Monday
Aug272012
A Point of View: Magazines vs. Blogs
Monday, August 27, 2012 at 8:39PM 
I wanted to discuss a topic that everyone seems to be interested in. I attended Alt Summit in NYC last week and the location was at Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia. Martha Stewart herself made an appearance at the conference, which of course was life changing. I really enjoyed all the panels and the ideas the panels touched on. The panel with the Martha Stewart Living editors, brought up a topic I'm passionate about: the future of media. When I say the future of media, I mean the whole printed magazines versus blogs discussion. I have many opinions and observations about this topic. While I have no experience in the editorial industry, I do have 12 years experience in the advertising industry, which allows me to have a very different point of view. Plus, I'm a blogger who produces magazine style, original content.
One of the items that was discussed was how are blogs different from magazines.
Magazines have a few things going for them that blogs don't. First, there is nothing like the printed page. I go to my moms house and she has the Martha Stewart Living magazine from 1998 sitting out like she just got it in the mail yesterday. Blogs are very outta sight, outta mind. Yes, we have Google searches and people do pull up older posts, but it doesn't have the same impact.
Second, magazines have budget and talent. How many times have I wanted to pull props for one of our posts? Many a times, but keeping our blog simple with no sponsors, we have no budget for that. I looked at that prop room at Martha Stewart Living and DIED. I would completely change the look of our blog if I had access to all those choices. The improvements would be out of this world. But alas, budget is a restriction. And that leads to the next item, talent. On each photo shoot there is probably an art director, prop stylist, food stylist and photographer. When we do a blog post, it's just the two of us, and for most blogs, it's one person. (I'm very lucky that my husband is a photographer, and I can do the styling.) There have been countless times I have wanted to shoot something more complicated and call in a food stylist or find the time to make the recipe 10 times to get it right, but just don't have the time.
Let's switch gears. Blogs have a lot of things the magazines wish they could figure out. Blogs have personality and passion, the individual vs the company. Blog creative is done by one person or a very small team. That keeps ideas and visuals pure. They are not muddled up by someone working for a company and trying to please their boss. Blogging is not work, it's a passion. In a work environment, this is difficult to recreate, if not next to impossible. As a design director who manages creatives, I often wonder when the ridged 9 to 7 work schedule will be abolished and creatives can come to work when they need to meet with the team. It's experience that creates rich creative, yet they are stuck in an office to 'create'. Seems counter productive to me.
If we do something less than perfect by industry standards on our blog, I know and do it for strategic reasons. It looks real. I think styling in American magazines needs a serious overhaul. It can be very stiff and unrealistic, and I am counting down the days to when a more realistic styling will come into fashion by publishers. There is an art and craft to loose styling, and I personally will always be chasing that butterfly when I style for our blog.
Blogs also have no rules for content. We know our audience reads because they are interested in what we like. As long as we present it with an authentic point of view, it normally goes over well. Magazines have lots of loaded moves when generating content. I'm not speaking for all publications, but there is a reason a make-up product is featured in editorial and the advertisement for that product is on the facing page. (This same issue is even creeping into blogging, where sponsored posts need disclosure.) I often wonder when magazines will change their voice and point of view. Right now we live in a very instant gratification society, but as a consumer I crave more from publications. I don't want a recipe, I want you to show me a technique, then three recipes I can use my new knowledge with. The longer form of a magazine and the printed page make this possible. A blog is the place I would like to visit for a great dinner recipe and why the blogger likes to share that with their family.
As someone who is creative and in the branding and strategic industry, I have my eye on this topic. I want to see American magazines take some risk and set a new bar. In the mean time, I'll be blogging.
Reader Comments (10)
On the food styling side of things, I agree that American styling is too studied and looks all the same. There's the "Martha" look and there's the "Kinfolk" look, etc. I like the European styling although it isn't as much loose as playing with the conventions of food photography. Almost like art.
There was an article in the WSJ this past weekend about how Martha is not doing as well financially and I wonder how much of that is due to blogs superceding her magazine. I have a HUGE soft spot for her and her work - she's an amazing entrepreneur who has created an incredible empire. She's changed how we live and how we think about living.
But that looseness that Kevin Sharkey referred to in the session is certainly something that print media can learn from.
On the blogging side of things, personally, I love the freedom to explore my own expression of my personality in what I write about and how I write it. Not having to cater to advertisers definitely is a plus in this regard.
and of course - great photo.
