Does this mean we should start referring to it as eh-OK!? In an apparent ploy to boost Canadian sales, U.S. celebrity magazine OK! Weekly has started running a Canadian flag and the tag line “Canada’s greatest celebrity weekly” on its cover. It’s a curious claim, since the Northern & Shell North America title doesn’t appear to have beefed up its Canadian content (a recent 100-page issue contained no references to either Canada or any Canadian celebrities).
OK! Weekly has been mum on its plans for the Canadian market. Publisher Tom Morrissy forwarded an interview request to publicist Brian Strong, whose only communication was an e-mail apologizing for not responding, and noting that he was just “feeling back to normal over here after a crazy week of Eva and Tony” (also not Canadian).
Gary Garland, executive director of advertising services for Magazines Canada in Toronto, says the crowded celebrity category is typically an impulse buy. Such a claim, he posits, could tempt a newsstand browser into picking up a copy and perhaps becoming a regular reader.
Still he calls OK! Weekly’s claim “incongruous. I somehow doubt that they’re the largest readership or largest circulation [celebrity] weekly in Canada, so ‘greatest’ can mean many things,” he says. “On the flipside, Canada is part of what seems to be a global craze over celebrity and entertainment news, so it doesn’t surprise me that they’re trying to tap into what is a receptive Canadian market.”
If OK! Weekly’s claim is having an impact on the Canadian edition of the celebrity title Hello! (a Rogers publication, as is Marketing) they’re not saying. As it approaches its one-year anniversary, the Canadian Hello! is making headway with both readers and advertisers. A 20% increase in its average monthly circulation guarantee, from 100,000 to 120,000, was recently announced, reflecting what executive publisher Tracey McKinley says is a receptive market for the title. “We’re finding the magazine is really resonating much more strongly with readers, and our sales have gone up,” she says.
Following a six-week test in British Columbia, Hello! has lowered its cover price across the country from $4.95 to $2.99. McKinley won’t reveal results from the B.C. test, saying only that executives were “pleased with the increase in trial” it produced. “We really want to stimulate trial and build upon our current success,” says McKinley of the drop in price. “We find that when people pick [Hello!] up, they love it.” She calls it an interim strategy and says its duration can be measured in “weeks or months.”
Garland says that with Hello! being relatively new in the market, it is likely still in trial mode. At this point, he says, a drop in cover price is “good consumer marketing. It is a very competitive marketplace, there’s no question… and this can be one way to turn people to them for the first time and perhaps they’ll convert. There are so many titles, [and] one just has to break through the clutter. I think that’s just one way to get at it.”
Hello! also plans to revamp its website, which currently attracts 100,000 unique visitors a month. The redesigned site is scheduled to debut Sept. 1.
