Publishing and subscriptions marketing: 15 blunders
In his time in publishing Peter Hobday has worked with three people who understand how business works (rather than just publishing). Brian Gilbert, who ran United Trade Press and the Wilmington Group, Sylvester Stein of Electric Word and John Gommes of Chartsearch. They have chosen publishing but would be successful in any business because they understand the elemental workings of the marketplace. . .
Drayton Bird on UK publishers
“Selling subscriptions .. probably the hardest of direct mail tasks. It gives you a complete (often bruising) education which, with a little imagination, you can apply to just about anything.”
In Circulation magazine
We publishers are very lucky to have In Circulation magazine. The Editor, James Evelegh has managed to bring the whole circulation marketing and management community together, which must be one of the toughest tasks in business publishing.
Current events can boost response
Linking your subscription marketing to a current event can have a wondrous effect on response. Peter Hobday shows how a copywriter can use a big event to sell a newsletter.
What does a copywriter like Peter Hobday do that you can't?
A copywriter has a hidden agenda: he or she is not writing about your publication but about your reader and what interests him. To show what I mean I have illustrated a promotion selling subscriptions to a sports training newsletter.
A really weak direct mail pack
In our famous Subscriptions Strategy newsletter we usually publish great promotions we can all learn from. We rarely show poor examples. But that doesn’t apply to this website, so here’s a really weak sales letter and direct mail pack from Traveller magazine for you to look at. Once you’ve looked, why not try our short quiz? There’s a great prize!
The subscriptions goldmine
Most information products such as websites, ezines, books, reports and other downloads and memberships can also be sold by subscription with a few easy changes.