Category: Industry Voices

The Discovery Club weekly newsletter will feature a new artist every week, including an exclusive design to download and colour, an artist interview, and extras like discount codes for the artists designs. The newsletter costs £3.98 per month.

With only 13 issues of Colouring Heaven per year, and hundreds of artists hoping to be featured in the magazine, the brand team have created Discovery Club as a way to introduce as many emerging artists as possible. The first artist to appear is Rob Roskam, a Dutch illustrator who specialises in botanical designs. 

Creative Director of Colouring Heaven, Jenny Cook, said: ‘I am so happy to finally be able to get more fantastic artists into the spotlight! Every month it is so difficult to choose just one to highlight in the magazine, so with Discovery Club our audience can meet many more talented artists and get to know their work. We’re excited to get going with this new venture and get more people involved with the Colouring Heaven brand.’

https://shop.anthem.co.uk/all-products/colouring-heaven-discovery-club.htm

What made you want to work in the publishing industry?

I fell in love with journalism and politics around the time that Margaret Thatcher got elected. The world was starting to change, and I wanted to be involved and write about it.

Chart you career from the start to where you are now.

I started off as a reporter and then I went into editing, publishing and then became a divisional CEO at UBM, which is now part of Informa. For the last eight years I have specialised in content strategy at UBM, Haymarket and now Incisive. I love the intellectual challenge of working with journalists and editors. What we try to do is use storytelling to build loyal audiences amongst professional people.

You have had a number of different job roles within the industry. How have you seen the industry evolve in terms of job opportunities since you began your career?

I have been in the business now for 33 years and what has been most striking is the acceleration in the pace of change. There has been more disruption in the last 10 years than in the previous 23. I remember appointing my first web editor in the nineties and those people were the ones that turned out to be the heartbeat of the editorial operation. I learnt then that you should always go with the new thing, even if it seems small and obscure to start with. When I became UBM’s Chief Content Officer I grabbed hold of that opportunity. I set up a content marketing team in 2009 and we hired a bunch of content writers, designers and project managers. Then we started hiring audience engagement managers and video producers and very soon I’ve no doubt we’ll be hiring podcast producers and presenters. In this business it really does help to be a shape shifter.

What forms of journalism are most effective for story telling across B2B titles?

With all journalism it comes down to finding great characters and stories. As in the print days, you still can’t beat a brilliant scoop. Over time the readers and rival journalists are going to know who is breaking the stories and that elevates the brand. The profusion of new platforms has allowed us to develop long form data journalism, a variety of video techniques and podcasts and campaigns which are much richer across digital and social than we could ever achieve in print. But in the end, these are only just tools and it really is just about finding the right platform for the story. What our readers are looking for is actionable intelligence and to feel part of the community. That is really about the story not the format.

You work across a number of titles on sustainability, technology and finance. How good does your understanding have to be of all those specialisms?

I think you have to understand enough to understand what is of value to the individual groups of readers, but you are never going to be as expert as the editors and journalists that work on those titles. In this sort of role, you must remember that they are the heroes in the drama. They have the depth and I’ve got the breadth. My value comes from taking a view from the bridge, making the connections across the titles and seeing what is going on in the wider media industry that might change the game for us. AI for example is clearly coming over the horizon and that is where you can hopefully add value as an editorial director.

What has been the highlight of your career so far?

I am not someone who looks back very often. Winning awards like the PPA Editor of the Year award have always been great moments but you have to move onto the next thing. If I was to pick one thing out it would be when a group of launched a magazine, a website and an awards show in three weeks in 2005. We beat the rival, who had been planning the rival title for a year, by a week. It was crazy, expensive and an absolute hoot. It was one of the first moments I got really interested in strategy because the way we were able to rethink and outwork them was really rewarding.

What would people be surprised to know about your job?

