Ad Downturn Threatening the Survival of Business 2.0

Ad Downturn Threatening the Survival of Business 2.0

BY BRAD STONE
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/17/business/media/17mag.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

Business 2.0 magazine, a seven-year-old Time Inc. publication that covers start-ups, technology trends and changes in the new economy, might publish its final issue in September, according to people briefed on discussions about the fate of the magazine.
Though a reprieve is still possible, according to these people, executives at Time Inc., the nation's largest magazine group, are threatening to shut down Business 2.0 in the midst of a sharp drop in advertising at the San Francisco-based magazine.

Advertising revenue at Business 2.0 was down 38 percent through July 9 of this year, according to the Magazine Publishers of America. The most recent issue on newsstands ran a scant 102 pages, although summer months are traditionally lean for magazines.

At the same time, readers are still showing interest in the publication: in 2006 its paid circulation - 623,000, including newsstand sales - was roughly the same as 2005.

So why the threat of the ax for the business and technology magazine during such heated times for the field?

Aside from the overall downturn in the magazine business, current and former Time Inc. employees point to what appears to have been an ill-advised move this year to combine the advertising sales teams of Time Inc.'s finance and business publications, which include Fortune, Money, CNNMoney.com, Fortune Small Business and Business 2.0.

Consolidated under a single banner, Time Inc.'s Business and Finance Network (or Tibfin, as it is known inside the company), Time sales representatives stopped pitching the distinct appeal and audience of Business 2.0 to focus on the larger titles like Fortune.

That often turned Business 2.0 into an afterthought; big advertisers like Microsoft and Intel were offered discounts on other Time Inc. business titles if they would also buy pages in Business 2.0.

The consolidation of sales staffs has been tough on other Time Inc. titles as well, with ad dollars, through July 9, down 26.8 percent at Fortune Small Business, 13.4 percent at Fortune and 8.3 percent at Money. The Time executive who headed the Tibfin initiative, Christopher J. Poleway, was replaced three weeks ago by Vivek Shah as head of the unit. Mr. Shah had run the profitable CNNMoney.com portal.

Josh Quittner, the former Time magazine technology writer and editor of Business 2.0, has endeavored to save the magazine, even unsuccessfully soliciting venture capital this year in an attempt to buy the title from Time Inc.

If Business 2.0 indeed goes the way of defunct Silicon Valley magazines like the Industry Standard, the original Red Herring and Upside, 10 editorial employees will stay on and join Fortune magazine in covering Silicon Valley, according to people briefed on these plans.

But a final decision still appears to be forthcoming. Mr. Quittner and a Time Inc. spokeswoman declined comment