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Belch: Advertising and
Promotion, Sixth Edition
IMC PERSPECTIVE 12-1
V. Developing the
Integrated Marketing
Communications Program
12. Evaluation of Print
Media
Magazines Seek the Most Elusive Readers
of All—Young Males
Teenagers are one of the fastest-growing market segments
in America. There are nearly 31 million teenagers
in the United States, and according to Teenage
Research Unlimited (TRU), a market research firm that
specializes in teens, they spend more than $155 billion a
year. While their numbers and purchasing power make
them a very attractive segment for marketers, teens
are very difficult to reach—particularly through magazines.
Teenagers spend a lot more time listening to
radio, watching TV, and surfing the Internet than reading
magazines. And while teenagers in general are an
elusive segment for advertisers, young males are a particularly
difficult audience to capture.
According to TRU, 80 percent of girls between the
ages of 12 and 19 read a magazine for pleasure every
week compared to only 65 percent of boys. The Big Five
teen magazines—Seventeen, YM, Teen, Teen People, and
CosmoGirl—all target girls. Only Teen People manages
to pull in a sizable male audience, as male teens
account for around 20 percent of its readers. Conventional
wisdom in the magazine industry says that
teenage males are too antsy to cozy up with a magazine
for any length of time. And when they do, they tend to
read publications such as Sports Illustrated, ESPN The
Magazine, or niche titles catering to specific interests
such as extreme sports or video gaming. Publishers
also note that teen guys are so worried about being
teased by friends for needing advice on things such as
muscle building or snagging girls that they balk at
picking up magazines that deal with these topics. And
today, no matter how racy the content, it’s difficult for a
magazine to compete with the raw subject matter available
on the Internet and many cable TV channels.
While few magazines have been successful in reaching
the elusive teenage male segment on a large scale,
publishers continue to look for the right formula to do
so. After years of watching girl-oriented magazines
dominate the teen-glossies market, a number of publishers
are trying to lure teenage boys. For example,
Rodale Inc. created a spin-off of its Men’s Health magazine
for teen guys called MH-18. The new magazine’s
content was similar to the girl’s magazine Seventeen as
it included boyish lifestyle fare: workout plans, girlkissing
tips, and ways to boost grades. When MH-18 was
launched in August 2000, the editor acknowledged
that it was a risky venture as he was not sure how teen
guys would respond to the new magazine. It did not
take long for him to get an answer: MH-18 lasted only
one year before being shuttered by the publisher.
While MH-18 was unsuccessful with a fairly tame
editorial mix, another publisher, TransWorld Media, is
taking a different approach with its publication
© The McGraw−Hill
Companies, 2003
Stance, which debuted in early 2000. The new publication
takes its cover-shot and content cues from adult
magazines such as Gear, Maxim, Stuff, and FHM.
Stance’s publisher says that the magazine is a combination
of the things teenage boys want to look at:
girls, action sports, video games, cars, and music.
Stance steers clear of grooming articles and girlgetting
pointers, focusing more on cool stuff to buy
such as computers and video game players and exotic
things to do such as snowboarding in Austria. The
magazine has been very successful in attracting readers
as well as a variety of advertisers.
Marketers will be keeping a close watch on Stance and
other new magazines that target the elusive teen male
market. Advertisers would love to see magazines that
can attract teenage boys succeed so that they can better
target this important market segment. Publishers have
already proved that they can attract teenage girls. Now if
they can only get the guys to pick up a magazine!
Sources: Jon Fine, “Rodale Names Steve Murphy New CEO,” Advertising
Age, Jan. 14, 2002, p. 7; Larry Dobrow, “Sounding Boards,”
Advertising Age, June 25, 2001, pp. S1, 8; Erin White, “Teen Mags for
Guys Not Dolls,” The Wall Street Journal, Aug. 10, 2000, pp. B1, 4.