Adweek : The Press

Paul Caine Hires Condé Nast Exec

Lucia Moses — Fri, 17 May 2013 00:47:38 GMT

Ex-Time Inc. CRO Paul Caine isn't wasting time raiding other media companies as he bolsters his staff at Dial Global, the audio content syndicator he joined as CEO in March.

In his first major hire, he tapped Christina Albee as chief marketing officer, a new position at the company. Albee comes from Condé Nast, where she helped run The Studio, a digital ad unit, and where she also served as GM of the Condé Nast Media Group.

It was at Time Inc. where Albee and Caine got to know each other. They worked together at the publisher for nearly 15 years, Albee at über magazine brand People and on a variety of launches including Teen People, InStyle and All You.

"One of our first priorities is reinforcing the importance of our many talented departments across the company," Caine said in announcing the hire. "Our goal is to unify, to nurture and to strengthen those teams."

Hearst Launches Digital Cross-Country Sales Division

Emma Bazilian — Thu, 16 May 2013 10:00:02 GMT

In the magazine business, buying and selling ads across international editions has always presented its challenges. Most ad buying is done locally, and magazines often aren't set up to execute cross-title buys. Then there's the difficulty of coordinating across time zones. It’s enough of a hassle, in fact, that most advertisers don’t even attempt cross-country buys. Yet demand for such deals is on the rise as brands try to reach consumers globally while cutting their expenses.

With the launch of a new division, Totally Global Media, Hearst is hoping to solve many of those problems and bring efficiency to buying and ad production, at least on the digital side. TGM, as it’s being called, will give brands a way to advertise across all Hearst Magazines' digital brands worldwide, as well as licensees and related companies (such as Groupe Marie Claire, which already partners with Hearst on French Cosmopolitan but will now offer access to its entire women’s and men’s digital networks through TGM). The division, with offices in New York and London, will reach 200 million monthly unique visitors.

“Before now, if an advertiser wanted to buy across every edition of Cosmo, there was no way to do it," said Gina Garrubbo, svp of Hearst Magazines International and now the svp of TGM. "There is a need [for this type of service] in the marketplace and a number of clients who want to buy multi-country from one source."

Here’s how it works: The advertiser pays a single production fee that includes all production, translating, and hosting across multiple international websites. TGM offers standard IAB-sized ad units as well as custom “mini marketing programs” that can be placed within banner ads—like a fashion designer “lookbook” that includes a live Instagram feed, link to the designer’s e-commerce site and store locations, all inside a banner ad. (“Even though 98 percent of our partners around the world use standard IAB units, logistically, it makes it so easy to have these custom programs running within banner ad units,” said Garrubbo.) Garrubbo said that pricing rates and packaging would be handled on the U.S. end.

Garrubbo said these digital marketing programs would be suited to marketers that have global appeal, yet translate locally. Burberry is a good example, she said: “When my plane arrived in Beijing last year, there was a full-sized Burberry poster that just said Burberry.com with a picture of a purse—no Chinese characters,” she said. “They have the same look and feel everywhere in the world.”

Publisher Mary Morgan Departs Redbook

Emma Bazilian — Wed, 15 May 2013 17:46:41 GMT

Mary Morgan, the vp, publisher and chief revenue officer of Hearst’s Redbook, is packing up after spending a decade at the women's service title. Today, Hearst Magazines announced that Morgan would be leaving Redbook and plans to retire to her home in Cape Cod.

Replacing Morgan is Jayne Jamison, who was vp, publisher and chief revenue officer of Seventeen. Jamison, who was Redbook’s publisher from 1997 until she moved to Seventeen in 2003, will now oversee both magazines under the new title of vp, publishing director of Seventeen and Redbook. She begins in her new role immediately and will report to Hearst Magazines president, marketing and publishing director Michael Clinton.

Seventeen has been strong on the advertising side, with ad pages rising 11 percent in the first half of 2013, according to Hearst. Redbook, which recently underwent a redesign, fell about 10 percent in ad pages in the first quarter, and according to Clinton, remained soft in the second quarter due to weakness in the consumer packaged goods and pharmaceutical categories.