One of the things I learned early on at UBM, which is still true at Incisive now is that you are powerless without the support of the CEO and the commercial leadership team on one hand and great editors to work with on the other. To use a sporting analogy, the editors are the players on the pitch and all you can do is scream from the touchline and to understand the limits of your responsibility is really important before you start figuring out what it is that you can do.

What would be in your Room 101?
Surveillance capitalism. It is not hard to see how Facebook and WeChat morph into Big Brother and that is pretty terrifying for human freedom. I would also like to zap all the phone zombies who menace my daily commute

What magazine would be your long train journey?

Other than reading my own titles, my fantasy read would be a vintage copy of NME from the late 70s or early 80s – the Neil Spencer era. I loved the egos and the narcissism.

What was it that made you want to work in the publishing industry?

I didn’t intend to work in the publishing industry. I did geology at university and my great love was horse racing. I worked in Newmarket for 3 or 4 years and then in Australia in horse racing and then came back to England and found a job in the back of Horse & Hound. I couldn’t type very well but I realised that magazines were all about ideas and creativity and within five years I had become Deputy Editor of Horse and Hound.

Chart your career from the start to where you are now.

After Horse and Hound, I then became the Editor of the Shooting Times and profit increased massively while I was there, however I didn’t want to be boxed in so after a bit of time there, I then became a publisher for 18 months. It taught me how to be bilingual and understand the business side of things before I then went on to be Editor-in-Chief of 51 magazines. I learnt a huge amount because every magazine did something brilliantly and spoke really cleverly about their special topics. In 2006 I then became Editor-in-Chief of Country Life. I was acutely aware that people were becoming more visually literate, so we did some amazing things with pictures. I have edited it now for 14 years and for 12 of those years, it has had an annual ABC increase.

What do you think it is about the Country Life brand that has resulted on this year-on-year increase?

The best piece of advice I ever received was that you must put the reader first. If you ever have to have a difficult conversation with a writer or a staff member, you have to remember that you have the weight of the readers on your shoulder, so you have to make those important decisions. You need a reader before you get an advertiser, so a reader is the most precious thing and you must look after your newsstand and subscriptions.

How has Country Life evolved as a brand since you started as Editor-in-Chief?

When I took over, Country Life was heavily focused on property. If you go back to before the internet, a lot of people who had a house in the countryside would only be able to sell it through the magazine. Property remains the most important advertising medium, but now we have an interiors medim, a luxury section, a school supplement and I have got Prince Charles to guest edit it twice. We have launched London Life for those readers who live in London and those that come from the countryside into London. You have to always be doing something!

How do you handle your deadlines?

There are three gifts an Editor has – the words, pictures and planning/productivity. If you really get the planning and productivity right, then you end up with more time for words and pictures. We work on about 13 issues at once. The countryside looks its best in May in June, so the architecture gets photographed then. It’s a strange mixture of planning a year advance, the features are planned two to three months in advance and the news is done within three days of the reader seeing it. Nobody has to buy a magazine and the greatest danger is producing a bad issue followed by another bad issue. You want to consistently produce very good magazines.

What would be in your Room 101?

Rats

What magazine would be your long train journey read?

Private Eye

What made you want to work in publishing?

I always loved comics and magazines as a child and that’s what I spent my pocket money on. I was forever making up my own magazines and “selling” them to friends and family. When I was a teenager, the high spot of my week was getting to read Jackie magazine. It honestly felt as if it was written only for me. That passion never left me and I knew I wanted to write – but as a youngster I never dreamed of working on Jackie. The thought of it was too unbelievably glamorous to even entertain.

Chart your career from the start to where you are now.

