Can the Celebrity Weeklies Be Saved?

Crisis! Drama! Shocker! These are all words that you would find on the cover of any celebrity weekly.

But, sadly, they all adequately describe the current state of the celebrity weekly category.

While many insiders would point to the recession for the decline in readership, as well as distribution problems and forced price hikes, those are all excuses and lame ones at best.

In fact, these types of magazines should be thriving as most escapist forms of entertainment, like going to the movies, do during tough economic times.

That begs the question what is wrong with the celebrity weekly category?

There are three big reasons why the category is in a crisis and the celebrity weekly bubble has burst.

Reason 1: Too many staffers doing one job function

Walk into any major celebrity weekly and you'll see a staff of 50 or more individuals working in separate departments, including editors, writers, photo editors, creatives and PR executives.

That's the first problem. You have all these individuals doing separate jobs. To survive and prosper creatively, it's time for celebrity weekly magazines to either train their existing staff or hire new staff who can "multi-task."

Instead of having separate departments, magazines should have staffers who can handle all the functions of the magazine - from writing, editing to selecting photos and designing the page - for both the magazine and the Web site. And, yes, the new editors of the future will also handle promoting their content.

Not only will you see an improved editorial product, you'll see a major reduction in fixed costs.

Reason 2: Ignoring the success of celebrity blogs!

Celebrity weeklies are really good at ripping off each other when it comes to layouts and features. But, for some reason, they have felt less compelled to study and imitate the success of blogs.

Most blogs that cover celebrities have succeeded because they have a strong point-of-view. Why don't we see more of that in the celebrity weekly magazines?

It would be nice to see a magazine present the typical voice of a blogger throughout its pages. Or, you can assign various writers to head up individual blog sections that present a point-of-view that stays consistent on a week-to-week basis.

I must point out that a snarky voice is not the way to go. While it has worked for some sites, that tone is not the future. A positive and upbeat approach combined with the writer's "supportive" opinion of the celebrity is a formula for keeping readers coming back to these publications.

Why? The readers love the stars they're reading about and consistently reject content that takes down their idols.

Reason 3: Too much text!

Magazines like In Touch and Us Magazine reinvented the category by introducing a much heavier focus on photos within the pages of their magazines. This approach distinguished In Touch and Us from category leader People Magazine. Readers clearly enjoyed this approach because sales skyrocketed.

The problem? The number of photos used by In Touch and Us Magazine are not enough in 2009. In fact, even those magazines are too text-heavy.

My recommendation to any one of the celebrity weeklies, which includes In Touch, Us, Star, Life & Style and OK!, is to become as photo-driven as humanly possible.

I would go as far as 90 percent photos with 10 percent text.

The text would be used for the big cover story and the captions to accompany the photos throughout the magazine.

Drop any thought of a consistent format. Let the photos of the week tell the story.

A hyper photo-driven magazine could take one of the also ran celebrity weeklies into a new stratosphere when it comes to sales on the newsstand.

Plus, it would clearly differentiate it from the rest of the category, which is a key to success in attracting new readers as well as advertisers.

Most importantly, it would make these magazines a value-add experience to what readers are finding online 24/7.

Bottom Line:

Those that continue to operate like it's 1999 instead of 2009 will eventually be closing their magazines down - blaming everybody but themselves!

The savvy publisher that follows my advice stands to benefit on many fronts. They will have smaller staffs creating more vibrant visual experiences for the readers and ultimately securing more newsstand/subscription readers as well as advertisers.

While some may see this approach as risky, I believe it's a big opportunity to reinvigorate the category. Now, which magazine will go for it?

Comments

[anastasi]

I've been in this business for 9 years, and the best thing has been the paycheck. If it weren't for the paycheck, I'd be preparing my dance routine for the celeb weekly industry's grave.

However, I have to disagree with the suggestions. 1. Knowing some of my editors who can barely type in Word, I cringe at the thought of them tweaking a layout. Considering the high interest the designers and prepress staff have in the content, I doubt that much reporting would be contributed by them. While some staffers can multitask (i.e. taking a paparazzi shot if you happen to see someone in Times Square/contributing a movie review), there is a division of labor for a reason.

