When Conde Nast pulled the plug on 68-year old Gourmet Magazine last October after ad revenues plunged with the economy, people who loved the publication, and others who scorned it, believed they’d seen the last of it.  At least, the last of new content, as many subscribers saved complete sets of back issues, donated them to libraries, and you can find the complete archives online – interesting for a publication that many of its detractors insisted was the epitome of snobbishness.

Well, Gourmet lives again…but not in print.  Conde Nast has announced the development of digital product called “Gourmet Live”, due to launch in Q4 of this year.  The new version is not an e-Zine, but a downloadable app, which will bring users to a mix of content which includes articles, recipes, slideshows, videos, etc.  Social media is incorporated – users can see which of their connections has viewed something and what they have said about it.  Although app download will be free, once a certain usage level has been hit, paid membership will be required.

The question of “who is the intended audience?” comes to mind immediately, because exactly what the content will be and where it is coming from seems a bit uncertain.  The Gourmet site promises a “new experience”, while an Associated Press article mentions buying credits which would allow users to access collections of recipes.  Since the current Gourmet recipe archives are available online to anyone already, it would seem that Conde Nast is planning to acquire other recipe archives – or stop making their own available, which may anger former subscribers.

Mediapost.com mentions that some content will come from the archives, some fresh content will come from independent “producers” that Conde Nast will hire, but they also speculate that Bon Appetit staffers and Epicurious interns might wind up doing more than anyone will admit now.  This all takes me back to – who is the intended audience?  Because, the initial thought, at least, is that this aimed at wooing back some of their old subscribers, which were about a million strong.  But, if basic content is coming from the archives, subscribers have seen it before, can access it online now and may have it in print at home.  If at least a significant portion of the new content winds up coming from Bon Appetit staffers, these are writers from a magazine that Gourmet subscribers do not like.

It’s not that reviving Gourmet as “Gourmet Live” is a bad idea, it’s not.  But if the aim is to attract their old subscribers, a significant proportion of the content has to be new and the magazine should stay away from using staff from their remaining food publications.  In any case, now that they have made the decision to go into this format, especially with their emphasis on the social networking aspects, there may be a significant new audience out there who was turned off by the imagined “snobbishness” – so why limit their sights?
 

Sources: MediaPost.com, Raw, Live and Unadulterated, ‘Gourmet’ Mag To Live Again (Well, Sort Of), Posted June 22, 2010 by John Capone.  Associated Press, Gourmet brand, dead as magazine, returns as an app, June 22, 2010, by Andrew Vanacore.  Wall Street Journal, Digits, Technology News and Insights, App Watch: Gourmet Magazine Being Revived — Sort Of,  June 22, 2010, by Russell Adams.

AdMob, the company which places ads on websites targeted at mobile users and which has just been acquired by Google, has published the results of a survey into app downloading, buying and usage habits. While the survey was quite small – under 1,000 people who opted-in to the survey – the findings were interesting. iPhone and Android users both downloaded just under 9 apps per month on average, but both were outdone by iPod Touch users, who averaged 12 apps per month.  And those iPod apps also get more use; an average of 100 minutes per user per day, compared to 80 minutes for iPhone and Android.

When it comes to actually paying for apps, Android users average just over one app per month, with only 21% of users buying anything; iPod Touch users average 1.6 apps per month, while the iPhone leads the way with 1.8 – and with 50% of users buying at least one app per month.

The number of ads served by AdMob continues to grow at an astonishing rate; in January, over 7.3 billion ads were served in North America, a jump of a third over December 2009. That rate of growth may slow in the coming months – all those Christmas presents are sure to have caused a spike in January demand and usage, which will likely drop off a little in February. The iPhone and iPod Touch accounted for a whopping 40% of those ads.

What does all this mean? It’s a good indication that the apparently insatiable appetite for apps shows no sign of slowing, and that the rise of the smartphone has yet to get anywhere near a peak. The marketing opportunities presented by providing branded apps, or by using mobile advertising, are ones that companies ignore at their peril. You can find the AdMob reports here.