yet another unique social media sphere with its own audiences and features.
Magazines can develop yet another substantial set of readers and customers using Instagram. For example, in September of 2012, the top five Instagram magazines (based on follower counts) were Teen Vogue (279,236), National Geographic (242,533), Nylon (190,298),Time (155,286), andSeventeen (153,186), according to MinOnline. It’s telling that of the women’s titles in the top 20, the top two are teen magazines; People and InStyle at the tenth and eleventh spots respectively, with Vogue, Marie Claire, and Entertainment Weekly coming in 17 through 20.
In just five months, Teen Vogue added 100,423 followers (between September 2012 and February 2013). What is Teen Vogue is doing so well?
Aside from posting pictures of eye-
candy accessories, the Teen Vogue site is very personality focused. Scrolling through Teen Vogue’s Instagram site is like leafing through the latest issue of Entertainment Weekly. Behind-the-scenes snaps, red carpet pics, and Fashion Week glimpses, coupled with the use of hashtags, add up to thousands of likes per picture.
Another leader in the Instagram-sphere is
Sports Illustrated, which had 67,376 followers at the time of MinOnline’s data collection. In the five months since, the sports title’s follower count has almost doubled to an impressive 122,944. Sports, like fashion, is an inherently visual topic, which is why SI’s
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“Great pictures, with inti- mate access to the MLB, shared with Instagram.”
TERRY MCDONELL TIME INC SPORTS GROUP EDITOR
strategy seems so similar to Teen Vogue’s – behind-the-scenes photos, action shots, and award shots (with a healthy dose of skimpy bikinis and model content on the side) .
The magazine is also incorporating
Instagrammed photos in its print edition, in the weekly Leading Off section. Dynamic photo content is also loaded into the magazine’s tablet edition. Prior to the July 2012 debut of Instagram in the print version of SI, Terry McDonell, editor of the Time Inc Sports Group, told Mashable that the print edition’s use of Instagram was the result of the service’s effect on media content and reporting. “This week’s Leading Off reflects the ‘socialisation’ of photojournalism,” McDonell told Mashable in an email. “Great pictures, with intimate access to the MLB, shared with Instagram.”
MinOnline also found other somewhat surprising titles doing well with Instagram, including hip titles like Nylon and Interview as well as a large number of extreme sports titles and, perhaps the most unlikely,High Times. As MinOline put it, “They are here ready to party.”
Indeed. And magazine publishers would be wise not to miss this party.