Exploit your Web site

A person who has a hammer, it is said, sees every project as a nail. And it may also be said that a publisher who has a magazine sees the Web as a blank page.

The Web came on the scene so rapidly that few of us had any option but to take our first whack at it with the tools we knew. page layout, display ads, recycled content, etc. Our second try at Web publishing should take better advantage of the medium's interactivity by doing things that cold, flat print can't do. For example, we can build our relationship with our readers by creating new services, ultimately attracting and retaining new print subscribers. In the process, we can create new sponsorship opportunities and new ancillary revenues.

Are you using the medium's interactivity to shape your message and create community? Use the following audit to assess whether you are exploiting the Web's core dynamic qualities -- communications, customization and computation -- to create new value for subscribers and advertisers. If you are exploring at least two of the three C's, you are ahead of most of your peers in using the medium effectively.

Communications

The Web increases a thousandfold our ability to communicate with subscribers and place them in contact with one another, yet it's a value-added niche that has scarcely been touched by publishers. Rather than rely on "Contact Us" buttons that generate a flood of unanswered e-mail, we can set up special-interest user communities: bring readers together to talk to one another and help themselves solve problems. For example, Chemical Week's Web site, www.chemweek.com, offers ChemChat, a user-to-user forum that can be accessed free by print subscribers. A reader Web-community will increase subscribers' loyalty to the Publication and creates new buying environments prized by readers and advertisers alike.

Indeed, ChemChat provides new advertising sponsorship opportunities targeted to readers exploring themes like "Creative Ways to Use the Internet for Competitive Intelligence in the Chemical Industry." ChemChat itself is sponsored by industry analyst Frost & Sullivan.

Customization

Ironically, while the Web is the greatest narrowcast medium in existence, many publisher sites target the masses. It's much better business to use the Web to create customized "magazinelets" that meet the specialized needs of that rarefied 20 percent of subscribers who typically comprise 80 percent of the activity in our markets.

Do you have at least one initiative to pinpoint these precious customers and customize your content to meet their interests? A myriad of usage-tracking and surveying tools can help identify these customer sweet spots, allowing you to begin rifle-shot creation of new layers of content. You will have to lean on your current editors or hire new people to create new editorial. But as users become hooked, you may well find you can begin peeling this new product like an onion -- either charging a fee for access to premium layers or charging advertisers premium rates to reach self-selected customers who use those layers. For example, Money's site, www.money.com, has started offering $49.95-a-year access (discounted $20 for print subscribers) to a premium layer of stock data and personal finance tools.

Computation

The least-exploited quality of the Web's computerized engines is their ability to, well, compute. Do you at least have an experiment underway to use a quiz, a calculator, a decision tree or some other type of computational tool to help solve a problem for subscribers? If so, you have discovered the most powerful tool ever to appear on your publishing workbench. Applications can range from a simple search of, say, Chemical Week's online directory of 20,000 products, to more complex services like Ziff-Davis Publishing's NetBuyer (www.zdnet.com/netbuyer), which cranks out lists of computer products that meet the user's stated criteria. Money's Web site offers dozens of helpful calculators and worksheets. On a lighter note, a site affiliated with Men's Health (www. amanslife.com) offers a "courtship calculator" that allows single men the opportunity to assess the exact cost of a romance -- "from the first rendezvous to the date when you pop the big question." These applications can lead to entire new lines of business.

If your audit tells you that your Web site is in interactive infancy, don't feel that you're alone. It will take another decade before most fully understand how to make use of the new medium. A Web site is a business venture that must be carefully developed and positioned by a magazine publisher. But the first publishers to put aside their hammers of static content and seize the tools of interactivity will be the first to benefit in increased revenues and more satisfied readers.

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