Solving the partnership puzzle

Folio: The Magazine for Magazine Management, July 1, 2002

So one of D'Sa's first jobs was to educate the ad sales and marketing staffs about what she was trying to do. "I believe that your ad marketing group and your ad sales staff - they're your people on the street," Stanich says. "If you arm them with the information and get them excited about the possibilities, and give them a quick presentation that they can make to clients - they're out there all the time. They're going to reel in all kinds of ideas."

That's just how one of AmEx's recent partnerships came into being. About half a year ago, Stolichnaya Vodka, one of Food & Wine's advertisers, asked the magazine what kind of additional promotions they could do together. After talking with the title's ad sales team, D'Sa took roughly three months to hammer out a "proof-of-purchase" program for Stoli. From March through July of this year, anyone who buys a bottle of Stoli can get a cut-rate six-month subscription to Food & Wine. To boost visibility, Stoli created and paid for co-branded signs that appeared in participating liquor stores and retail outlets.

Consumers who want to take advantage of the offer send their proof of purchase and sub orders - with payment - directly to D'Sa at AmEx, who in turn puts the orders on file so the issues can be served. One of the best parts of the partnership, D'Sa says, is that there aren't any costs for promotion. Because the partnership continues through the end of this month, D'Sa couldn't discuss results, but she did say that AmEx considers the partnership a success and is planning to work on "proof-of-purchase" deals for other products.

On the surface, the AmEx/Stolichnaya partnership seems like a no-brainer: Food & Wine gets new subs, Stoli gets added value, and the consumer gets a deal on a subscription. So why haven't other partnerships taken off since the audit rules were relaxed?

Circulators point to a number of issues, the most important of which is that partnership marketing is an entirely new way of generating circulation. "I think it's going to have tremendous potential as we all get smarter and figure out how to do things," says Hearst's Wells. "But it's not like you could say, 'I'm going to go into this campaign and pull down 120,000 subs.' That is not going to happen."

One key issue is interdepartmental cooperation. Although circulators and ad-sales staffers are working together more nowadays, the two departments traditionally have not had much interaction. Today, however, the consumer marketing director of a magazine might go on a sales call with a publisher in order to help explain the magazine's circulation to a media buyer. Just as important, though, is the relationship the two departments develop internally in order to identify potential partnering opportunities. "To make partnership marketing work, the first partnership that needs to be truly developed is that between circulation and advertising," says Mandel.

"In the beginning it was tricky, because they didn't really know what I did, and you don't want to step on anyone's toes," D'Sa says. "I'm not here to sell ad space; I'm not here to come up with this fabulous marketing program."