A recent client project involved taking a magazine with national distribution and creating custom content for specific geographical areas. We created 5 issues for major metropolitan areas, plus a “general” issue that mailed to everyone else.

Custom content is an efficient way to hone a message for an audience segment. While this client chose to customize based on geography, you can customize content based on any attribute in your database, such as age or gender segments.

The Process

Customizing content begins with a strategy, not logistics. While there are many logistics involved, the overall strategy has to drive the editorial and design decisions. As we began the planning process, we met to affirm the purpose of the magazine and to consider how the magazine strategy would be strengthened by custom content.

Once the strategy was in place, then logistics were the focus. We generated several potential scenarios, getting bids from the printer and mail house. Eventually we settled on creating custom content for the first two and last two pages in the magazine. This gave each issue a custom cover and inside story, along with custom content on the inside back cover and back cover promotional space.

Another project I worked on had custom content for an insert, with the regular magazine going to the membership audience and the magazine with the insert going to the leadership audience.

Flow

While the magazine team is aware of all the different custom components, the reader of the magazine only sees one version. So the editorial and design flow between the custom content and the core content has to make sense to the reader. The team dealt with content in chunks by custom issue; but we also had to consider the editorial and design flow between the custom pages and the core pages.

After our first issue with custom content, we decided that we had to draw more attention to the custom content on the inside back cover, so the reader would realize that along with a feature story on page 2, there was additional geographical content at the end of the magazine. In addition, some issues included a custom promotional space on the back cover, and others have featured a consistent back cover between all versions.

Measuring Results

The client can measure engagement by geographical area, based on responses they get from readers. For other custom content projects, reader surveys or online engagement can measure response.

Variety of Applications

There are many ways to make custom content work to accomplish strategic objectives. Custom content can take the form of a single custom page, such as a cover, back cover or advertisement. Another project might feature a custom insert or center section. Custom content has long been a tool of large organizations, but it can easily be applied to accomplish the goals of any communicator.