Digital magazines mirror print

Warc, 16 August 2013

LONDON: Magazine readers consume content in digital and print forms in much the same way and with much the same dwell times, research from publisher Condé Nast has said.

A study of 6,965 subscribers to Vogue, GQ, Wired, Vanity Fair and Glamour – all Condé Nast titles – included those who read them in print or digital forms or both.

A further similarity between print and digital emerged in the finding that both tended to be read from front to back, with the different formats not affecting how readers approached the titles.

"This research debunks for all time the assumption that people read print and digital magazines in different ways, and for different periods of time," declared Nicholas Coleridge, president of Condé Nast International and managing director of Condé Nast Britain.

He told Campaign that the research was "of intense importance to clients and media commentators alike", adding: "The ABC has been particularly keen to see third party verified data on this subject and scale, and now we have it. End of argument. We can move on."

The detail of the research revealed that print readers of Vogue typically spent 122 minutes on the magazine, compared to 116 minutes for digital readers. But those who embraced both print and digital spent the longest, at 162 minutes.

Comparable figures for GQ were 131 minutes for print, 110 minutes for digital and 176 minutes for combined print and digital.

Wired attracted 137 minutes for print, 142 minutes for digital and 158 minutes for both.

Vanity Fair registered 169 minutes for the print version, compared to 154 minutes for the digital and 188 minutes for both.

For Glamour, the equivalent figures were 117 minutes (print), 104 minutes (digital) and 141 minutes (both).

Previous research from Condé Nast, in the form of The Vogue Business Report, found that 93% of readers of women's monthly magazines engaged with print ads, while 64% felt that such ads were a trusted paid touchpoint in their decision-making process when considering fashion and beauty purchases.

Data sourced from Campaign; additional content by Warc staff