2. Yeah, blogs are a heavy competition - it would do the industry well to expand the interactivity of our own websites. But, there are journalistic standards: we do have to factcheck everything and pass all articles by a Legal department. Where a blogger gets to be as snarky as they want to, we have to worry about lawsuits.

3. Not enough text is the problem! We're not getting new readers by having the same stories as the nightly gossip shows and fan blogs. A full interview with an actor about his latest project is far more interesting than who he's dating/photos of his kids/etc.

If we follow your recommendations, we'll be the equivalent of a child's picture book and be superfluous to the blogs.

[Adjuster]

Hope not!

[juoliv]

I hope not. If these magazines went away, it would be great.

These publications do nothing but expolit and oversimplify people's complex life problems, for the amusement of people too weak to deal with their own lives.

[swift goat pet for truth]

Why would anyone want to?

[Milash]

I hope so, I need reading material in my bathroom.

[Canadiannie]

Better question - SHOULD the celebrity weeklies be saved - I vote NOT

[ArcticMky22]

Blimie -

The sales for all weeklies except Peeps (and possibly OK) are down considerably. The reason you see empty racks is because the mags don't print as many copies as they used to. US, Life & Style, In Touch and Star magazine have all missed their rate bases the last 4 or 5 quarters. The rate base is the number of mags they guarantee advertisers they will sell each week. For instance - In early 2008 In Touch's rate base was 1.125MIL. The current rate base, as of April 1, is something like 768,000. That's about a 32% decline - roughly 360,000 issues a week. The Star magazine used to have a rate base of around 1.4MIL. It's currently around 950,000. US magainze was at 1.5MIL and is now back around 1.2MIL per week. Only People, the publicists' BFF, has increased. Their weekly rate base is around 1.8MIL. Plus, they have over 2MIL subscribers. Of the celeb weeklies only Star and US have at least 700,000-800,000 subscribers - and I'm being generous on those numbers. They're getting trounced by People. They more sales they lose, the more People gains.

[emariejon]

And People has a fairly generous amount of text. Doesn't that disprove the theory put forth in the article? The day that People reduces itself to the quality and format of US or In Touch is the day I (finally) cancel my subscription. And I'm a subscriber since 1975.

[MED1025]

Let's hope not. Give the "celebrities" a break.

[Bcasey11]

I love distractions, rot my brain plz

[kps888]

The disappearance of these publications will only enrich society and culture. Good riddance.

[Alvin4NY]

Amen. All they report on anyway is Brad and Angie, and whether or not Jennifer has a boyfriend. Who gives a flying leap? What will all these tabloid hunters (reporters, eh!) do with no outlet? Eat their own arms off?

[sher2x4]

Celebrity Weeklies, are you kidding?

"Get-O-Life, Please."

[blimie]

How much have they declined really. The magazine racks are always empty, and I see people still buying them. They are great escapist entertainment. 50 employees for a national magazine is not excessive and they don't have too much text, the stories are usually pretty short articles. Huffington Post generally has too much text.

[MightyMeno]

Sometimes I enjoy a little trash wallow, but I read them at the doctor's office or while waiting for a haircut. Trashy and free ... can't beat that with a stick!

[Irockcollinwood]

I hope these weeklies go out of business, I don't want anyone to loses their jobs, but these magazines are what's wrong with this country...... I sound old right now.

[KMAz]

No, the magazines aren't what's wrong with this country, they are just symptomatic of what's wrong. And I prefer to think about it as sounding older and wiser.

[NevaforLeadership]

I hope so.

At grocery-store check-out counters I glance at the headlines on the cheap, sordid celebrity magazine covers, and I wonder how on earth we as a society tolerate publications filled with outright lies -- madeup and/or unchecked "journalism."

I wonder how those in charge of these organizations and their editors can live comfortably with themselves.

[springsm]

Oh I most sincerely hope not.

[LittleSanityLeft]

Here here.