There is a very significant narrowing of publishing and lead generation that has been happening for years and now, because of tablet computers, is picking up more steam and is nearing a critical mass.
Historically, big magazine publishers produced one magazine via one medium with many advertisers. Now, those publishers are publishing in a variety of mediums and competing with more and more opportunities for advertising from all over.
The fragmentation of people’s attention has fueled Inbound Marketing, which is when a company produces an informational site and they publish educational, interesting things on the site and they are typically the sole “advertiser” or “sponsor” of the site. Through this strategy even very small businesses are becoming more like publishers in their own right.
While many organizations already have their own email newsletter, blog and probably multiple websites, the day is coming very soon where businesses will begin to operate like a magazine publisher and really put 100% effort behind attracting, educating and entertaining their perfect prospects.
Where a business can be the most successful is when they actually hire a publishing management company like Outstanda to create a complete publishing strategy and run the effort just like a magazine would run the effort. In fact, the only difference between a magazine and this publishing strategy for a business with products is that a magazine needs to spend time selling ad space and keeping a diverse set to advertisers happy. A company sponsored magazine on the other hand will focus on adding value and building and audience while only needing to keep one advertiser happy.
A few years ago this model would not have worked because of the costs associated with publishing. Now, with the web, mobile and tablets anyone can launch a magazine. Even if you want to do print it is possible with small quantity print on demand.
Keep in mind that a small group of businesses with a similar market but non competing products and services can also share these kinds of costs. It is not dirt cheap, but it is an amazing asset that will generate value and become a wonderful asset for any business.
