Forbes goes high-tech with sales presentations - Forbes magazine

Folio: The Magazine for Magazine Management, May 15, 1993 by Lorraine Calvacca

Forbes is giving its clients the big marketing picture on the small screen. The magazine's sales force recently began using CD-I--a compact-disc based interactive multimedia technology--as a sales tool, according to Forbes ad director, Irwin Kornfeld. It's "a fun way to let our customers know that we have their marketing solutions" somewhere among the magazine's nine complex programs.

"If you're selling standard programs that can be easily understood, or ad pages, you probably don't need something like this," acknowledges Kornfeld. "But it can make a complex thing simple."

One of the medium's major strengths over other electronic sales pitches--such as laptop-computer-based slide presentations--is its ability to intersperse video clips with still pictures, according to William Dolan, director of Blairstown, New Jersey-based Murray Multimedia, who custom-designed the 74-minute disc for Forbes. That feature, he notes, allows the prospective client or agency to hear expert opinion and testimonials about the magazine.

Tom Benelli, an associate media director at Wunderman Cato Johnson, a New York ad agency, agrees: "The major benefit is having actual testimonials |from other clients~ on video. It's very effective. Other than that, I'm not sure what was presented that could not have been handled in a flip chart."

Forbes' Kornfeld also cites CD-I's user-friendliness, its high-resolution images, its non-linearity, and the ability to show--not only to tell. For example, Forbes' golf tournament is a lot more appealing if you can see the course where sponsorship materials will be displayed, instead of just hearing about it, he notes.

Murray Multimedia's own presentation on the benefits of CD-I boasts that no computer skills are necessary to operate the players, and that the compact discs--which hold up to one hour's worth of interactive presentation materials--costs only about $1 apiece.

The technology, however, requires a considerable financial investment. Dolan says a good starting budget for creating a pitch on disc is about $50,000, and could range as high as $150,000, depending on how much existing art is available, the complexity in terms of the number of "paths" created, as well as the need for music and voiceovers. Kornfeld says the whole package--including the Sony CD-I player, which retails for about $1,800--costs the company $40,000 to $50,000. For now, the 10 players they have purchased are shared among the ad sales staff.

High-tech lead

At the moment, Forbes is ahead of its rivals in its use of CD-I. Time Inc.'s Fortune is currently using flip charts, "across-the-desk" brochures and sometimes Apple Powerbook presentations, says Leslie Ross Gaines, director of marketing. Her feeling about CD-I technology? "It depends on the match you're presenting it to," she says. "It might make sense if you are selling to a computer client, but all the wizardry doesn't replace a well-researched, well-done presentation. The CD-I may be good to say who you are, but it may not address who the client is."

The major sales tool at McGraw-Hill's Business Week is a recently redesigned, pocket-size media kit, according to promotion director Holly Romero. "It's more effective to ask what a client's needs are and to come back with a tailored package than it is to go in with a laundry list," she says. Instead, Business Week is currently exploring the use of CD-ROM as an editorial enhancement. "It's much more exciting to look at technology as a way to invent editorial products, rather than sales tools," Romero adds.