Wired and Cisco Collaborate on Crowdsourced Tablet Mag

Emma Bazilian — Wed, 15 May 2013 10:00:01 GMT

Last month, Wired Insider, Wired's marketing and promotion arm, announced that it would embark on a daunting experiment in magazine-making: Assemble a standalone tablet issue in just two days. (In other words, no one would be leaving the office for a good 48 hours.) The Insider marketers and editors revealed the issue’s theme (“Mass Transmit”) at 3 p.m. April 26, crowdsourced content from Wired readers via email and Twitter, and then, fortified by Red Bull and fare from Wired’s resident chef, turned those articles into a fully interactive tablet magazine, sponsored by Cisco Systems.

Today, that magazine—called “The Connective”—hits digital newsstands. (It's independent of editorial, but will be available for free at Wired.) The issue contains more than a dozen articles submitted by readers on topics ranging from Internet-connected basketballs to a woman who befriended strangers on Words with Friends, as well as four “Dynamic Edit Pieces,” features written by the Wired Insider team that integrate real-time, interactive data, powered by Cisco. (One article uses live conditions to predict traffic patterns in Los Angeles; another assigns musical notes to Twitter hashtags to create a never-ending tune.)

“We literally locked ourselves in a room working on this product for 48 hours straight,” recalled Wired vp, publisher Howard Mittman. “It was an exercise in pushing the limits of digital publishing.” Readers were given constant updates on the process through Wired Insider tweets, Instagrams, and Vines.

The Connective also includes five interactive Cisco ads, created by Goodby Silverstein & Partners. Each ad tells a chapter in the story of a man’s morning to commute to the airport, showing how each item in his daily routine (his pillow, his alarm clock, his car) could be connected to “the Internet of everything” using Cisco technologies. It’s meant to fit in with the company’s new tagline, “Tomorrow starts here,” unveiled last December.

Goodby creative director Jon Rondazzo said the ads were developed specifically with Wired’s readers in mind. “This was a good way to demonstrate [to executives] how Cisco is building connections for their companies and making them more relevant,” he said.

Meredith Corp. Buys, Closes Parenting, Babytalk

Lucia Moses — Tue, 14 May 2013 19:04:09 GMT

Meredith Corp.'s merger talks with Time Inc. fell apart just two months ago, but now Meredith CEO Stephen Lacy can partly save face. Today, the publisher announced it would buy Bonnier’s Parenting and Babytalk magazines and their related digital assets. And while Meredith didn't state this detail explicitly in its statement, Bonnier confirmed that Meredith would be shutting the magazines down. Some 68 people will be impacted; another 12 people who worked at the brands may find other jobs at Bonnier.

The deal fits squarely with the Meredith playbook; the Des Moines publisher and broadcaster has styled itself as a media and marketing company that reaches women, which is a mass play. Meredith already dominated the parenting magazine category with Parents, to which it tacked on Disney’s FamilyFun in 2012.

With this newest deal, Meredith effectively ties up the category, but that's about all. Parents and Parenting have a fair amount of overlap in their audiences. The magazines are high-circulation, low-CPM titles; the audience turns over regularly; and the Internet is proving a more efficient way to get that information. As the No. 2 title, Parenting has proven to be a difficult title for Bonnier. CEO Dave Freygang admitted that Parenting hadn't made money since 2007, the year Bonnier bought it as part of its big Time4 Media acquisition from Time Inc. "We were never able to get out in front of the parenting decline," he said. "It’s a challenging market. Service is competitive, and Meredith is a very formidable competitor.” Meredith itself doesn't expect to get a big bump in circulation from the acquisition, as it's not going to increase Parents' rate base guarantee.

The Parenting deal continues Meredith's acquisition spree, the publisher having also added big food properties like Every Day With Rachael Ray and AllRecipes lately. Bonnier, on the other hand, has been winnowing its footprint in the past few months. Bonnier just sold its snow sports group to Active Interest Media and has folded some small, unprofitable titles. The Sweden-based company is taking pains to say it’s not folding up its tent and abandoning the U.S., though. Freygang said the moves were necessary to get Bonnier back to profitability this year and that he foresees no more closings or sales.

"It was a financial decision," Freygang said. "My goal was to create a foundation that would get us back to revenue growth and sustained profits. We really analyzed the portfolio, and the brands we’ve shut down and sold are the ones that were the most challenging for us. It’s a smaller company but still significant."