1. Budget for props & the Martha prop library. The way Martha mag works is quite different from most editorial photo shoots. Most props used in decor and food stories are borrowed from the supplier in exchange for the printed credit in the magazine and then returned promptly (and that last word is key) to the supplier after the shoot. Total loan time is usually a few days. No budget is required. The suppliers agree to this because they see value in the editorial credit. But I don't see why an established blog with solid reader stats couldn't build product loan relationships like that. It's also a great reader service when someone sees a product and then can find out immediately where to go to buy it. To me that's what's frustrating about the Martha Prop Library - readers can't access many of the items featured. It's kind of a bummer, but of course it also means beautiful editorial with often one-of-a-kind accessories to lend character.
2. Personality and Passion. You suggest blogs have these and magazines wish they could figure them out. In reply I give you Margaret, Newell, Anita, Kevin, Martha, Dara, Deborah, Michael...Um, hello, since when are print magazine lacking in Personality? As for the "personalities" of the magazines themselves, I would argue the best have finely crafted editorial voices that lend them personality. Those who craft the voice ARE the personalities who work at the magazines (paging Helen Gurley Brown..oh, wait, nevermind). I can also assure you that those listed and dozens and dozens more people on print mastheads are incredibly passionate about what they do. Print editorial, in fact, is notoriously low-paying except at the very highest levels, and any gig that involves shoots and styling involves long hours and incredibly hard work. Those who aren't passionate about it move elsewhere pretty quickly.
You suggest that passion is next to impossible to create in a work environment. Not true. When a talented team works together with all cylinders firing it is incredibly energizing. I'm glad to report that my experience is that this is more the rule than the exception.
3. Styling. Meh...loose styling, neat styling, minimal styling -- each comes and goes to echo the mood of the moment and the editor-in-chief's personal preferences and pet peeves. All I know is, if I see one more dark and moody food story I might gag, toilet seats all better be down and pillows better not be karate chopped.
4. "Show me a technique + three recipes...the longer form of a magazine"...Demonstrating a technique on a printed page is incredibly expensive. And the static two-dimensional nature of these shots limit their ability to really show technique. This is the exciting opportunity for video clips embedded in iPad editions, which Martha and some others are using. Magazines may seem "long form" until you try to plan an issue and fit the stories you want to do in the number of pages allotted to you to maintain the ad/ed page number ratios...but that's a topic for another time.
Anyhoo, just wanted to stick up for my print peeps a bit. Thanks for your interesting post!
Also, I do believe people at magazines work hard, it is a lot of work to carry out that publication, as bloggers work hard to post frequently on a smaller scale. My husband is a photographer and we have a live work photo studio. I get to see this first hand how much work goes into an editorial photo shoot.
I see you listed major editors from magazines, and I do respect them, and think as individuals they have personality and passion. But they can not write an entire magazine on their own. When you work with a large team, that overarching personality may get diluted. I don't believe every magazine is doing a bad job. In fact, some of them have been on panels at blogging events I attended talking about this very subject (hence figuring it out). I think as good leaders in the industry, they are aware of the changing landscape and moving forward.
One thing blogging has taught everyone, is how important the personal connection is to the consumer. In branding (my background), that is the one thing companies strive to do. Have a brand personality and voice, so they have stronger connection to their consumer. The result is that consumer is loyal, returning time and time again. Magazines are seeing that, and making adjustments to have a stronger connection.
For the passion at work comment, I re-read what I wrote. I probably could have been clearer, as I had two different thoughts. When I mentioned passion, I was referring to blogging. When I was referring to creativity, I was trying to say, I think it is difficult to be creative in a constant office environment, working for 10 hours a day. Experiences heighten creative minds. I hope employers give more freedom to their creative teams, so long as they produce great results.
As for styling, it is a personal preference and I am sure we all have our own.
With this post, I was trying to call attention to what the differences are between magazines and blogging pertaining to the changing landscape. Sorry you felt like you had to stick up for magazines. You must have a lot invested in the industry with 20 years experience. For a while, in the advertising industry everyone was having the print vs digital conversation. As a print designer, I knew what I did would never go away, but it would change. With print and digital, one is not better than the other, but they do serve different purposes and are different mediums. Having conversations like these identifies the differences and what is driving that divide. With magazines having been around for longer, they are doing the changing. The real question is, what will make blogs change? What's next? :)
With that said, whenever I read a magazine I become inspired in a different way. I have a tendency to focus on design blogs, but if I pick up a magazine that might suggest recipes + colors + trends I never considered.
Beautifully written post, thank you!