Magazine Covers Battle It Out For Top Spot

Gideon Keith, Creative Director of Seven Ltd, explained the difficulty in judging the covers, “If you have a look at the magazine shelves, there are a lot of titles out there, so a cover has to speak to the right audience. I suppose that’s the hardest thing about judging, it’s not being subjective, it’s putting yourself in the audience’s shoes, and making sure you are looking at it from the perspective of the target audience, or target market.”
Lindsey Dawson, creator of three major women’s titles in New Zealand More, Grace & Next and winner of the MPA Lifetime Achievement Award 2009, on the importance of a good cover, said “A cover is utterly critical; as an Editor, you know very quickly when the numbers start coming back from the distributors whether a cover has done the trick or not. It’s just some magical formula. Some covers that you’ve been a bit dubious about, have come back being wonderful, and others that you’ve had total confidence in can be dogs and sometimes you just never know what it was, despite everyone’s theories.”
Debra Millar, former Group Publisher of ACP Magazines, agrees, “The difference between a good cover and a not so good cover can be probably as much as about 20% in circulation, so thought and care that goes into a cover will be returned in terms of sales. Unfortunately it is sometimes the cover that is the last thing in the process of putting together a magazine, so it can end up being rushed. It really should be what every editor thinks about first, as it really can be what sells their magazine.” Sharon Grace, a book and magazine designer, said “The image is the first impact, it’s got to be a good image; sharp, good focal point, with good composition and typography.

A combination of these is very important.” Peter Fenton, Chief Executive Postal Services of New Zealand Post, said “I’m really impressed by the overall standard. One of the business magazines, Co., really caught my eye, it’s the image of Paul Reynolds, calling him The Boss. It made me want to pick up the magazine and look at what’s inside, so that for me was my personal favourite.”

The public will be incentivised to vote for their favourite magazine cover with a reward of a $5 iSUBSCRiBE gift voucher. The voucher may be redeemed against iSUBSCRiBE’s entire range of over 200 magazine subscriptions. In addition, $1 from every subscription sold using the iSUBSCRiBE gift vouchers will be donated by iSUBSCRiBE to children’s charity, Cure Kids. The short list consists of: Business & Trade Food & Wine Co. (Oct 2009) Healthy Food Guide (Aug 2009) Unlimited (Apr/May 2010) The Foodtown Magazine (Jun/Jul 2009) Unlimited (Jun/Jul 2010) Dish (Aug/Sep 2009) NZ Property Investor (June 2010) Cuisine (Jan 2010) New Zealand Retail (Oct 2009) Cuisine (May 2010) Lifestyle Specialist MINDFOOD (Jan/Feb 2010) NZ Geographic (Jul/Aug 2009) NZ Life & Leisure (Mar/Apr 2010) NetGuide (Jul 2009) M2 Magazine (Mar 2010) M2 Tech (Apr 2010) PILOT Magazine (Dec 2009) NZ Autocar (Dec 2009) OH Baby (Autumn 2010) NZ Lifestyle Block (Jun 2010) Sports Youth & Pop Culture NZ Rugby World (Feb 2010) The Groove Guide (18th Nov 2009) NZ Rugby World (June 2010) Real Groove (May 2010) Curl Magazine (Jan 2010) Pulp (March 2010) Ski & Snow Magazine (Jun 2010) Pulp (June 2010) The Cut (Feb/Mar 2010) Prime Times (Jun 2010)

ENDS.

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