Atlantic Media to Launch Another Digital-First Brand, for Defense Community

Lucia Moses — Tue, 14 May 2013 04:01:02 GMT

Six months after launching digital business site Quartz, Atlantic Media is preparing to roll out its fifth brand and second "digital-first" property. Defense One, a news and information site for the national security community, will be the latest output of the company strategy to launch verticals aimed at influentials in the digital form in which they've grown accustomed to getting their news.

Set for a mid-summer launch, Defense One is a natural extension for Atlantic Media, since it already serves some 60,000 senior-level subscribers in the Department of Defense through its Government Executive and National Journal brands. "Given we're very interested in influentials, and given defense is close to a number of brands we have now, we began looking at this marketplace," said Atlantic Media president Justin Smith.

As first reported by Nieman Journalism Lab, Defense One will go up against existing products like Jane’s, Gannett’s Defense News and Army Times, and Breaking Defense. (Incidentally, Breaking Defense is owned by Breaking Media, which Smith co-founded and remains involved in as a shareholder and board member, although he said he recused himself from the purchase of the site, then known as AOL Defense).

Defense One will import the Quartz model, if on a more niche scale: It will be ad-supported and free to the reader, and offer marketers native ad, mobile and non-standard display advertising as well as events sponsorships. The site hasn’t hired an editor, and it’s running sales out of its Government Executive group for now, but it’s secured its first launch underwriter, Northrop Grumman.

With paywalls all the rage, the Atlantic Media’s free-content route stands out. Smith said that the free, ad-supported approach made sense for a couple of reasons. First, it would be easier to gain a foothold in the market with a new, unknown brand such as Defense One by not asking users to pay. The ad economics also favored this approach, he said. “Because it’s a niche that’s very valuable, the advertising pricing is generous and has not depreciated along with mass general advertising,” he said.

And by Atlantic Media accounts, the model is working for Quartz, which has 2.5 million monthly users and is growing advertising at a nice pace. Atlantic Media likes the model so much that it's planning on putting out a third digital-first brand, likely next year. The subject area hasn’t been decided, but technology and high-end lifestyle are high on Atlantic Media’s list of interests. The digital-first strategy that helped get the flagship Atlantic in the black is now a companywide mantra; this year, more than 60 percent of the advertising across the company is budgeted to be digital, up from less than half in 2012, according to Smith.

Not that Atlantic Media is uninterested in consumer revenue. It recently launched a new e-book division off the Atlantic brand, where a small, dedicated group is working on identifying other paid content opportunities. And the company is looking to launch a paid content strategy for Quartz next year.

Vanity Fair Targets Brand Campaign at Ad Community

Emma Bazilian — Tue, 14 May 2013 00:11:45 GMT

Vanity Fair has had a strong start for the year, with ad pages up 5 percent. But the Condé Nast title isn't taking anything for granted, launching a campaign to woo the advertising community.

Beginning Thursday, Vanity Fair will send out a weekly email newsletter called “The List” to 1,000 people in the agency world. The e-newsletter includes highlights from the magazine’s website, print edition, and its Cultural Agenda promotional blog. (It also reminds recipients to contact their local sales rep if they’re not on the magazine’s comp list.)

Each month, 50 people from “The List” will receive a hand-delivered red envelope containing a prize that ties into the magazine’s content. On May 14, 49 list members will get an AMC gift card to see The Bling Ring, the new Sofia Coppola film profiled in the June issue of Vanity Fair (and based on a 2010 VF article by contributor Nancy Jo Sales), while one will get a ticket to the movie’s premiere instead. Other future prizes could include items from the magazine’s Fanfair section or tickets to a Vanity Fair event—like its fabled Oscar party.

“Our goal with this program is to create new and exciting points of entry for media audiences to engage with the Vanity Fair brand,” vp, publisher Edward Menicheschi said in a statement.

Bloomberg Apologizes for Reporters' Use of Financial Terminal Data

Maura McGowan — Mon, 13 May 2013 14:37:32 GMT

After Bloomberg disclosed that its journalists used its proprietary financial data terminals to monitor clients and score scoops, the company apologized and the Federal Reserve and Treasury threatened inquiries, The New York Times reported.

"The error is inexcusable," editor in chief Matthew Winkler said in an editorial this morning.

