Making a Customer Magazine
By: Andi Naujoks
Tags: Ecommerce, Startup Lessons, B2b Marketing, Marketing, Content Marketing

Why a magazine?

As an online shop, your only physical point of contact with the customer is when they receive your package and you should exploit that. The magazine, if of high quality, can extend that touch point over time and also to people in your customer’s environment. It is your chance to have a direct, high involvement channel to transport your message into people’s heads and let them enjoy the process.

You will have to make the business case yourself, but good preconditions are

high average order value (mag impacts CPO)

many orders per year (fixed cost degression of editorial work)

a somewhat defined /not too broad target group

your business relies on retention and brand is important

Define Goals and Manage Expectations

I know, this sounds like a no-brainer. In reality it is often overlooked. Also at Contorion, there had been previous experience with a print publication that lacked strategy (and was still deemed a success, highlighting the potential of the medium).

For us, it was of utmost importance to clarify (within the company and with partners) that the goal is not to immediately generate revenue. This is not the right channel to quickly sell off products. Instead, our goal was for the customer to perceive the magazine as a gift rather than a burden (scrap paper) and engage with the brand in a meaningful way. Admittedly, that goal is hard to measure, but I’ll explain below how we attempted to judge our performance.

Get this out of the way early to focus on the right discussions and avoid frustration.

Come up with a modular structure

Try to think in modules from the start. Think of them as the building block with which you create the magazine’s skeleton, before writing any content or coming up with concrete topics. This could look like this:

COVER — TABLE OF CONTENT — PRODUCT FEATURE — STORY — … — INTERVIEW — RAFFLE — BACK

Modules are the building block of your publication // Photo by Dan Burton on Unsplash

Always having the magazine structured in a similar way gives it character and authenticity over time. More importantly, this simple process allows you to also structure your thinking process when coming up with new topics. It allows for a very targeted approach to fill the blank spots and also helps to identify modules that you can pre-produce for upcoming editions.

Set up efficient creation processes

Again, no rocket science, but I will share how we did it. Once the structure was defined, we went on to fill every module with a concrete content idea /topic and assigned all modules to pages. This is your editorial plan.

Build a content machine // Photo by Isis França on Unsplash

We then had one story ticket in Jira with sub-tickets for every double page assigned to it. Our external designer had access to the board. We fed the content (texts, images) into the tickets and she layouted from there. There is a milestone meeting halfway to identify potential problems. In the end you just put it all together. Having it all in one Jira(/Asana/your choice) board is a great way to monitor your progress, and has proven to facilitate communication with the designer and other stakeholders effectively.

Define strict design/layout rules

In my experience it is better to have strict rules and to break out of them than the other way around. Clear rules massively simplify the layout process, because you don’t have to discuss questions of taste all day. They also take a bit of the pressure off the designer, because they don’t have to come up with something groundbreaking on every page. A clear layout gives the magazine a face and recognition value. It makes it more authentic and professional. Very important here: Typo (font&size), colors, and the layout grid.

We also defined a certain look for images in the magazine and slightly adapted photos from external sources accordingly. This is not much work but has great effect, as everything feels like it is from one source. If a partner brand gave us graphics (think performance chart/feature table) we used to redesign those in our style, too.

Be super strict about what goes in!

The most important perspective you have to take in order to decide what goes into the magazine is your customer’s. If they don’t like it, they won’t read it. If they don’t read it, you could have burned your money instead.

be strict who to let in

The second important aspect is your brand. You don’t only want to spoil your customer, but you also want to get paid in brand recognition in return.

These are the hard requirements for 90% of your magazine’s content. It must:

inform

entertain

or both

→ while always communicating the brand and what it stands for.

Customer relevancy: I stress this so much because I know how tempting it is to produce easily accessible content like “Employee XYZ’s favorite 5 products”, “Customer of the month”, but which — when you are brutally honest to yourself — nobody cares about. Always challenge hard if anyone actually wants to read the articles before writing them.

Brand fit: Contorion positions itself as “The smart shop for craftsmen” (“Der smarte Shop fürs Handwerk”). “Smart” means clever/digital/on top of the game; “For craftsmen” in this case stands for eye-level relationships, expertise in the field, and a down-to-earth slightly rough character.

