Trade Magazines: The Facts

Trade magazines and shows have been the only way manufacturers could advertise their products, but, as a manufacturer, don't you wonder how many people in the industry they really reach and who those people are?

Most "subscribers" (store owners/managers/buyers) are the same for each magazine. Big stores ("A" & "B" accounts) get two or three "magazine" titles sent to their store, and, if there is a buyer and actual decision maker in that store, TSI's Direct Mailer is definitely one of those magazines!

In our estimate, if you combined all the actual mailing lists from the other trade magazines and focused only on the buyers and decision makers that purchase equine products for the purpose resale (removing all the manufacturers, sales reps, organizational people, and duplicate addresses) the "trade magazines" are actually mailed to only around 6,000 stores total, with a maximum of 8 to 10,000 at best. When you consider that there are over 46,000 different businesses in the U.S. that resell products that are sold at the equine markets – and even more that specifically sell some horse related items – you can quickly see that those magazines are missing a whole lot of important and growing business potential for their advertisers and for the industry as a whole, even if you use their own highest estimated numbers.

Just because a store owner, manager, store employee, spouse or other relative glances through or reads a magazine, which would increase a "readership" and "audience" count, it doesn't mean additional magazines are being sent to that one store or that a manufacturer would necessarily increase their chance to sell their product to that store – or even that it reaches the buyers' hands! Having a popular magazine is important to this industry, even if more are distributed at trade shows than are actually mailed to store addresses. Understanding the semantics of numbers most of the publishers in the equine business use and realizing that "hits" are totally different from "unique impressions" and that "readership" or "audience" is most definitely different from the number of magazines is actually being mailed out is vital to both where your money is being spent and what your potential return is. Understand that people often play with numbers and wording to make things appear or look better than they really are. That's both normal and human nature.

However, TSI's distribution numbers are exactly what is actually mailed out, and what we pay postage for. The TSI Direct Mailer is by manufacturers for manufacturers, to reach the maximum number of actual buyers and decision makers at the highest number of different store addresses for the least amount of money possible. Just because Tennessee Farmers Co-op has 128 different stores doesn't mean we ship out 128 (or more) to them. On the contrary, we ship just to the 2 corporate buyers and to the 18 store managers that make direct buying decisions for equine products outside of the corporate buyers. So, our 20 actual magazines shipped to Tennessee Farmers Co-op cover that 128 store chain. It’s the same with Tractor Supply. We ship to the 6 buyers, not the 500+ stores that rely on Corporate for their plan-o-grams and stocking decisions. It's our money, and we try to use it as wisely as possible, to get the biggest bang for the buck! That's the reason TSI is still going strong after 3 years and our 10th publication (remember, we only print and mail three key times a year).

Lack of information, playing with words, or failing to break out of where a magazine is actually being mailed is no excuse. Phrases like "total readership reached" and "reaches a total audience of" can mean many different things and are frankly unclear and definitely misleading.

The evasive and indirect words some magazines are using in the publishing business reminds me of a trade show organizer a few years ago who stated that they'd sold 650 booths, which represented nearly 1,500 different lines, to help promote their upcoming show … yet, in reality, had only 100 actual contracts (exhibitors) at their show. In my humble opinion, the most important information is the number of different exhibitors that are at a show, not the number of booths. The latter grossly inflates the count because some companies have huge 60'x100' booths (60 single booths combined into one), and each of those 60 booths is being counted individually even though it's just one big exhibitor occupying them all. The same goes for the huge product line numbers since one sales rep could easily represent 10 to 50 lines or even more It's normal for some people to inflate their numbers and use a play on words to help justify or insinuate better numbers (higher or lower, according to their goal) while trying to maintain some element of honesty and integrity. It's most common at tax time, with the IRS. You should take a look at the things people write off, back date and use to understate their income. That's all normal, but with industry professionals, like magazines, organizations, and industry wide news and services, I think a higher standard in communication, ethics, and integrity that is clearer and less confusing needs to be established and maintained.