Until April, reporters had access to data for more than 315,000 terminal clients, including Wall Street traders, regulators and central bankers. Reporters could see whether a client had logged into a Bloomberg terminal and whether the person was using message or chat functions or looking up news stories, though they could not see the content of any of these functions.

Bloomberg chief executive Daniel Doctoroff told the Associated Press that reporters never had access to "trader, portfolio, monitor, blotter or other related systems or our clients' messages."

Reporters used their special access primarily to get contact information for subscribers.

Bloomberg eliminated terminal data access for the news division in April, following a complaint from Goldman Sachs, a company that pays Bloomberg millions of dollars a year to rent the financial terminals. Goldman voiced concern after reporters investigated the possible dismissal of a Goldman employee after the person had not logged into a Bloomberg terminal for weeks.

J.P. Morgan voiced concern that Bloomberg was using private information to monitor Bruno Iksil, "The London Whale," who was responsible for a $6 billion trading loss last year.

The Federal Reserve and the Treasury are looking into whether chairman Ben Bernanke and former Treasury secretary Timothy Geithner were monitored, according to The Washington Post.

Babe Ruth Makes Cameo in Jockey's New Ad

Andrew McMains — Mon, 13 May 2013 13:59:03 GMT

Yes, Babe Ruth used to endorse the Jockey brand, but there’s another reason his image appears in a new ad for Jockey Sport underwear that breaks today.

You see, beyond his talents as a home run hitter, the Babe was a man’s man, known to enjoy his hot dogs and social life as much as the regular guys that Jockey is targeting in its new “Get real” campaign from NSG/SWAT. So Ruth’s cameo in the campaign’s initial TV ad works strategically as well as historically.

“He played right into the real athlete positioning,” said Dustin Cohn, chief marketing officer at Jockey in Kenosha, Wis. “It wasn’t just a celebrity professional athlete. It was a guy who was at the top of his game but was a real guy.”

Ah, but the Babe takes up but a few seconds in an 30-second ad that mainly focuses on modern day sports men in sweaty settings: a weight room, a basketball court and a soccer field. Those guys represent the 25- to 39-year-olds that Jockey hopes will buy a new line of underwear that dries fast and resists odor.

While the TV ad is hard-driving and macho—with quick cuts and shots of the product being tested in a biometrics lab—print ads use humor to get their points across. One print execution features an image of two guys playing one-on-one basketball under the headline, “Smell like victory. Not your friend Victor.”

The campaign, which also includes digital ads and online video, represents NSG/SWAT's first advertising work for Jockey, which uses agencies on a project basis. Cohn greenlit the effort after the New York shop, which is led by Richard Kirshenbaum, Troy Lumpkin and Miles Skinner, developed an in-store presentation of Jockey Sport for retailers about a year ago.

Another Jockey agency, Coyne PR, is handling social outreach for “Get real,” distributing samples of the new underwear to bloggers and influential amateur athletes via health clubs and recreational sports leagues, according to Cohn. The initial focus is on markets such as New York, Los Angeles, Chicago and Miami.

While Jockey’s past media spending has been relatively modest—about $8 million last year, up from less than $5 million in 2011, according to Nielsen—spending behind the new ads represents a “significant step up” and the most support in about a decade, Cohn said. That said, he declined to reveal the budget behind for effort, which launches this week and will have a second phase in the fall.

Connie Anne Phillips Leaves InStyle

Lucia Moses — Sat, 11 May 2013 01:10:32 GMT

More talent is leaving Time Inc. as the company prepares for its spinoff from Time Warner. Connie Anne Phillips has exited fashion/beauty giant InStyle, where she was publisher of four years.

Resumes are said to be flying amid the uncertainty around the spinoff and as the search plods on for a new CEO to replace Laura Lang, who is slated to leave after the spinoff. Earlier this spring, Paul Caine left as CRO.

Another higher-up, chief research and insights officer Betsy Frank, also recently exited the company after almost seven years there. From the sales ranks, Aaron Gallagher left as digital sales director.

To be fair, the door has swung the other way, too; the company's recent hires include Moritz Loew, vp of sales for Time; and Edward Felsenthal, m.e. of Time.com.

Phillips came to InStyle in 2009 after 14 years at Vogue. In her time at InStyle, said to be one of the company’s most profitable titles, she’s led the magazine to 14 straight months of ad page growth with the March issue.