By the time I was leaving school at 17, I knew I wanted to work in publishing. My sister spotted a tiny ad in a local paper for an “editorial assistant” with DC Thomson Ltd and I applied. Within weeks I was working on Jackie –  a dream job for me as it had been my essential read for so many years. It was my foot in the door and such a good grounding in important basics. I stayed with the company for nine years, then left to freelance. I worked for lots of different newspapers and magazines and had a spell working in PR and doing contract work for the NHS. I even had an ill-fated six weeks in a bank. Let’s not discuss that one. Then I got asked to return to DC Thomson Media for six months to cover maternity leave. That was more than 10 years ago. I ended up working for The Sunday Post, one of Scotland’s most famous and much-loved newspapers. The experience I gained there really helps me in the job I’m doing today. Then I came back to magazines to work on Platinum. It has been so great to return to the department I worked in as a teenager and it’s been a joy to have worked on a launch. Sadly not many of us get to do that these days.

What were the reasons behind launching Platinum?

There was a lot of research done by a really passionate team before I came on board. They had long felt there was a gap in the market for a monthly glossy for 55+ women who were still living life on full power and not “winding down”. The research backed this up – the women we spoke to while we were developing Platinum became as enthusiastic as we were and most of them are now our brand ambassadors. DC Thomson Media has decades of experience of writing for the mature magazine market and a team was brought together to make Platinum happen. DC Thomson Media is a champion of women over 55, who are an underserved consumer group.

What is the biggest challenge Platinum has faced since launching?

Before launch, some famous faces were interested in talking to us but wouldn’t fully commit until they could see the first couple of issues. They wanted to see exactly what we were about and I understood that because they needed to make sure we were right for them but at times it could be frustrating. I will always be immensely thankful to Twiggy and Shirley Ballas and their teams, who showed faith in us and were the first to sign up. We got two fantastic covers and interviews from them and then it became a lot easier.

What feedback have you received since the launch of the magazine?

We’ve had lots of great feedback from the industry – not many people are launching mags these days, so there has been a lot of enthusiasm for it. People working in magazines want to see them survive and thrive. For me, the loveliest feedback has been from actual readers and new subscribers. So many women have taken the time to contact us and tell us they love Platinum. They’re still arriving. I got one at the end of last week which said: “It’s wonderful to have a magazine for my generation of women. It’s a long time since I read a magazine that seemed to be talking to me.” Every time I get an email like that it makes my day.

What has been the highlight of your career so far?

Can I choose two? Getting that first job on Jackie when I was a teenager. And becoming editor of Platinum. It’s been the best job I’ve had and launching and developing a magazine with a passionate, committed team has been amazing.

What would people be surprised to know about your job?

It’s much less glamorous than they would imagine! My friends who don’t work in the industry tease me about going to launches, meeting famous people and the fun that you can have in our industry. They never believe me that there’s a lot of work involved, too and seem to imagine I spend my days quaffing champagne. I wish!

What would be in your Room 101?

Gin and tonic “stuff”. Just pass me a chilled G&T and I’ll be fine, thanks. I don’t want to bathe in it. And butter substitutes.

What magazine would you take on a long train journey?

Vanity Fair, Grazia and Empire and I love Red. I sometimes buy independents, too – most recently The Gentlewoman and The Face. It’s great to see it back.

What was it that made you want to work in the publishing industry?

Writing was always something I liked doing. I did English and languages at school and English Literature at Birmingham University. I got involved in the university newspaper and I had a radio show so I have always been attracted to the idea of working in the media. This role then came up when I was considering what I wanted to do after university. I had never considered an apprenticeship before, but it was an opportunity to write about cars and it was channelling everything I had learnt in education into something I quite liked talking about.

Explain how your apprenticeship programme has worked at Haymarket.

For me it was 2 months of settling in at Haymarket and learning the ropes and then I started my college course at the Press Association which is run through the NCTJ. There was a period when the course was full time then it went down to one day a week and I was back at work full time. I finished my last exam in October and now I am just working on a coursework portfolio which I hand in in 3 weeks. I applied more for the job role than the apprenticeship at the time, although I now consider it extremely valuable and I am very glad I am doing it.

Why has it been valuable to start out as an apprentice before going into a full-time contracted role at Haymarket?

