A Multichannel Makeover

As marketers, you often have the task of rethinking your campaign to see whether or not a little tweaking is in order. Perhaps you discover that the offer actually needs to be adjusted or the pitch is just a little bit off. Nevertheless, it's sometimes important that you take a step back and evaluate your work with an objective and discerning eye.

In magazine publishing, it's not so different. Now that Electronic Retailer is heading into its third year of publishing (yes, it's been that long), the editorial staff felt it was the perfect time to re-evaluate the magazine's content. In the past couple of years, I've introduced upcoming topics that were coming down the pike in our feature articles section, and filled you in on the launch of our website and special supplements. However, this time, we've decided to tweak our column section in the magazine.

No, we're not going into the publication and gutting it; we've simply decided to do a little bit of repositioning--that's all. Some of the questions that we staff members asked ourselves were: "How can we make the columns in the magazine stand out more? And, what is it that makes our editorial a reflection of the multichannel marketing environment? Well, after careful consideration, we realized it was more than just connecting the dots for our readership. Our columns need to reflect what is happing among today's marketers and their marketing messages: crossing different channels.

Thus, we thought that "Channel Crossing" would be a perfect name for a section in the magazine. For the past three years, industry experts who specialize in the various marketing mediums--such as direct response television, DR radio, print, live shopping, retail and online marketing--have generously shared their expert analysis and insights with Electronic Retailer readers. We've debuted "new" column names in the magazine to provide more information about a specific marketing medium. However, we realized that as we were adding varous columns and placing them toward the back of the magazine, we actually were making it more difficult for our readers to really get the full scope of the magazine.

Of course, you still will be able to read editorial content from your favorite industry experts. The only difference is that it will be easier to open up the publication and find what you're looking for in terms of columns and departments. "Channel Crossing" will comprise of columns that spotlight multichannel marketing, including DRTV, radio, online, retail and even emerging technologies. Industry professionals representing media buying, production, legal and supports services, to name a few, will continue to share their valuable tips of their trade within these pages.

In addtion, we have repositioned some of the other regular columns toward the front of the magazine for easier access. I encourage you to check out our new format in this issue, and let us know what you think by submitting your comments to editors@retailing.org.

In honor of our former column sections, I advise you not to look at these changes as if we're changing the "Radio Dial" or dismissing important "Legal Affairs." We're simply attending to "Backend Business," yet we are well aware that "Media Matters." We're simply tweaking our content lineup while doing a little "Channel Crossing." And, "That's a Wrap!"

Vitisia Paynich
Editor-in-Chief