cookbooks
We have been promoting Annette Sym’s range of Symply Too Good To Be True healthy cookbooks with this behind the counter display. We have put this up to support the cross promoting in upcoming issues of Take 5 magazine. Our team has done a terrific job in showcasing the range – we know from our sales data across a number of newsagencies that Symply Too Good customers usually purchase two or more titles at once.
I’d encourage all newsagents to promote the range – to leverage the Take 5 promotion and drive sales because these things just sell.