Mag Bag: Business Mags Bow New Digital Features

Business Mags Bow New Digital Features

Two leading business magazines are introducing new digital features online, with an announcement from Forbes.com that it's launching a Business and Finance Blog Network, and an announcement from BusinessWeek that it's partnering with LinkedIn to create a sort of social network for companies.

Although it has come a bit late to the blog network game, Forbes.com is making up for lost time with scale, as the network launches with over 400 blogs that already have substantial audiences of investors, executives, and other business professionals. Ad sales for the network will be handled by Nick Ricci, who also oversees the Forbes Audience Network, another service bringing together Forbes' online properties. The blogs were vetted by Forbes editors for editorial integrity, relevance, timeliness, and readership.

Forbes.com President and CEO Jim Spanfeller remarked: "Forbes.com can ensure advertisers are reaching a hard-to-find and very desirable audience within safe, well-lit environments by exclusively inviting 'best of breed' business and investing bloggers to our new Business and Finance Blog Network."

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Last week, BusinessWeek announced that it is partnering with LinkedIn to create profiles for over 160,000 companies to aid social networking and career development by business professionals. Rather than allowing companies to create their own pages, the LinkedIn profiles will draw on information provided by BusinessWeek as well as contributions from LinkedIn members employed by those companies. The latter information will include the number of company employees within a member's social circle, new hires and promotions, as well as executives who receive press coverage or a large number of profile views.

In December, LinkedIn announced that it had opened its "back end" to Web publishers, beginning with BusinessWeek, that want to bring the network's functions to their site. In one feature, LinkedIn will create links in the text of BusinessWeek editorial content for the proper names of businesses and people. By mousing over the links, the reader can determine how they are connected to the individual or entity in question, including how many of their own contacts are connected.

In May, BusinessWeek announced that it is partnering with Capital IQ, a division of Standard & Poor's, to launch a Company Insight Center hosted on the magazine's Web site. The new online content area will triple the size of the BusinessWeek site. Information and analysis will cover companies, industries, markets and leaders.

BusinessWeek's newest content-sharing arrangement with LinkedIn comes not long after Mansueto Ventures created two new networks for competitors Fast Company and Inc. The "Company of Friends" network hosted on the Fast Company site includes 95,000 business professionals who contribute content and discuss topics in public forums. Sister publication Inc. is launching IncBizNet.com, a sort of social network and user-generated company database for privately held companies. IncBizNet.com will function as a directory with data updated by the companies themselves, with a press release newswire, blogging functions, local community groups and a marketplace for products and services.

Pennington Gets Quarterly Mag

After the favorable response to a special interest publication in spring 2007, Hachette Filipacchi is launching a quarterly magazine called Pennington At Home, focusing on renovation and design tips from the ebullient TV home makeover impresario. The first issue appeared on newsstands March 25th, with a cover price of $4.99 and launch circulation of 500,000.

Lexus Relaunches Custom Pub

Lexus is relaunching its Lexus magazine custom publication both in print and online. The print relaunch this January brought in new departments like Lexus News, covering products, services, owner benefits and partnerships; Spotlight, covering interesting and well-known Lexus owners; Lexicon Culture Pages, covering travel, design, recreation, dining, and philanthropy; and a new back-page essay. Meanwhile, the online pub is offering more interactive elements, as well as slide shows, video, travel and lifestyle features by well-known journalists, exclusive fiction from famous authors, quizzes--and of course plenty of product information, including links to technical details and specifications. The site was created by Story Worldwide.

Atlantic Names Jay Lauf VP, Publisher

The Atlantic Monthly has lured publisher Jay Lauf away from Conde Nast's Wired magazine to serve as vice president and publisher, overseeing all sales and marketing for the 150-year-old publication. Lauf comes on board not long after the magazine relocated its sales and marketing to New York City. Meanwhile, Elizabeth Baker Keffer, the outgoing publisher, will continue on with the company, leading its booming event business, Atlantic Live, which includes the Aspen Ideas Festival and various signature salon dinner events.

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