Despite the disheartening news this week of Nielsen's plans to shutter the 108-year-old newspaper industry trade bible Editor & Publisher, the news on the b-to-b publishing front may be slightly less bleak than it's been the past two years.
In 2009 (so far, at least), 120 trade publications have been closed down. Many are continuing in digital form, and others have been merged into other related books. Out of literally thousands of business trade titles, 120 may not seem disastrous, unless you happen to have been working at one of those titles.
What is perhaps a bit encouraging in these numbers is that they may represent a slowdown in the downward trend. According to Crain's b to b, about 140 trade mags closed in 2007 and 120 shut down a year ago.
Some publishers have been wisely, I think, using their trade titles in print and/or online as a lead into the often profitable businesses of trade expos, trade seminars and online webinars. The publication can provide both a potential audience and needed credibility. In some cases, the back end of the expos and seminars may end up as the real moneymaker that helps keep the publication -- in print or online -- going.
And then I read this morning in Bulldog Reporter's Daily Dog that Editor & Publisher may yet have a bit of life in it. Here's their story...
| Daily 'Dog - December 17, 2009 Hope Remains for Editor & Publisher: Although Nielsen Media Pulled the Plug Last Week, Mag's Readers and Advertisers Demand January Issue |
| Nielsen Business Media shuttered Editor & Publisher last
week, and sold off eight other titles, but due to overwhelming reader and advertiser demand, E&P gets
an issue's worth of life support as the title will indeed publish a January issue — and offers
hope for the hallmark publication's readers and staff that somehow, some way, the magazine
might rise from the dead. That seems unlikely just now, but mag staffers are taking it one
issue at a time.
An outpouring of support for E&P from within and outside the newspaper industry, and from readers and advertisers alike, led to a decision by staffers to go forward with the January issue, and continuing to post stories at E&P Online until Jan. 1 when, under current plans, the end of the line will arrive, Editor & Publisher reports. |
And, despite the gloomy business climate, some people just keep trying, thankfully. About 80 new b-to-b titles launched this year.
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