Anatomy of Today's Successful Publisher

Canon Communications—Chairman and CEO Charles G. McCurdy is quick to point out—is not immune to the current economic environment. However, double-digit revenue growth in recent years, strong penetration in recession-resilient industries, and well-defined business strategies in print, digital and events have helped the Los Angeles, Calif.-based business-to-business media company weather an often-debilitating economic storm. Canon, which is owned by Apprise Media, publishes 16 trade magazines and produces a number of related conferences and expositions that serve industries such as packaging, plastics and medical manufacturing and design. Its titles include Medical Device & Diagnostic Industry, Cosmetic + Personal Care Packaging and Modern Plastics Worldwide. Last summer, when Canon budgeted for fiscal year 2009 (which began in November 2008), it anticipated “an 11-percent organic revenue increase,” says McCurdy—a reasonable calculation, one would assume, in light of the company’s growth in previous years. In FY2008, revenues increased 23 percent over FY2007. “By the end of the [2008] calendar year, it became clear that we weren’t going to be seeing that kind of growth [in FY2009],” says McCurdy. “The reality of the impact of the economic downturn is [now] a lot clearer to all of us than it was previously. We’re going to be tracking down in the mid-single digits overall for this fiscal year.” With that image of the economic impact becoming more clear, Canon set out to do some belt-tightening. With its printer contract up for renewal, the company renegotiated the contract at a lower rate. Also, “we have, selectively, in areas we’ve seen very healthy growth and online reach through Web sites and outbound e-newsletters, been able to implement print circulation reductions, often substituting some print distribution with digital editions,” he says. Canon also trimmed its workforce in February by 10 percent, or about 30 employees. Best in ShowIn addition to implementing those and other cost-cutting measures, Canon is surviving by playing to its strengths. While trade show businesses in general have been suffering—with low attendance and a weak exhibitor presence plaguing even some of the most historically successful events, and others shuttering altogether—Canon’s events business is proving to be an exception. No small feat considering the American Business Media recently released a sobering statistic that b-to-b trade show revenues declined by more than 20 percent in the first quarter of 2009 compared to the same period last year. “… Our trade show business has held up nicely …,” says McCurdy, who notes that Canon’s events business generates more than 55 percent of the company’s revenue (with print pulling in about 30 percent, and digital and data products generating a little under 15 percent). Both McCurdy and Kevin O’Keefe, senior vice president of Canon’s events division, attribute at least some of that ability to buck the trend to the markets the company serves and its global presence. Canon’s largest shows are its Medical Design & Manufacturing exhibitions, for the medical device manufacturing market. “[This market] has been and, as far as we can see, will continue to be a long-term growth sector that the performance of which is not highly correlated with general economic cycles,” says McCurdy. “It’s an industry that has been growing, on average, 7 [percent] to 9 percent per year … . So we benefit from that.” Canon also is the only company that produces events that service this market, notes O’Keefe, which makes for a compelling sales pitch when approaching potential sponsors and exhibitors. A testament to the company’s success in this area, it launched in April two new medical manufacturing trade shows, one in Japan and one in France. “Our international business is growing at more than 20 percent year over year—twice the U.S. pace,” says O’Keefe. “Our MedTec Europe show continues to expand at nearly 20 percent; our PharmaPack event in Paris has doubled; our new MedTec France launch was a great success and is projected to grow at 25 percent; [and] our new MedTec Japan show was a real hit and will at least double in 2010.” McCurdy and O’Keefe concur that Canon will continue to focus on growing its international events business, with additional overseas trade show launches imminent. “[These days] attendees come out to trade shows because they have a problem they need solved now,” notes O’Keefe. “… Nearly 80 percent of individuals that come to one of our shows will not be there the following year. We may see the same person two or three years later. So, for exhibitors, they see a whole new audience every time, and for attendees, because we are really the only show in town, and the largest, we see our attendance climb at every show, every year.” A “Web-first” ApproachCanon’s digital business also is holding its own in a difficult economy. “We’re looking at low single-digit growth this year in our digital and data business,” says McCurdy. A “Web-first” approach drives the company’s editorial process, in which current and breaking news is first provided to audiences on the company’s Web sites, and then later dissected and analyzed in the print publications. In addition to offering digital products that McCurdy deems “fairly standard fare these days,” such as e-newsletters and webinars, Canon has channeled its digital efforts into grouping multiple, related brands under a single umbrella via “portal” Web sites. Its first portal Web site, DeviceLink.com, builds on the company’s 11 magazine titles and various trade show events focused on the medical technology industry and offers breaking news, blogs and Webcasts, among other features. Visitors also may access each individual magazine’s site through DeviceLink.com. “It’s a well-trafficked, well-monetized site,” says McCurdy. Based on the success it experienced with DeviceLink.com, he continues, Canon launched a similarly conceptualized Web site, PlasticsToday.com, to support its presence in the plastics processing market. “[These portal Web sites] work for Canon because we have multiple brands both in print and in trade shows that support activity on those sites,” says McCurdy. “We wouldn’t want to limit ourselves to individual, discreet brands, but we do maintain a presence for those brands [on the sites]. … We co-position publication brands with the umbrella Web site brand [in a way] that takes advantage of the brands that people have come to know and trust, with a broader resource than any one publication or trade show can provide.” Mastering Audience DevelopmentWhile McCurdy doesn’t necessarily feel that Canon is breaking new ground with its digital products, what he believes the company is doing differently than most is developing what the company terms a “Master Audience File.” With Plymouth, Minn.-based vendor KMPS, Canon combined more than 70 discreet circulation files for its various publications, events and digital products into one master audience database. The result is a nonduplicated file of about 800,000 design engineers and managers in the advanced manufacturing sector worldwide. “It’s quite a compelling asset,” says McCurdy. “We’re able to look at our markets and these constituents that we want to reach editorially, and that our marketing partners, exhibitors and advertisers want to reach, in a global sense—both in terms of comprehensiveness and worldwide.” One insight that analysis of the Master Audience File has provided is that Canon has a low duplication rate among its audiences—for example, only about 25 percent of subscribers to a particular magazine also attend a related trade show. “I find that a very important marketing point …,” notes McCurdy. “… I’ve been involved in quite a variety of niche markets, and [a low duplication rate] is not uncommon. [However,] it’s not something that publishers … have really stressed or built a marketing program around for advertisers.” Canon also is using its Master Audience File to subsegment its audience to more accurately target its marketing efforts. For example, if the company only wants to reach out to the orthopedics sector of its medical device manufacturing audience, it can do so with messages tailored specifically to that group. “It increases our marketing efficiency and our ability to deliver targeted audiences dramatically,” he says. “It’s very exciting,” he continues. “Every month, we discover more things we can do with [the File].” The Importance of PrintIf there is one child in the family who is bringing home less than stellar grades on his report card, it is, not surprisingly, print. McCurdy notes that Canon’s magazine print pages were down about 30 percent in the first calendar quarter—“not a happy performance, but in line with the market,” he says. However, he does not subscribe to the “print is dead” theory. “When people ask, ‘Is print dead?’ it may be for some people in the market who only consume information online, but there is at least a large minority of the marketplace, in our case, who are not going to trade shows, so you can’t reach them there, they’re not going to our Web sites, so you can’t get them there. If you want to reach them, you have to do it in print,” McCurdy continues. “In 10 years, will that shift a little bit? It probably will, but [currently] there are 300,000-plus design engineers who, if you want to reach them, you’ve got to be in our magazine.”

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Anatomy of Today's Successful Publisher

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