Those who HAVE the data, know how to MANAGE and can use it CREATIVELY… will win!!!
by Lucia Moses
Some Popular Mechanics subscribers got something extra with their November issues. The issue was bundled with an outsert from Hewlett-Packard that greeted them by name and showed a scene specific to their hometown. Inside the issue was a 16-page insert that gave readers locations where they could buy HP products near their homes.
The program was meant to promote HP’s line of printers aimed at consumers, but the bigger message was about its printing technology that produced the ads.
Jane Wladar, associate publisher of the Hearst title, said magazines have had the ability to individualize copies before, but never this inexpensively and with accountability measures. She wouldn’t reveal the cost of the HP program but said it was comparable to nonindividualized print ads.
“I heard HP had this technology and I reached out to them,” she said. “We’ve seen big programs but never any so cost-effective.”
The ads contained issue-specific URLs directing the reader to an online contest they could enter to win an HP printer. There were also issue-specific QR codes in the insert that linked readers to more information on their mobiles.
As for the results, 3 percent of the 300,000 subscribers who got the customized issue entered the contest, which is in the ballpark of the response rate for direct mail. But of that 3 percent, 85 percent clicked on the QR codes in the insert.
Continues at: Can Personalized Ads Save Magazines? | Adweek.
