Then recently, a few magazines started changing their web strategies. E-commerce doesn t live by advertising. It lives by selling products and services. It attracts customers because it s efficient and cheap. The Internet works for books, CDs, airline tickets, e-trades, collectible beanie babies.
Retailing goes against the grain of magazine thinking.
When you re a magazine, you sell advertising, not products. But recently, a few magazines started making deals with retailers to give their customers what they really want. Reader s Digest has partnered with a WebMD to sell Net-based services to physicians. This fall, Conde Nast s Epicurious site will begin selling Williams-Sonoma products. All this activity is the sound of the magazine industry getting it.