By Lynn de Souza

THE NATIONAL READERSHIP Survey, 2006 was released a fortnight ago. Once again, it has shown a fall in the reach of magazine in India, from 9 per cent to 8 per cent of all adults, while every other mass medium has registered an increase. The second round of the Indian Readership Survey will also be released soon. Expect similar results.

Indeed, the Indian Readership Survey (IRS) reports a loss of 14.3 million magazine readers between 2000 and 2005, a fall of 12 per cent. Among the worst sufferers are the English magazines. In 2000, 32 million Indians read English magazine; today only 26 million do. That’s an 18 per cent drop.

Do these figures truly represent reality, when, every other month, a new international glossy hits the market? New titles for women, business, interiors, advertising, automotive, construction, travel-the list is specialized and long. Surely, they all have readers. Unfortunately, studies like the NRS and the IRS are just no longer designed to do justice to the way magazines are now read, and the kind of people, and the kind of people who read them.

For the most part, neither does the INS (Indian Newspaper Society), or the ABC (Audit Bureau of Circulations), both of which are geared to cater more to newspaper. In 2000, the INS had 284 magazine members; that is now down to 274. Likewise, 29 English magazine subscribed to the ABC in 2000, that is now drastically down to just 13, at a time when this category has shown tremendous growth in advertising revenue (up from Rs2,378 crore to Rs6,508 crore for the same period, at card rates).

Clearly, therefore, advertisers continue to use magazines extensively, despite the lack of figures to support them. Magazine publishers have been highly responsive to the demand for innovative advertising layouts, often throwing open their front covers to the not-so-hidden persuaders. Editorial plugs and spreads, and promotional offers, gifts and discounts, have all helped magazine stay afloat financially and secure readers. Sponsorships, tie-ups, and partnerships with on ground events have helped magazines obtain content as well revenue.

Wouldn’t it be great, therefore if there were real useable measures available to the media planner to help decide on magazine selection and evaluate post campaign performance? Most of the titles are not measured by either of the readership studies, being too ‘niche’ to quality, and most of them also do not conform to the stringent audit norms of the ABC in order to get a certified circulations.

There is growing trend in the UK and other stronger print markets to invest in industry sponsored studies that supplement the broad readership measures provided by the national readership studies. These studies place a greater emphasis on sampling people from higher socio-economic groups. Lower circulations cut-offs are allowed. Measures of the quality of reading are also introduced-preferred pages and content, time spent, and indeed some go so far as to attempt measuring advertising return on investment (ROI) per page.

Audience accumulation is something that is rapidly gaining preference over simple average issue readership. Newspapers have a limited life. Magazines on the other hand tend to pick up only 60 per cent or less of their readership during the actual life of the issue. The rest is picked up over time even as newer issues hit the stands. A masthead and recall based measurement technology such as that used by the IRS and the NRS does not pick up accumulated audiences well enough.

If the magazine industry in India can come together to set up and support industry level readership and engagement measures, it will not be a day too soon. Otherwise, we will all have to continue to live with depressing figures of 20 per cent fall in readership when the reality may be quite the opposite, and base our selection of titles more on gut that evidence.

The author is Director of Media Services, Lintas India
BUSINESS TODAY, October 8,2006