Change is relative.
After much anticipation, the new WSJ Magazine and the new T Magazine hit newsstands within a week of each other. One cover headline read “PURE ELEGANCE”, and the other “TRUE ELEGANCE”. Yes, both headlines were in all caps.
For those of you unfamiliar with the drama, Deborah Needleman was the editor in chief of the WSJ Magazine, but left to overhaul T magazine for The New York Times. WWD has stories about both here and here that are worth reading.
This isn’t a tribute or take down piece of either approach. Truthfully, we were very excited to compare and contrast how dueling editors would relaunch and redesign from the helm. There was an infographic in the works and plenty of quantitative research so as to carefully give an unbiased opinion based on facts. We counted the times that each editor used terms like change or simplicity (too many). But, in the end, the results and content was shockingly similar:
Kitten heels – Check. Supermodel profile – Indeed. Black and white statement pictorial – Done. Designer profiles – Without a doubt. Game changing rings from Balenciaga by Nicholas Ghesquière – Spot on. Feature on the son or daughter of a mega fashion portfolio founder (Pinault vs. Arnault) – Naturally.
According to our research, the biggest difference between the two came in the form of advertisements and photo editorials. While both produced excellent feature stories, T Magazine had 11% more ads as a portion of total pages, but had 21% less photo layouts. If that is an effective long term strategy or not, remains to be seen.
There's a strong message about branding, innovation, and execution however, that is relevant both inside and outside the media and fashion forum: when launching a product or service, don't simply subscribe to a formulaic approach based simply on what others are implementing. Create your own vision, differentiate, and find a true customer need.
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