The debate may be new to the school marketing world but not so in the world of Business to Business or consumer magazines. Think of most any big UK brand and you will find that they are now producing a digital magazine. Think British Airways, BT, Tesco’s, Waitrose, M&S, Virgin, Cadbury’s, Boden to name a few. And then of course the traditional magazines themselves are creating a digital magazine, think Homes & Garden, Marketing Week, even “Dairy Farmer” has a digital edition! So just why has the digital magazine arrived and why is it becoming so popular? Firstly, faster internet speeds are now the norm at home and in the office making so many more things possible. We, as a society now spend more time on the internet than reading magazines or watching TV. Secondly the birth of eReaders such as Amazon’s Kindle and the iPad make reading on the move a light weight, slip in my handbag / briefcase, must have. And while you may be in the “I prefer reading printed versions of books etc” camp, many people find reading on screen far easier as they can make the text any size they want.
So what are Digital Magazines – after all they’re not websites and they’re not print. Is it a lazy way to get online without investing in a really good website? You may have been led to think so by the proliferation of PDF / Flash whatever replicas of print where you take your Prospectus and simply turn it into a page turning edition. Some simply convert their Prospectus into a PDF file, which loads at a snail’s pace, even on the fastest computers. Others convert their printed Prospectus into page turning online magazines using Flash based software – simple and low cost and many schools have them. However many of these printed online replica’s are clunky to use, slow to load and have type so small that you have to constantly zoom in and out. Not to mention the photograph quality is often blurry. So the PDF or simple Page turning printed equivalents have major shortcomings – although on the upside they are still environmentally friendly and lower on cost than printed Prospectuses.
So what’s a REAL Digital Magazine you ask yourself? Well firstly they are formatted to easily be read on a computer screen, secondly the good digital magazines – not all – offer outstanding visual quality and thirdly they make clever use of interactivity within the content to bring your school to life with video, audio and animation. The best digital magazines for readers are the ones created as digital magazines specifically rather than taking the printed prospectus and converting it into a page turning magazine. The Prospectuses created as true digital Prospectuses also offer clickable tables of contents, clickable links such as “Contact the Registrar” and forward to a friend and reader statistics which no printed Prospectus, PDF or simple page turning printed Prospectus replica can ever achieve.
So now you know the difference in digital magazines and PDF and page turning printed Prospectuses. But why have an online Prospectus or School Magazine when you have a website? Well, the two have different functions. The website is designed to be highly navigable and offer information in brief, easily digestible pieces. Some school websites boost of having over 500 pages for the viewer to look at and you have no control in what order the Prospective viewer sees the information. For example, they may decide to go from the home page to the admissions page to the junior school news page to the fees page in 3 jumps. They may miss the page that lists your best features. So web sites are fantastic information repositories for parents, prospective families, alumni and the school community where all the info, the small print, the bullying policies and the news about the school are held. But your Prospective Families don’t always want infinite and constantly changing, and they don’t always have the time or desire to explore your 500 pages. The digital Prospectus however takes your readers by the hand and takes them through the best features and benefits at your school in a linear fashion in exactly the way you want them to see your school. So readers enjoy the same, familiar experience as thumbing through a print magazine, dwelling over stories, following the flow of the magazine’s layout and looking at quality pictures. Except the digital Magazine can be viewed immediately by Mum and then forwarded on to Dad in the office at the click of a mouse. continue reading…