It is especially important because I am learning something I didn’t have experience in before. If I didn’t do the apprenticeship I wouldn’t have an understanding about the industry in general as the training course teaches me about court reporting, magazine production and media law. While they are elements of my everyday job at Haymarket, I wouldn’t have been able to get such a good understanding if I hadn’t done the NCTJ course. Doing this has allowed me to get that training while also making a name for myself in the industry.

What has been the highlight of your apprenticeship so far?

Most recently, I was named a rising star at the Haymarket internal awards. I also went to the Goodwood Festival of Speed and I was there for three days, on the ground reporting. I also still get excited when I see my name in print or on a big piece online. Last month I did a big feature about a garage near the Grenfell tower and it was the cover feature of Car & Accessory Trader and it was picked up by Autocar. That feels like a good point to end the apprenticeship on.

What is the biggest challenge you have faced during your apprenticeship?

Coming at it as a complete newbie. I had never worked in a professional role so it was a real change of pace from working in a pub.

What is your plan when the apprenticeship finishes?

I finish at the beginning of April and last August, I was successful in my application for a new permanent role, which means I can stay on past April, my salary will go up and I will be a contracted employee of Haymarket.

What would be in your Room 101?

Love Island

What magazine would be your long train journey read?
​​​​​​​
Car & Accessory Trader and VolksWorld.

What was it that made you want to work in the publishing industry?

I used to read magazines voraciously, like Just Seventeen and Smash Hits and dream of London, popstars and fashion which didn’t exist in Newcastle where I lived. I thought that if I worked in magazines, it would get me out of the North and I would be hanging out with popstars all day. I always did journalist type work, like at the Newcastle Evening Chronicle and at BBC Look North. At university I worked on the student supplement, so I worked hard at the start to get into that industry.

Chart your career from the start to where you are now.

I was travelling in LA during university and helped out a journalist with some quotes. She worked for a magazine called TV Hits, which was in Australia and London at the time, so when I got back to London, I got in touch with them, and ended up working on Inside Soap. I was keen and did everything they wanted me to do, so when I graduated, they immediately put me on the payroll as editorial assistant. I worked my way up to features editor. I then went to Australia to launch a monthly TV magazine but it didn’t really work and lasted about a year. I went back to LA to be the Bureau Chief for TV Hits, so I did all the Hollywood press junkets, and after that, went back to London to B magazine where I was Deputy Editor, then I moved to Company. That closed about four years ago and I moved to Good Housekeeping to help with their digital presence. Hearst then started to started to work with Asda and that’s when we set up the Hearst Content Agency.

Can you describe what the Hearst Content Agency does?

We produce content for brands other than our own brands. We draw from all the talent from our brands like Elle and Cosmopolitan, but the content that we produce sits on well-known brands owned platforms. For example, Asda have an in-store magazine, a website which we feed daily and we run their social channels.

Do you have separate editorial teams for every brand?

A bit of both. Asda have a very separate team because it is massive – the magazine has a circulation of 2 million. We have a central Hearst Content Agency editorial team which works across the different brands. Brands are really hungry for content and so they have us and other agencies creating it for them.

Can you envision any revenue streams that have not yet been tapped into by publishers?

Publishers are very good at understanding audiences and how their lives work and what we can do to enrich their lives. So that can lead to so many things. Could Mens Health open a chain of gyms for example? You also have the power of the brand behind everything which provides reassurance. If Esquire thinks something is cool, then it probably is. People are nervous about big value purchases so the idea that someone from an established brand has endorsed it, then it gives you extra reassurance.

What main prediction would you make for UK magazine media in the next decade?

I hope there is a place for magazines for evermore. What is going to become crucial is edited and targeted choice. General all-purpose media is a bit old fashioned. Most people expect bespoke content. The media in general will become increasingly niche, bespoke and targeted to the individual rather than being a mass offering.

What has been the highlight of your career so far?

When I see people in the building that I have employed as an intern and they have worked their way up. Working in magazines in general has been an ongoing highlight and of course the showbiz stuff.

