Straining at the leash

Time Inc’s latest wheeze to revitalise the magazine industry launches in a few weeks. MagHound takes the NetFlix subscriber model (LoveFilm for you Britishers) and applies it to magazines: any titles you want for a fixed fee. It’s a bold idea, but there’s a few crucial details yet to be confirmed that will make the difference between it being the Messiah or just a very naughty boy.

Here’s the form letter that Aimee at Time Inc sent to me in response to a few casual queries:

Many thanks for your interest in MAGHOUND, a new online membership service that allows magazine lovers to choose up to fifteen magazine titles- and get them delivered to their home- for one low monthly fee. MAGHOUND members are able to add or change magazine titles whenever they wish, with no long-term commitment or obligation.

A MAGHOUND membership is priced by tier- three titles for $4.95 per month, five titles for $7.95, seven titles for $9.95, and $1 per title for eight titles or more. Titles that are more expensive to publish are considered “premium” titles and will have a small additional fee per month. First-time MAGHOUND users are eligible to receive a free one month trial.

MAGHOUND looks forward to a successful September 2008 debut. By launch, the service will carry approximately 250 diverse magazine titles offered by several major publishers. MAGHOUND is always looking for new additions, so if you have a publisher or title in mind, please let us know at maghound@customersvc.com

MAGHOUND is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Time Inc, the publishers of Time, People and Sports Illustrated.

So let’s break that down. Three titles for $5 is a decent enough price, I suppose – cheaper than the newsstand, not quite as cheap as some of the deals you can get as a subscriber in the US. But that’s ok, you’re paying for the convenience of being able to swap your faves. It’s the rest of the detail that seems a little hazy.

The phrase “Premium titles” brings down the fog of doubt immediately, lit only by a 30-feet tall flashing neon question: what is premium? Close by are the shining followups: Is it “anything you’ve ever heard of”, or just the really big stuff? How much is “a small additional fee”? And will this make the whole thing unnecessarily complicated from day one?

The rest of the questions break down into three categories:

The functional

What are the monthly cycles on this? Do I have to get all my magazines in one parcel (doubtlful, if publishers are sending them out themselves), or do I have 3 “credits” to use per month?

What’s the delay between choosing a title and getting it?

When do I have to choose? Can I see a great mag on the newsstand, and then select it on my MagHound account? Or do I have to put my order in the previous month, going on brand / pre-issue hype alone?

Will I get an inordinate amount of crap in the mail for signing up? (Answer: almost certainly. Magazine choices are demographic gold mines)

The structural

Are Time Inc the best people to do this, rather than say the Magazine Publishers of America or even Comag?

What’s the financial split for the mags in question, and how much will Time Inc charge them to be on the homepage / send out special “Look out for this month’s XXXXX” emails to all subscribers (surely the cornerstone of their business model)?

The crux of the matter

Will people want to consume/buy magazines in this way?

Consumers are essentially split into two basic groups: regular readers and casual readers. Regular readers will usually subscribe to their favourite magazines, especially in the USA, though will probably also be casual readers of other titles. Casual readers will glance over what’s available and decide on the spur of the moment. How will they do this? Assuming their train/plane isn’t about to leave, they probably pick the magazine up, flick through it, stop at certain articles. If the lucky publication succeeds in keeping their attention for more than 30 seconds, chances are that they’ll take it to the cashier. (Or, if you’re unlucky, they’ll just stand there and read until they’re done). The vast majority of newsstand consumers will buy magazines for instant gratification – for reading on the train, while eating dinner, at the hairdressers and so on. It’s a functional, cheap thrill.

MagHound seems determined to create a new kind of reader, the casual multiple subscriber. This is a person who doesn’t need that instant gratification and yet doesn’t want to commit to a single title for long. Neither one nor other, it assumes a magazine-title literacy that most people won’t have, without having a commitment to any particular brands. It’s a strange hybrid that doesn’t really have a place in the current consumption model; as a system, it really only seems to make sense, as the Freakonomics blog points out, as a way of handling your subscriptions that already exist.

The Netflix model works because they’re films. You don’t own them, you mail them back when you’re done, and you don’t mind the expectation of waiting for another to arrive (just as we do for upcoming films in the cinema). Whether an instant-hit medium like newsstand magazines will work the same way is, to say the least, unproven. Still, I’ll be signing up, and will let you know next month how the hound hunts.

More worthwhile reading about MagHound over at:

Portfolio.com
Corante.com
Forbes.com