Research into similar products: Publishing Companies

In order to get a deeper impression of a magazine, looking at the Publishing Company can tell you how well they're doing. For example, Q magazine used to be Published by EMAP (now known as Top Right Group) a British media company specialising in the production of business-to-business magazines, and the organisation of business events and conferences. EMAP publish mainly retail magazines such as 'Drapers' and 'Retail Week' along with other magazines like LGC (government magazine) and engineering magazines such as 'Construction news'. Their portfolio of work certainly doesn't attract me, so I don't blame 'Q' magazine for moving on. Now 'Q' magazine is published by Bauer Media Group; a German media company which manages a portfolio of magazines, digital products, radio and TV stations in local markets across the world.

The fact that 'Q' moved to a more appropriate publishing company and a foreign one proves how they've made a name for themselves and have become a global brand. Bauer also publishes Kerrang! magazine, so is popular with the more well-known music magazines, reinforcing their reliability as publishers. A lot of my favourite magazines come from Bauer, such as 'EMPIRE' magazine. The sort of magazines Bauer publishes appeal to me a lot in terms of their variation and loud yet sophisticated layout. Bauer uses lots of media forms to promote the work they publish, such as radio, internet, smart-phones, TV, and of course, their magazines. If, hypothetically, my magazine was published by Bauer, then it'd be going alongside some brilliant media products, and the audience for these products would be brought to my magazine too!

NME on the other hand has a much more interesting development, it used to be a music journalism publication, published since March 1952. It used to be a music newspaper, and gradually moved towards magazine format during the 1980's and 90's.  It was the first British paper to include a singles chart, in 14 November 1952 edition. An online version of NME, NME.com, was launched in 1996. It is now the world's biggest standalone music site, with over 7 million users per month. IPC Media (now known as Time Inc) publishes NME along with a wide range of other magazines such as 'Whats on TV' and Uncut. I like their magazines and they keep their audiences up to date on whats the latest in media, but I don't think they're the publishing company for me. I much prefer Bauer in their style and what they publish.