Primedia earnings rise, but not for B2B

Primedia says its net earnings rose to $13.5 million in the fourth quarter from $9 million a year earlier. The company gives the credit to its "enthusiast" unit, which includes magazines such as "Snowboarder" and "In-Fisherman."
But if you exclude earnings from the company's About unit, which it has agreed to sell to the N.Y. Times, then things look a little different -- revenue for all of 2004 is essentially flat, showing a climb of only 0.2%.
Things certainly don't look good in the B2B unit, where I once worked.
In the fourth quarter, total B2B revenue rose 5.2% compared with a year earlier. But despite years of layoffs and cost-cutting moves, expenses rose 8.4%. That leaves segment EBITDA -- the measure by which Primedia prefers to be judged -- down 2.9% in the quarter. Across the entire company, excluding About revenue, then segment EBITDA is down 2.6% for the year.
So what's next? If past is prologue, then expect another round of layoffs, more ill-conceived initiatives to "drive revenue", and another management shakeup.

Wicks buys magazine for corporate lawyers

Wicks Business Information has purchased a monthly magazine that serves corporate lawyers. Corporate Legal Times, based in Chicago, was founded in 1991 -- one of dozens of law-focused B2B publications that hoped to duplicate the success of The American Lawyer.
Only a handful of administrative jobs are heading to Wicks' headquarters in Fairfield, Conn. The rest of the staff, including the five-person editorial team, will remain in the Windy City.

Location, location, location

I spent much of the long weekend in the Berkshires in Western Massachusetts, perhaps the prettiest place on earth. It's home to much of what I treasure: the music of Tanglewood, the yoga retreat known as Kripalu, and the mountains themselves. And, as I was reminded early on Sunday morning as I passed through downtown Pittsfield, the Berkshires are also home to Laurin Publishing. Laurin, owner of B2B titles such as Photonics Spectra, has offices on the second floor of a building overlooking the town square.
Laurin recognizes that perhaps the greatest draw it has for B2B journalists is its location. When the company runs ads seeking reporters, it always plays up the beauty of its Berkshires home.
Location is the advantage that many trade-journalism companies have in the recruiting battle. And I'm always surprised how few of them seem to understand that.
Here in New York, where I live, B2B publishers must often choose from the bottom of the barrel of available journalists. The mainstream press offers more money and more prestige. As a result, the great unspoken truth is that B2B journalism in New York and other media centers is often the domain of second-rate practitioners.
The luckiest B2B publishers are based in places where the locale can lure top-tier recruits.
Think of Laurin in the Berkshires, Wicks in Fairfield, Conn., and NTP in Latham, N.Y.
And I've always said the best location for a B2B publisher is the suburbs of Kansas City, where Vance, Primedia Business and Ascend all operate. The area has cheap housing, good schools and offers a low-stress lifestyle. Most importantly, the University of Missouri and the University of Kansas -- both among the top five journalism schools in the country -- are just two hours away. Hundreds of talented kids are available for recruiting every year. And many of them are locals who don't want to leave the area. As a result, local B2B publishers can pick and choose among talented and well-trained journalism students. My friends in New York hate to hear it, but the truth is that much of the best B2B journalism is being practiced in Kansas City, not Manhattan.

Post Office B2B magazine

The U.S. Postal Service is becoming a B2B publisher. "Deliver" is a bimonthly magazine aimed at executives in the direct-marketing industry. Some 350,000 copies were mailed this week, the post office says. That seems to be an extraordinarlily high number. PrimediaBusiness' "Direct" magazine, which serves the same market, has a circulation of only 46,527. So I'm left wondering if the postal service understands the "controlled" part of controlled circulation.
Addendum: Rex Hammock at Rexblog wrote to tell me about another, more detailed article about "Deliver." In this piece, the reporter says the magazine will send those 350,000 copies to "CEOs, corporate marketers and their creative agencies." That may be a broad enough pool of people to account for those circulation numbers.

N.Y. Times buys About

Well I was right about this one. When word came a few weeks ago that About.com was for sale, I predicted the New York Times would buy it. That's exactly what has happened. But before I start patting myself on the back, I'll admit to being shocked by the price the Times will pay -- some $410 million.
For extensive coverage, take a look at paidcontent's take on the sale. Rafat shares my view that part of the reason the Times is interested is that the newspaper giant has been slow to respond to the blog movement. About is the grandfather of "citizen journalism." So the purchase pushes the Times to the forefront of the phenomenon. The other obvious justification for the deal is the growing importance of online advertising.
The lessons here for trade journalists are two-fold. First, if your publisher isn't focused on generating revenue from online ads, then you need to find a new publisher. Second, if you haven't established an ongoing, digital "conversation" with your readers, then your publisher needs to find a new you.
ADDENDUM: I'm flattered that my prediction about the N.Y. Times deal won me some praise on David Shaw's B2B blog.

Editorial integrity award

Given my recent complaints about journalists who also sell advertising, I want to offer some praise to a journalist who performs his job with honor. Whitney Sielaff, publisher and editorial director of VNU's National Jeweler magazine, has won the Timothy White Award for editorial integrity among B2B journalists.
I've mentioned National Jeweler here before, taking note of the crisp writing style at the publication. But the Timothy White Award is for ethics, not for prose. Sielaff is a worthy recipient. According to American Business Media, which oversees the award program, Sielaff's "history of active campaigning for objective reporting and a firm separation of church and state dates back to 1989" when he exposed a program by diamond supplier De Beers to manipulate supply and prices. Sielaff has also developed a code of ethics to uphold journalism ethics at VNU.
Congratulations Whitney!

tags: journalism, b2b, media, trade press, magazines, advertising, newsletters, business media, journalism ethics