After Holding Back, National Geographic Releases Traveler for iPad

Apple’s Newsstand triggers launch.

By T. J. Raphael
Wednesday, January 4, 2012

In an effort to give readers more options, National Geographic Traveler is now available on the Apple Newsstand, a move, the editor says, that was based around strategic timing.

“We actually went on the iPad with an app about a year ago with a special issue, which sold about 55,000 copies,” says Keith Bellows, editor-in-chief of National Geographic Traveler. “We were very keen to get on it but none of us were really convinced that it was a viable option without the iNewsstand—the idea that you could have a direct relationship with your subscriber and that you could be found on a reliable basis. Once Apple changed some of its policies we immediately made the decision that that’s where we wanted to be.”

The title had previously been available on the Barnes and Noble NOOK, Amazon’s Kindle and through digital newsstand provider Zinio. Now as the brand continues its digital expansion through Apple, a new question presents itself to the title’s creators.

“What are we as a magazine in print and what are we on a tablet?” asks Bellows. “Right now, it’s an extended magazine but that’s not where we think we’ll be. We’re going in a direction to create a virtual travel experience for our consumers. We want to really focus on what it is that consumers expect from us, which is great photography, storytelling, maps and the idea of really curating a cultural experience.”

With its official launch on the iPad, the content and business model for National Geographic can also expand with the technology.

“We’re navigating,” says Bellows. “We’re looking at the business model in two different ways. The first would be you buy the print magazine and you get the digital version for free. That seems like the model that we’ve pursued online, we have a magazine that we spend a lot of money creating and we’re giving the content for free online which isn’t a particularly effective model for creating value for content.”

Right now, annual subscriptions to the iPad edition are $15.99, monthly subscriptions $1.99 per month and single copies are $3.99. Print subscriptions do not automatically provide iPad access. The editor says that the publication is considering increasing the cost of receiving both the print and digital tablet version, using an example of $15 for a print subscription and $25 for both a hard copy subscription and digital access. Bellows says National Geographic is also weighing the idea of giving print access for free when signing up for a digital edition.

“What we would have to be doing then is betting that we’d be reaching potential new subscribers and creating an instant, in our case, digital audience of 715,000,” he says. “That all works if everyone has a tablet but we don’t even know how many of our readers have them. If we pretend it’s 250,000, you’d have to jumpstart our circulation entry into digital tablets with that number, making no extra money off that until we could start to build an advertising base that values that 250,000. And that’s an in ‘If’ because advertisers are still finding the way. My feeling is, going the second route you’re instantly saying the digital version does not have added value. From what I see is a lot of publications are putting a great deal of added value into the digital version through the cost in both time and effort and pure dollars out of pocket. It’s incredibly hard, this is not a cheap medium.”

Some of the added value that could be factored in, Bellows says, is instead of the typical 15 photos in a print article, content could be coupled with 50 photos, panoramic shots, video interviews and interactive maps.

“I think we’re all feeling our way in this but with each passing month we at least feel a greater sense that we’re beginning to see the outlines of a business model and a consumer relationship,” says Bellows. “As the technology gets more powerful, we can start to add more community building tools into the tablet product as we have been able to do online, it opens up a huge array of possibilities for a completely different media product then we have now. It’s kind of exciting, and a great time to be doing this.”