The news apparently took insiders by surprise, but by mid-afternoon, a succession plan was in place. Phillips will replaced by Karin Tracy, who is moving over from Entertainment Weekly (but spent a year as AP at the title prior to moving to EW). Melissa Mattiace, who was AP of EW, will be promoted to publisher.

The announcement was made by David Geithner, evp and group president of Time Inc.’s Style & Entertainment Group.

“After five very successful years as the Publisher of InStyle, Connie Anne Phillips has decided to take some time off before exploring new challenges,” Geithner wrote.

Roger Black Moves to Asia, Where Print is Growing

Lucia Moses — Fri, 10 May 2013 17:57:09 GMT

Roger Black’s name is synonymous with U.S. magazine design, but the days of the expensive, ambitious magazine design are over. Today, Black announced that he is moving to Hong Kong to head design for the Swiss publisher Edipresse in Asia, best known for its Tatler series of high-end society magazines.

Perhaps the most prolific of his kind, Black made his reputation working on publications like Rolling Stone, Esquire and The New York Times Magazine, but also titles like Reader’s Digest and the National Enquirer. He embraced digital technology, working on sites like MSNBC.com and Bloomberg.com and helping create a digital publishing platform, Treesaver. In 2012, he received a lifetime achievement award from the Society for News Design.

Yet the U.S. print industry declined, and with it, the money for Roger Black redesigns. Black gave up his gracious New York apartment. “The old studio ideas of going around the U.S. and designing newspapers and magazines is not a good business anymore,” said Black (who’s as upbeat as ever, even when he’s talking about how grim the magazine business has become). “I’ve had this a lot—‘Let’s get Roger!’" Black paused for effect. "‘He’s so expensive.’”

At Edipresse Asia, which will be his first in-house position since he left Newsweek 25 years ago, he’ll be able to get back into designing magazines. “The great thing about going over there is, print is growing,” he explained. “It’s an emerging market, there are more newspapers and magazines, and advertising is still bringing in money.” Black said Edipresse is “very lean, but they’re willing to spend money where it’s going to count.”

Black said the U.S. magazine business had become too dependent on big, ad-supported audiences rather than circulation revenue, an assessment few would dispute. “The real come-to-Jesus moment was when the CPM model did not work on the Web,” he said. Then, tablets came along, and magazines have largely gone with a replica approach (all the better to preserve their subscription model) instead of reinventing the medium for the device.

Black will keep homes in St. Pete Beach, Fla., and Marathon, Texas.

Politico Enters the Realm of Native Advertising

David Taintor — Thu, 09 May 2013 21:28:03 GMT

Politico, chronicler of all things Washington, D.C., made a foray into native advertising on Thursday with a sponsored post from the National Retail Federation displayed prominently on the site's homepage. And in another attempt to up its revenue base, the political news organization also announced that it will experiment with a metered paywall starting next week.

First, the sponsored post. The company had been discussing sponsored content for a couple of months, and everything got squared away with the business and editorial sides of the operation last month, said Jim VandeHei, Politico's co-founder and executive editor.

"Obviously our business side feels very strongly that this is a trend that's here to stay in the advertising space," he told Adweek.

Other more traditional news organizations have entered the native ad space in recent months to varying degrees of success. The Washington Post announced a native ad program in March to little hoopla, but The Atlantic ran a spectacularly ill-received native ad for Scientology in January. The New York Times, meanwhile, doesn't seem likely to run native ads anytime soon.

VandeHei said there hasn't been much fuss from readers over the sponsored post, adding that audiences are pretty accepting of this type of advertising as long as it's clearly labeled. So readers can expect more or the same in the future, he said.

Politico will also begin testing a metered paywall starting late next week in Iowa, North Dakota, Vermont, Mississippi, New Mexico and Wyoming states and overseas, according to a blog post by Politico's Dylan Byers.

"We will experiment with a few different price points and page limits to find the sweet spot for our readership. We chose smaller states, spread across the country, so our experiment captures any regional trends and also limits any potential loss of traffic to the site. This will last at least six months, so we have a large enough sample to appraise the results," wrote Politico bosses VandeHei, John Harris, and Kim Kingsley in a memo to staff.

Like native advertising, VandeHei said readers have grown accustomed to paying for editorial content. And it appears Politico wants to jump on both trends.