Coming from there, we were very strict about the topics (also and especially those published with partnering brands). We only featured products and topics that made sense in the context of the brand, meaning innovations, everything digital, passion for the craft, etc. Whenever possible, we embedded the products in a story that gave a bit more value than just the product itself (biodegradable dowels were embedded in the article about green building). This also allows you to add the brand-fit to “weaker” products.

For example, we had a comic about a craftsman who uses his skills in all kinds of life situations in a clever way, or one section where we recommended (and gave away) a book that has some congruence with our brand.

and by “you” she means your customer

One more time: Only publish stuff people want to read and make sure it all fits into your brand’s framework.

Let others write for you (win-win)

You have direct access to a specific audience and a desire to fill your magazine with content. Others have knowledge/expertise/stories and a desire to be visible for your audience. A perfect couple. Find third party experts relevant in your domain and ask them if they want to contribute to your Magazine (ideally on a recurring basis). This takes pressure off you to generate relevant content, the pieces can be pre-produced and it does not cost you a thing. Also, the right partners can add credibility to your publication.

How could this look like?

We had the German lawyers association deliver a legal tip in every issue. The tips were specifically designed for crafts people. The association was visible with their logo and website.

A friend of mine (who runs a painter business) wrote a funny anecdote from everyday working life of a craftsman, highly resonating with our target group

What to look out for

find partners with authority in the domain

look for content that would be difficult to create by yourself

accept only high-quality content

Authentic stories are hard to invent — partners and friends can contribute

Have 1 Big Story

I am a big fan of having one really ambitious article in each issue, in terms of length, quality, images, research, etc. We used to have them over 2 double-page spreads (normal story was 1 double page). For example, we once had an article about how to deal with world war bombs that can turn up on construction sites; one about a massive tunnel in Norway that is mounted floating in the ocean; one about the demolition of an old nuclear power plant with a special high-tech excavator. Sometimes they would include an interview with an expert.

The Big Story makes the magazine more credible and appear more independent. Additionally, a high quality article with awe-inspiring story and imagery is fun to read and adds a ton of value. Also, you can produce it well in advance.

It’s worth it to focus on the big picture sometimes // Photo by Guillermo Ferla on Unsplash

Include interactive Elements

When people interact more with your brand, they are more involved. Facilitate that interaction by including interactive elements. For example, we had: crossword puzzles, letters to the editor, photo contest, book tip raffle. Additionally, at the end of some articles we called for interaction (“What are your experiences with XYZ? Write us!”).

Letters to the editor and photo contest are also worthwhile because they serve as social proof for interaction in the next issue. Even if just a few people write you letters, the ability to print real reader content reinforces the real-magazine stamp (there’s no such thing in brochures).

Track your performance

Just because it’s print does not mean you have to remain in the dark about your performance. We used these mechanisms to track quality over time:

Coupon code (always in the same location)

Participation in the crossword puzzle (collect answers online, postcards suck)

Interactions with other interactive elements

Reader survey that went out via newsletter

We could see that the return from the coupon alone would have justified the production.

much profit

Utilize interaction for feedback and content generation

To participate in our crossword raffle, people had to fill out a Google Form that we had embedded on the website (no development effort, easy to customize). In addition to the mandatory fields, we included small surveys that we pre-planned and that we changed frequently.

This way, feedback can be collected (“did you particularly enjoy one article?”). This point of contact is also great for getting user generated content. For example, we had mini-surveys like “How many coffees do you drink on a working day?” but also “How do you feel about law XYZ?”, which we then turned into a mini info-graphic for the next issue. Super easy, unique and interesting content.

Promote iterative improvement

It’s extremely important to not stand still. After each issue, we critically examined what worked and what did not, if possible using data (e.g. survey results). What doesn’t work has to go so new ideas can be tried and proven (or discarded). The basic idea is that the magazine in its form is never actually “finished.” This needs to be an active process.

you get the point

Find someone to pay for it

Depending on your industry, brands are happy to contribute if the end results are convincing. In markets other than fashion & beauty they might not have the capacity to create appealing brand presentations that go beyond sales material. So you can use placements in your print magazine when negotiating market development funds. In our case, we found that the extra funds acquired through this roughly covered production/printing cost, so that all we put in was manpower (writing, editing) and money for one freelancer (layout).