Face-Off: Jealous Eye For The It Guy

Folio: The Magazine for Magazine Management, Sept 1, 2003

If recent Publisher's Information Bureau numbers are any indication, tech adverting hit bottom in July and began a slow creep upward. Three franchise IT weeklies target the elusive mid- to high-level corporate executives responsible for buying technology, be it computers, routers, servers, or software. Over the past three years, these execs haven't done much buying, and ad pages crashed accordingly. The category slipped 10.6 percent from 2002, and while three- and four-book buys used to be the norm, today's tight ad budgets only have room for one book or two - max. Here's the matchup: - Michael Learmonth

Information Week (CMP Media)

Year Founded: 1979

Total circ: 440,000

Ad Pages Jan-July: 1,487.9 (-7%)

Revenue Jan-May: $60,732.20 (-9.8%)

The ad page and revenue leader, Information Week has been the subject of some flattering imitation of late. Both InfoWorld and eWeek have switched from tabloid to glossy in the past year. Information Week's niche is the big-picture feature. This puts it at the top of the list for buyers looking to reach the literate IT guy. "There are two types of readers, those that want long editorial, and those that want news," says OMD associate director of strategy Kevin Arsham. Since there's not a whole lot of news right now, I-Week's editorial has an edge, but since it had the most pages to begin with, it has the most to lose. Nevertheless, I-Week is flooding the zone with vertical spinoffs like Wall Street & Technology. On the competition: "What's happening is the middle-class of players are disappearing. This is an industry that will have leaders and laggards." - Michael Friedenberg, vice president and publisher.

eWeek (Ziff Davis Media)

Year Founded: 1983

Total circ: 400,100

Ad Pages Jan-July: 836.1 (-3.7%)

Ad Rev Jan-May: $44,643.82 (-5.6%)

Following eWeek's conversion from tabloid form in April, Ziff is pouring money into their 20-year-old title (formerly PCWeek), hoping to position it to surge when tech spending comes back. Editorially, eWeek walks the line between features and news, but its major point of differentiation is their ability to test enterprise tech at two labs in Woburn, Mass., and San Francisco. "eWeek does more testing than, say, Information Week would be doing," Arsham says. The conversion from tab to glossy opened up editorial room, and publisher Chris Dobbrow says their edit-to-ad ratio favors edit, heavily. "You've got to surround your ad with a great envelope, and that's editorial," Dobbrow says. On the competition: "We are the news leader for the broader IT community bar none. InfoWorld focuses on tech reviews, but it's in a vacuum; Information Week focuses on case studies, but substance is lacking compared to eWeek." - Chris Dobbrow, publisher

InfoWorld (International Data Group)

Year Founded: 1980

Total circ: 220,060

Ad Pages Jan-July: 922.9 (-10.9%)

Ad Rev Jan-May: $31,165.03 (-34.3%)

Two years ago, InfoWorld took a hard look at the IT market, determined that it had shrunk, and cut circulation almost in half. The result, says CEO Kevin McKean, is the most targeted book with the most stringent qualifying requirements in the industry. It's party line: While other tech publications really want to be business magazines, InfoWorld is staying true to the tech-y mission. Arsham says InfoWorld is the newsy buy of the group. For example, a recent cover story on Steve Jobs isn't a narrative of Apple's business prospects, but answers the fundamental question for IT professionals: Can I trust Apple gear as the backbone of a data center? On the competition: "If you just want to just read what Carly, Michael, or Larry said, you can get that any number of places. But if you want to know the inside of Carly's products or how Michael's match up, the only place you will get that is InfoWorld." - Kevin McKean, CEO

Sources: Ad page counts from Publishers Information Bureau; ad revenue from TNS Media Intelligence/CMR; circulation data provided by the publisher.