But don't expect a Politico paywall to come to the Washington, D.C. area anytime soon. The memo touted robust advertiser interest in the D.C. market, and Politico doesn't want to lose any traffic in the area. "We want and need that traffic in D.C. because the desire of advertisers to reach our elite audience here is exceptionally strong. For you non-business folks, that is a very good problem to face," the memo stated.

Read the company's full memo at Politico.

AOL Names Cyndi Stivers EIC of Homepage

Lucia Moses — Thu, 09 May 2013 19:14:30 GMT

AOL has named Cyndi Stivers as editor in chief of AOL.com as it tries to make the portal relevant to Web surfers again.

The appointment is important in terms of Stivers’ editorial heft and her mandate. Her background spans a wide breadth of platforms and verticals, including print (Vanity Fair, Time Out New York), radio (Martha Stewart’s satellite radio channel) and online (serving as managing editor of EW.com and launching Premiere on CompuServe). Most recently, she was editor in chief of the Columbia Journalism Review.

At AOL, which is focusing more attention to its portal after building a collection of acquisitions including the Huffington Post and TechCrunch while investing heavily in the local venture Patch, Stivers will be charged with making the homepage a destination, drawing from content AOL-homegrown and otherwise.

“We are looking at AOL.com to be more than just a way station to send people off to all our different brands, where you can be informed and entertained at any time of the day,” said Susan Lyne, who came on as CEO of the AOL Brand Group in February to grow its own brands and content.

That may be a tall order for AOL, which now ranks 15 in U.S. traffic behind sites like Google, Facebook and Amazon, per Alexa rankings (although comScore had AOL at No. 6 in March). Lyne believes AOL has an opening, however, because “people are looking for curation, they’re looking for someone to identify what’s important and what they might like.” She said to look for a redesign in the third quarter.

Lyne said she had the chance to see Stivers’ editorial experience in action when the two worked together before, at Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia and Premiere.

“I’ve watched her hire, train, create an agenda and a highly functioning team of people,” Lyne said. “She’s an idea factory, she reads more than anybody I know and is just on the Web constantly. She’s also just got the creative gene that allows her to come up with great ideas and franchises. She’s just had a long history of covering virtually everything in society and culture.”

Stivers' hire apparently came as a surprise to her. When she came down for her first meeting, she thought she was just giving hiring advice, and ended up being offered the position. "I didn't think I was going there to apply for a job," she said.

Stivers acknowledged AOL has some perception issues, as longstanding brands often do. "AOL’s been around a long time, but if you think of it as a place with the little discs and dial-up, you’re going to be missing a lot. There will be a lot of exciting stuff going on at the home page, and there’s a lot of stuff that can be surfaced better, too."

Stivers is set to start in early June and will report to Chris Grosso, gm of AOL Homepages.

Daily News Layoffs Continue

Maura McGowan — Thu, 09 May 2013 18:53:56 GMT

The Daily News is undergoing a rash of layoffs, Capital New York reported. Around 15 employees were given pink slips yesterday, with another round of cuts planned for today.

The Daily News has not had such a large-scale downsizing since editor-in-chief Colin Myler took over in November 2011. Myler attributed the cuts to a "restructuring" effort that will emphasize digital.

It has been a tumultuous day for New York news media. At The Village Voice, editor-in-chief Will Bourne and deputy editor Jessica Lustig stepped down rather than oversee a round of layoffs. The New York Post has also been hit by cutbacks, offering voluntary buyouts in order to downsize the staff by 10 percent as News Corp. plans to divest its publishing properties and entertainment assets.

Hearst Magazines Hires President of Digital Media

Emma Bazilian — Thu, 09 May 2013 14:57:07 GMT

Hearst Magazines has put a lot of resources into developing its digital assets, and now the company is creating a new position to oversee its efforts. Today, Hearst announced that it hired Troy Young as president of Hearst Magazines Digital Media. Young will oversee digital content, technology, operations, revenue, product and business development strategies across all of Hearst’s online brands, according to the company.

Young, who said he has spent the past several months advising Hearst, is steeped in digital. Between 2010 and 2012, he was the president of Say Media, parent of sites like Jane Pratt’s xoJane and tech blog ReadWrite. Prior to that, he was chief experience officer of Omnicom’s digital agency Organic and has held board and advisory positions at digital companies like Refinery29 (a fashion, lifestyle and e-commerce site in which Hearst is an investor) Spinmedia (formerly BuzzMedia) and ticket sales platform CrowdSurge.

