Why do magazines give us all those subscription cards?

August 30, 2009

Because it works.

If it didn’t, they’d save the time and money.

This is an important lesson in advertising strategy: Watch for techniques that have been used for many years.

When you see the same thing used again and again, it means two things:

It works, or the advertiser is stupid. (But stupid advertisers run out of money.)
Simple, proven (and possibly stupid-looking) ads fund themselves through measurable sales results.

Ruth Stevens August 30, 2009 at 9:02 am #

True, Andy, but this theory only works if the advertiser tracks and evaluates results. I suspect a lot of ad $$ is spent with 1) no clear objective and 2) no resulting metrics. So just because you see the ad again and again doesn’t always mean it’s working. It can mean just that lots of people took their eyes off the ball. But now I am sounding like a grouch. Sorry.
Daniel August 31, 2009 at 10:02 am #

I know Wired gets a lot of crap for putting those cards in, but they really do work.
Ruth: Take a closer look at your cards, you’ll see there are all sorts of tracking numbers on them. Not only do they date the date of publication, but I’ll suspect they may, in some cases, track the subscriber. Could be wrong about that, though.