company is also taking a page out of the editorial playbook by curating its cont e nts, “providing editorial reviews and suggested items” to its users.
In the Netherlands, the tijdschrift.nl iPad app gives readers the opportunity to choose from a wide selection of high-class Dutch magazines and to easily read and buy them on their iPad. “The application has been downloaded more than 170,000 times since its launch in September of 2011,” said Justus Fokker of tijdschrift owner SanomaMedia.
“More than 145,000 issues of magazines
have been sold to users of the kiosk. It has never left the top 10 of apps with the most revenue in the App Store and most of the time it has had a top five position,” said Fokker. “The number of frequent users is steadily growing. The sales have progressed from 1,700 magazines per week to roughly 3,500 magazines per week with peaks of 5,000. Thirty Dutch publishers have made their magazines available within the app.”
Time Inc, famously an opponent of all
things App Store, appears to be coming around. In June 2012, the publisher of People, Sports Illustrated, and Entertainment Weekly to name a few, struck a deal allowing Newsstand readers access to 20 of its titles.
Hearst, too, is finding success on Apple’s
Newsstand, announcing in January 2013 that it had 800,000 digital subscribers, 80 per cent of whom were new to Hearst. Hearst was so happy with the relationship that it partnered with Apple
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to be the first publisher featured in the Newsstand’s new area called Read Them Here First, launched on 17 January 2013. The new section of the Newsstand offers Hearst’s entire catalogue to subscribers days before the magazines appear in print or even on other digital platforms.
Condé Nast’s experience on
Apple’s Newsstand has also been a boon for that company, leading to a 268 per cent jump in digital subscriptions, according to AppleInsider.
There is no doubt about the power
of Apple’s Newsstand. It “has seen an impressive revenue growth of 407 per cent since it launched,” wrote Technode’s Jason Lim in September 2012.
With a variety of options available,
should publishers continue to use Apple’s Newsstand? The answer, as with many things, will vary from title to title. Apple’s steep 30 per cent cut and stringent conditions had many companies considering other options from the start.
Where does this leave publishers?
Over the past few years, the industry has learned that single-issue apps do not work – as Time Inc and NewsCorp can both testify. But the proliferation of newsstand apps and stand-alone, multiple-issue apps suggests that there are options outside of the Apple-centric ecosystem.