Troy’s “pure-play” experience was a key part of his hiring, said Hearst Magazines president David Carey. “We admire the common thread of innovation that digital entrepreneurs are bringing to the space by being less rigid and taking greater risks than some of the large-scale companies,” he said. “In identifying and hiring Troy, we realized that’s the path we need to be on.”

One of Young’s initial goals will be to push Hearst’s digital side from the month-to-month thinking of a magazine publisher to the moment-to-moment schedule of a digital company. “I think that’s the big theme: How do we move really quickly and learn to develop a relationship with the consumer every minute of the day?” he said.

Many of the companies Young has been involved with—including Say Media and Refinery29—have been heavily involved in native advertising, which Young is planning to bring more of to Hearst’s brands.

“Content marketing is a huge part of what we’ll do, and a huge part of what differentiates us from other platforms,” Young said. “We create an unbelievable amount of content across the brands, and it’s an important mechanism to build a relationship with a consumer for the advertiser. I think that’s what’s special about the organization.”

Meet the Most Powerful Woman at Condé Nast

Lucia Moses — Thu, 09 May 2013 10:49:54 GMT

Many at Condé Nast aren’t sure what Jill Bright does, but they are sure of one thing: She’s one of the most powerful people at the company.

“So powerful, she’s scary” is actually how many describe Bright, 50.

Bright’s title is chief administrative officer, but a more fitting one might be consigliere to CEO Chuck Townsend. And while “scary” may not be the first word one associates with human resources, at a privately held, talent-driven company that historically has had no obvious org chart or formal employee-review process, Condé Nast’s HR apparatus wields considerable influence over careers and often-lucrative pay and perks.

Jill Bright Photo: Dimitrios Kambouris/Getty Images

Bright joined the publisher as a mid-level HR executive in 1993, working under Pamela van Zandt, a kingmaker at the time. “You weren’t going anywhere unless Pam was behind you,” recalled a former executive. “Pam was very close to Si [Newhouse, chairman of Condé Nast parent Advance Publications], and Jill was a junior person on that team. Jill saw a very powerful head of HR.”

Bright ran the department from 1996 to 2010, when she was named chief administrative officer, a newly created role overseeing corporate communications and strategic planning. It was a time of major change at Condé Nast, which had just named Bob Sauerberg president in a play for new revenue streams outside advertising. As if to add to the mystery surrounding Bright’s reinvention, the company described her role in a jargon-laden announcement as someone who would “coordinate strategic business initiatives” and assess “organizational effectiveness, providing important guidance on people, productivity and alignment.”

In an interview at Condé Nast’s 4 Times Square headquarters Wednesday, Bright described her role as wide-ranging, a behind-the-scenes “chief of staff” who counsels the brands and keeps the company on its road map. It's often noted that Bright now oversees areas in which she lacks direct experience. Bright allowed that “it wouldn’t necessarily be a logical move” for an HR exec to follow her career path. But, she said, “We are a very talent-driven company, and [with] my appreciation for how the company works and my key relationships with the people, I think I’m very attune to know how to assist them.” She added that she also has an MBA (NYU’s Stern).

Early on, Bright decentralized the PR department so that individual magazine publicists reported directly to their brands. She then got rid of the old guard. Longtime communications chief Maurie Perl was sidelined, then shown the door in January. Bright shook up the new guard, too, letting go svp Patricia Steele just last Friday, a move that has renewed chatter about her power at the company.

Bright’s ascension coincides with a renewed interest in elevating the Condé Nast corporate brand.

It’s been a few years since the company let its “Point of Passion” campaign lapse. Meantime, rival Hearst has unleashed its own brand positioning, “Unbound,” and it pushes harder into Condé Nast’s space with fashion books Harper’s Bazaar, Marie Claire and Cosmopolitan.

“There’s a fairly healthy paranoia about Hearst now that [former Condé Nast executive] David Carey is there,” one Condé Nast sales exec said. “Jill’s there to burnish the Condé Nast crown.”