What would people be surprised to know about your job?

How much free reign we get to advise and guide clients. People assume that brands tell you what to do and you just do that. The world of commercial content is incredibly creative and expansive and big budgets from big brands give us the freedom to do a lot!

What would be in your Room 101?

Crocs and socks and ambiguous toilet signs.

What would be your long train journey read?

ELLE Decoration or House Beautiful.

Anthem wants to help people lead happier, healthier lives through their food, wellbeing and music brands, and this new website design and branding aim to reflect those goals.

The new site brings Anthem’s key brands to life, as well as featuring information about partnerships, events, and company news. It also presents the company’s stated mission to create 10 million meaningful connections with its audiences every month by 2022, and to grow revenue by at least 10% every year.

This website redesign is just one of a number that Anthem is undertaking, as they progressively update each brand website as well. The process began with the new Vegan Food & Living and Women’s Running websites in late 2019, with more brands to follow this year.

CEO Jon Bickley said: “Our new site makes clear the goals we’re aiming for, as well as highlighting the qualities of each of our unique brands. We’re pleased that, 12 months into the company’s refocus, the new Anthem branding and logo help make clear our position as a key player in the active wellbeing media.”

www.anthem.co.uk

What made you want to work in the publishing industry?

It was a happy accident. I set my sights on PR and marketing and I did that at ASOS for two years and I came to realise that I wanted to be on the other side of the industry and be a journalist. It made more sense because I loved writing.

Chart your career from the start to where you are now.

I stayed at ASOS for five years. Two in the PR department and then three in their editorial department. It was a really interesting time because they were pretty much the first retailer to pioneer this editorialization of retail and content. I launched their ASOS Today Blog, which was daily shopping news and celebrity gossip. Then I went to Stylist where I was their first Digital Editor for a year. I went travelling for six months and went freelance, working for titles like the Mirror and MSN. I moved abroad and lived in Portugal, continuing to freelance for titles back in the UK and that is when I started to work for TI Media. I came in on a maternity contract and they’ve just kept me on. I moved through a number of titles and was the Digital Content Director where I looked after eight different digital brands. I started working on The Caribou in the summer as editor.

What has been the highlight of your career so far?

There has been plenty that I am proud of, like launching The Caribou and Homes&Gardens.com. But the role that I have got the most out of was when I was in Portugal I was editor of a small local community magazine called Tomorrow magazine. The edition I was editor of had a circulation of 5,000 copies a month which looked at local news, events, health, business, food and drink. The brilliant thing about working on it was that I was living amongst the audience, talking to them and I got to see how much the magazine meant to them and how much they engaged with it.

How did you identify that The Caribou audience would be an ABC1 40+ female audience ?

We have an audience insight team who have done a lot of research around the travel market. They have also done a lot of research around the existing audience we have at TI Media across the various different brands within the business. The heart of The Caribou is powered by our heritage brands. It pulls in travel content across our travel portfolio, from Woman&Home, Marie Claire and other specialist brands like Cycling Weekly and Golf Monthly. The key to The Caribou is around passion point travel.

What has been the most challenging thing about building The Caribou brand?

The first thing that people have asked is, why The Caribou? What does the name mean? So it has been an education for us around why we called it that. The thinking behind that was because a caribou is a north American migrating reindeer that travels thousands of kilometres every year, much like our audience. So, it has been important for us to figure out exactly what The Caribou is and who it is for. But really, now is when the real hard work starts.

Do you have lots of press trips planned for The Caribou?

That is the question that people always ask. There will be travelling involved because we think it’s important that as a business, everything we do is authoritative and effective. We have to make sure that the travel content is written based on someone having experienced the place.

What does a typical day involve at The Caribou?

The first thing I do every morning is check the stats from the day before. One of the reasons I love working with digital content is that we have so much data available. It’s so useful to help understand who your reader is, what has performed well on social and what has performed well on the website. On the back of that you may have to jump onto something quickly. Because it’s a new brand, it feels like a start-up mentality and that we could be doing anything at any point.

