Hachette Signs On With ABC Rapid Report

Hachette Signs On With ABC Rapid Report
by Erik Sass
http://publications.mediapost.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=Articles.san&s=63951&Nid=32281&p=204904

HACHETTE FILIPACCHI MEDIA IS COMMITTING all its publications to the Audit Bureau of Circulations' Rapid Reporting system, beginning with their January 2008 issues. This move expands Hachette's existing commitment to ABC Rapid Reporting; the company already submitted some of its biggest titles, including Car and Driver, Road & Track and Woman's Day, to the service.
Introduced in July 2006, ABC Rapid Report allows publishers to deliver important circulation data to advertisers within weeks of an individual magazine issue going on sale. Rapid report data includes paid and verified subscriptions, newsstand sales, rate base and analyzed non-paid circulation. As part of the report, ABC calculates whether magazines are meeting their rate base goals, including the percentage of over- or under-fulfillment.

President and CEO Jack Kliger explained the decision: "We believe that greater transparency and accountability are in the best interests of Hachette and the industry. Advertisers deserve timely assurance that the circulation delivered by the titles in which they advertise is in keeping with their expectations."

However, Kliger added that Hachette would like to see a move to ad sales based on new audience metrics, akin to the data available to TV and Internet advertisers. "While we hope that eventually magazines will also be bought and sold based on timely audience information," he said, "providing prompt information on circulation delivery brings us an important step closer to this goal."

New audience-based metrics have recently been introduced by Mediamark Research Inc., including its new Issue-Specific data. Last year, publisher Time Inc. announced that media buyers would have the option of negotiating deals for Time magazine inventory based on MRI Issue-Specific audience data.