Other trade magazines DO NOT reach a major chunk of the industry's buyers and decision makers. Now, we're not saying that trade magazines are useless. Far from it. This is just to educate you on the facts about advertising in trade magazines, to show you who your advertising is and is not being seen by. The magazines have a business to run, mouths to feed, expenses to pay, and shows to go to, as well as the need to promote their magazine to future advertisers, and to show they are trying to reach new buyers (at least those that go to the shows, as well as the few they are actually mailed to). It's expensive to operate a magazine. It costs money to pay writers, editors, sales staff, secretaries, graphic artists, printers, postage, publishers, utilities and other operating costs, as well as travel, hotels, dining and entertainment expenses. The more people, the higher the costs. These costs MUST be passed down somewhere, MUST be absorbed somehow. The only way is through selling their product: the advertising. It's simple business. But, it also means that big pieces of your advertising dollars are being spent supporting other in their business rather than the people in your own business! Think about that for a moment.

That's NOT the case with TackStoreInfo.com's mailer. It's run by manufacturers, for manufacturers, people who already go to key shows and already spend money contacting the stores and buyers. Their goal isn't to profit from the advertisers, but to profit from the greater branding and sales of their own products sold because of the mailer. By networking with TSI, your company has an opportunity to save money and reach more buyers and to be treated as we want to be treated: fairly, economically, and with respect. Even if you disagree with our views, we can still help save you money and reach more people!

Our Fall 2007 Mailer (shipped early July 2007, approximately 1 month before the start of the Fall wholesale trade show season), was actually mailed to (and postage paid for) a total of 20,765 different people. The breakdown comprised 19,094 tack shops, feed stores, and equine product retailers in the lower 48 states and Washington DC, both Western & English. This includes all store/retailer types that normally attend one of the wholesale markets and stores that receive multiple copies of popular regional equine magazines for redistribution (to end-user customers that shop in their business). Our list also includes Western & English clothing stores, lifestyle stores and gift shops that resell equine related products. PLUS, we direct mail to 1,260 fellow manufacturers (some of which carry other lines or distribute other companies' products), 356 veterinarian offices (that have a retail area in their lobby), 41 farriers (that carry products for resale to their customers), and 14 catalogers for a grand total of 20,765. Only 477 mailers were being shipped to multiple buyers at the same address. Our numbers are updated with each mailing, our addresses updated throughout the month.

If TSI used the wording and math some of the trade magazines do, the breakout for TSI would look something like this: "Based on our own surveys, demographics, and feedback, an estimated 2.31 people per mailed location looked at (read) the received mailers, including business owners, managers, employees, spouses, etc. and potentially other manufacturers, sales reps, and industry people (show organizers and organization leaders). Multiply that audience ratio with the real number of printed high quality mailers we mailed out, and the resulting number is that TackStoreInfo.com's "total audience" of 47,967 is actively in our "readership"! By the way, our master database has over 36,000 different equine products related resellers, yet we choose to only ship to the nearly 21,000 retail buyers and decision makers that actually make purchasing decisions.

If you advertise in any trade magazine (or mailer), track your return, your response, your sell-through! How many calls did you get? How many people looked at your Web site because of your ad in a certain magazine? How do you know that a given magazine, a given advertisement, a certain effort you are spending your time or money on is at least breaking even or helping you make money? Have you considered the cost for each sale? What is a new account even worth to you? Net sales related to an ad in a particular magazine (and you should have a method of tracking it or you are potentially wasting your money) minus the ad development and deployment cost, is a pretty simple formula, though it might take you time to figure out the actual numbers. Are you getting the biggest bang for your bucks?

The average manufacturer participating with TSI picks up 5 to 50 new accounts with each mailer. If your average sale is even $500, then a reasonable return expectation is $2,500 to $25,000 in immediate gross sales, with only a $500 minimum order size. Now, calculate what reorders a new account you actively maintain, train, and work with will bring you throughout the year, and most businesses agree that $1 to $3k is reasonable (per wholesale account value) with the occasional $10 to $50k value from the larger volume accounts. Even at the lowest estimate, $1,000 yearly value, it correlates into a gross return of $5,000 to $50,000 extra (from new accounts) that you might not otherwise have known about, met, or picked up – for an investment of less than $2,000! Tell me how the math doesn't work in your favor if your ad is able to attract even the average minimum interest the majority of our manufacturer participants have reported (and we've personally seen for our own businesses)!

If more manufacturers joined TSI, not only would they save money reaching more buyers, increase their branding, pick up new accounts, and help drive buyers back to the trade shows, they could also help unite both buyers and manufacturers for a positive change in a wonderful industry that's struggling to grow … and, in some areas, even to survive!

Sincerely,

Terry Mercer
tsi@helpus.com
865-384-8556