"We've used Mequoda's strategies and techniques to sell thousands of books, videos, and subscriptions."
- Charlie Spahr, Executive Director, The American Ceramic Society
They might not rival Major League Baseball’s offseason hot stove of free agency and trades, but publishing deals at the end of 2015 are still making magazine industry news in a business that in recent years has seen only one constant: change.
In today’s roundup, relayed from The Wall Street Journal’s CMO Today, we’ve got one brand circling back on its content marketing strategy to produce a stronger magazine business model and another moving its digital content and operations to a leader of the “platisher” movement.
Meanwhile, Facebook, recently on a streak of publishing deals culminating in Instant Articles, reconsiders its own advertising revenue model as its partners register some early complaints.
Ev Williams’ Medium – the long-form digital publishing platform that launched a couple of years back – has steadily grown in both audience and users, crossing off each item on its to-do list along the way. Gradually shedding its silly “platisher” tag and emerging as a leader in a media strategy, Medium has now moved on to the natural next step in its progression: monetizing video content.
Ev Williams’ Medium, the long-form publisher that launched as a platform, is making its move into monetization by partnering with BMW on a native advertising package.
As its most high-profile hire, Levy will be writing long-form pieces for the platform-turned-publisher, while also commissioning stories from across the Internet, David Carr writes in The New York Times.
"We've used Mequoda's strategies and techniques to sell thousands of books, videos, and subscriptions."
- Charlie Spahr, Executive Director, The American Ceramic Society
"We have used the Mequoda Method to deliver a real-time online magazine that features individual issues and our amazing archive of premium content."
- Paul Belliveau, Vice President New Media and Production, Yankee Publishing
“We’ve used these techniques to boost sales of our higher-priced products, and dramatically increase our multiplatform subscription revenues.”
- Susan Laden, Publisher, Biblical Archaeology Society
"Adoption of the Mequoda Method has produced three benefits for us. First, we are seeing sustained growth in subscription revenue. Second, we monetized a content archive with two decades of news and information. Three, our new customers have immediate access to the content they seek."
- Robert Michel, Founder, The Dark Intelligence Group
"We have used the Mequoda Method to increase our revenue by more than 60% while completely eliminating direct mail from our marketing mix. Unsurprisingly, this has allowed us to dramatically increase profitability and our ability to fund our mission-driven programs."
- Gail Odeneal, Director of Marketing, Program on Negotiation Harvard Law School
"We have used the Mequoda Method to create two successful online magazines that generate subscription revenues that are completely independent of our advertising driven legacy business model."
- Stuart Hochwert, Founder and CEO, Prime Publishing
"We know there’s demand for individual subscriptions based on our limited marketing efforts, but we needed the resources of a top-tier marketing organization to effectively and aggressively scale our individual subscriptions business. Mequoda has the best business processes we’ve seen for getting the job done."
- Hampton Stephens, Publisher, World Politics Review
"Mequoda’s knowledge of the fundamental practices and technologies at the core of the media business is unsurpassed by any other group of consultants I know. If you’re in the media industry, Mequoda would be a valuable ally."
- Bryan Welch, Publisher
“The team I worked with at Interweave successfully transitioned a leading print enthusiast media business into the digital age. The folks at Mequoda were an important part of this team and the company’s most valued strategic advisor. We could not have done it without them.”
- Clay Hall, Former CEO, Interweave
"With more than 3.2 million monthly unique visitors, Mother Earth News has increased its revenues 39X over the past 10 years, using these strategies.”
- Bill Uhler, Publisher, Ogden Publications