How do you handle your deadlines?

I find it useful to break tasks down into smaller chunks, which gives you the ability to tick things off. When I am really stressed, I block my day out and allocate times for different projects. Working in digital content, it is so fast paced, and things change all the time so it’s a lot to juggle. Asking my senior for help prioritising is also important.

What would people be surprised to know about your job?

How much time I spend looking at data, graphs and google analytics. Data is power in this side of the industry.

What is the last photo on your phone?

A picture I took last night of my passport because I need to check-in for my flight to Amsterdam. I won’t send you that because I’m not sure I want my identity stolen!

What would be in your Room 101?

Misogynistic pick-up artists. I read a great piece from the Evening Standard magazine about the industry, which was jaw-dropping.

Whose phone number do you wish you had?

An American singer songwriter called Jewel. I grew up listening to her music. Recently she released a book which talks about her personal life and struggles that she faced, and it included so many life truths. I would like her on my speed dial as a personal therapist.

Introvert or Extrovert?

Ambivert

Optimist or Pessimist?

I am training myself to be more of an optimist.

Film or TV?

Film and preferably watched on the big screen in the cinema.

What magazine would be your long train journey read?

Evening Standard Magazine and there are a couple of well being magazines which I really like. One is called Flow magazine and the other is called Breathe.

Visit The Caribou website here: https://www.thecaribou.com/

Specialist creative customer experience agency, Bopgun, has partnered with Anthem to help support their ambition to drive the digital side of the business forwards.

Vegan Food & Living shares UK vegan news and product releases to their audience. Whilst the magazine is very much led by food and recipes, the website is more of an online hub for news, product releases and all aspects of vegan living. After research into user journey and experience, it was established that the existing site was busy and confusing for customers. As 80% of website traffic also comes from mobile, it was vital that this new site took a mobile-first approach to the development process.

The core aim of the new site is to make it easy for customers to access information and functions relevant to them whilst being informative, distinctive and on the cutting edge of digital innovation. This is just the first stage in Anthem’s digital development journey – over the next 18 months, the plan is to relaunch all of Anthem Publishing’s brand websites.

Commercial Director of Bopgun Design, David Mathews, said: “Our key aim for the new Vegan Food & Living website was to enhance the experience of the user, focusing on how we could not only increase dwell time but encourage them to navigate to other areas of the site. The site is jam packed full of news, advice and recipes and we’ve loved the challenge of being able to let the content visually breathe. A restructure of the site was central to making this happen whilst also building a robust and easy to use bespoke content management system for the whole team to use. We are looking forward to seeing the results and applying the same thinking to other Anthem brands.”

Vegan Food & Living’s Publisher, Sally FitzGerald, added: “Veganism is such a thriving sector at the moment with so many exciting new products being launched every day and we knew the existing site just wasn’t doing our content justice. Now the mobile experience in particular is so much more intuitive, we hope that users will continue to come back to us every day for their vegan news fix and find all the other great food and lifestyle content we have on the site too.”

The new site is now live at www.veganfoodandliving.com

Over the space of two months, 50 experienced Women’s Running product testers have tried out over 1,500 products across 34 categories. Ranging from shoes to vegetarian nutrition, each product is tested in four categories – value for money, fit for purpose, practicality, and quality – and marked out of ten. Three awards will then be given for each category: Winner, Best Value, and Editor’s Choice.

The Women’s Running Product Awards have helped to position the magazine at the centre of the running industry and guarantee readers a safe purchase.

Editor of Women’s Running, Esther Newman, said: “With so much choice in the running market, we’re proud to take the lottery out of choosing new kit, and deliver a valuable service to our passionate tribe of runners to help them have the best running experience possible.”

The full results of the Women’s Running Product Awards will be announced on 28th November at womensrunning.co.uk and in the December issue of Women’s Running.