A tenth of revenue comes from digital sales and at least that much comes from events in the changing business model of the century-old Philadelphia magazine, said president David Lipson at an event organized by Venturef0rth. The local Online News Association group was a media sponsor.
Here are some of his main points from the event.
- Lipson says making phillymag.com clearer, more like the magazine was a major step in reinventing the company.
- Acquiring Foobooz.com helped the company branch into the popular food realm. Lipson says the company has experienced success placing ads around contextually relevant editorial content.
- Serving the customers is Philadelphia magazine’s paramount concern. The president says editors and salespeople are working side by side strategizing.
- Lipson says mobile traffic to the site has tripled in the last year. Mobile growth has the company thinking mobile first with everything.
- Prioritizing innovations is something the company values. Lipson says settling on what’s important is a tough job. In the age of disruptions, companies cannot get comfortable with success.
- Digital makes up 10-15 percent of the company’s profit; Lipson’s goal is to get it to 30 percent in the near future. Events (Be Well Philly festival, food festival, etc.) make up 10-15 percent, which is more than newsstand sales. Print is expected to stay where it is for the next five years.
- Native advertising is something the company feels can be used as long as there’s transparency with the customers.
- Writing about what people are talking about is still key for the company to create content people want to read
- Getting to a point where a paywall can be set up is a future goal of the company.
- Philadelphia Magazine sees itself as media leader in the city; wants to be modern, cool media company. Lipson wants people to think of company as the Apple of local media.
This is a guest post from Ryan Venezia, of the Philadelphia Tribune, who submitted this as a member of the Online News Association, which was a media sponsor of this event.
Companies:
Philadelphia Magazine
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