Are university magazines worth it?
What's your take on university magazines, their impact, and ROI? What about digital vs. print versions and print frequency?
Oooh, I love a magazine. And it makes me sad to see so many institutions discontinuing theirs.
Last year, I asked my pal Matt Jennings to teach me everything he knew about magazines. Matt is the Editor in Chief of the award-winning Middlebury Magazine, so he's the guy to ask.
He shared the coolest framework with me. You’re in for a treat.
A magazine is like a great meal. 🍽️
A great meal has appetizers, main courses, desserts, and palate cleansers. It asks you to sit down and spend time with it. It's something you look forward to, enjoy, and don't rush through.
You can use this analogy to order your content, know what to include, and make decisions about format.
🍢 Appetizers (the beginning). This is where you whet the appetite. Teach the reader something. Think infographics, short Q&As, facts and figures, anything useful. The format is modular and easy to scan.
🍛 Main course (the middle). The meat and potatoes. Feature stories, extended profiles, retrospectives. Long-form narrative or beautiful photo essays. Immersive, and the length is forgiven.
🥮 Dessert (the end). The sweet stuff. Memes, cartoons, games, campus moments. Alumni submissions. Celebrations and wins.
Like a meal, there are days you sit down to eat, and days you eat on the go. This framework lets readers consume the magazine the same way — flipping through the front or back when in a hurry, and making a mental note to sit down with a cup of tea and the full thing. ☕️
Palate cleansers (if you must). I hate ads in university magazines. But if you must include them, place them between sections. Don't sacrifice your appetizer and dessert space.
Stop treating the magazine as a discrete project.
I think one reason universities don’t see the ROI of magazines is because they think of them as discrete publications instead of content ecosystems.
A feature interview with an alum can become:
a long-form magazine story
snippets for social
a web article
a podcast episode
You don’t need to embargo content for the magazine. Alumni will consume it wherever they want. It’s not your job to dictate the channel.
You can set yourself up for two major content cycles a year, resulting in two magazine issues and countless digital touch points in between.
So, print or digital?
100% print. Digital magazines are silly. (Who sits down with a PDF by choice?).
Magazine content should certainly be shared digitally — in formats native to those channels, not some PDF or funky reader thing.
What about ROI?
It’s so hard to measure. What’s the goal of the magazine? What's the ROI on delight? On experience?
You can measure links or QR codes, but that's not the point. You can sell ads, but that’s also not the goal of the magazine.
The magazine is an experience. It's a reprieve from the routine — to learn something, get lost in something, smile at something.
Brand science says that builds affinity. And generational research shows people want paper again.
If it were me, I'd be making a bet on magazines.
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