The recent appointment of Vogue editor Anna Wintour to artistic director, the staging of multibrand events at Art Basel in Miami Beach last December and at the Four Seasons to celebrate the National Magazine Award nominations, and hiring of the Tribeca Film Festival’s Patty Newburger as vp, special projects all point to an effort to elevate the corporate identity. “We’re not looking to replace the brands,” Bright said, adding, “Wouldn’t it be great if there was a Condé Nast event” that leveraged their influence. (Given that Bright is seen as a stand-in for Townsend, it would be hard to imagine her not persuading editors to rally behind her.) Bright’s publicity strategy involves more swagger than the company has displayed in the past, as evidenced by a congratulatory ad for the magazine awards that read: “We’re kind of a big deal.”

Bright may be inscrutable, but the question of how someone who’s not in a revenue-producing role or advancing a new business model could become so important at the company is one of endless debate inside its walls. When it comes to talk of succession, Bright’s name is mentioned in the same breath as Townsend and family scions Steve and Jonathan Newhouse. To be sure, her institutional knowledge, political instincts and negotiating skills are all solid.

“She understands the people dynamics, organizational behavior,” said former Fairchild president Mary Berner. She's also close to Townsend, who emailed that "Jill is a key member of my executive committee and has been an instrumental force in moving the Condé Nast agenda forward. Quite simply, she artfully embodies Condé Nast's commitment to excellence, quality and innovation—and she does so in her own unique, elegant way."

Bright comes across as warm, but extremely guarded. When Adweek approached her about an interview, Patti Röckenwagner, her new svp of corporate communications, asked whether the talk could begin on background, explaining that Bright prefers not to be in the spotlight. Bright started our conversation by revealing it was her first with a reporter, and during the 45-minute interview, deferred frequently to Röckenwagner.

When asked at one point about her identity as a minority woman at the company (Bright is African-American), she claimed not to think about it, saying, “I don’t think of myself, so I don’t really think other people might think about it. I think I’m very Condé Nast.” Bright seemed to immediately regret her choice of words, commenting, with a glance over at Röckenwagner, “I knew I was going to get in trouble.”

Bright’s lack of forward-facing experience may be a stumbling block as she transitions into a more public role. Her tight-lipped style may have worked in HR, with its requirement of confidentiality, but in communications, people are used to more transparency. She’s known for not returning emails. Shortly after she took over PR, people saw her imprint in a company wide memo from Townsend that took jargon to a new level with phrases like “multiplatform, integrated sales and marketing organization” and “commitment to consumer centricity.” Said the sales-side exec, “She’s really good at understanding the talent piece. The only Achilles heel she has is, she operates in the shadows.”

How Bright’s ascension plays out may depend somewhat on how Bob Sauerberg defines his own role at the company. Sauerberg now oversees HR, along with technology and consumer marketing. (It was he who named Bright’s HR replacement, JoAnn Murray.) Sauerberg is the presumed successor to Townsend, 69. That said, his lack of sales background is seen as limiting, and the jury’s still out on his big initiatives in consumer marketing and digital video. If Sauerberg doesn’t succeed, could Bright be waiting in the wings?

Some thought it telling that at a recent publishers’ meeting, it was Bright who made the rallying speech. When the announcement came that Lou Cona was being promoted to president and CRO of the media group, gossip had it that Bright had her eye on his old CMO title.

Asked about that, Bright responded, with a nod to her boss, “I’m not angling for the job. I like the job I have very much. I think, honestly, Chuck thinks he’s got that title.”

The New Yorker Saw Record-Breaking Web Traffic Last Month

Emma Bazilian — Thu, 09 May 2013 04:17:02 GMT

The New Yorker has been putting a premium on Web content in the past year, launching new verticals like Books and Humor and features like the "Double Take" archives blog and daily cartoons and publishing more online-only reporting. That digital push appears to have paid off: April was the best traffic month ever for NewYorker.com, with 10.7 million unique monthly visitors (a massive 129 percent year-over-year increase) and more than 33 million page views. (Outside web analytics firm ComScore, which typically reports lower traffic numbers than publishers' internal ones, recorded 3.8 million monthly desktop uniques for NewYorker.com in April—still a 108 percent year-over-year increase.)

Some of the most popular stories for April included an article on The Saudi Marathon Man, several Andy Borowitz posts in the Humor vertical, an interactive New York Subway infographic (which received more than 500,000 hits) and David Remnick’s article about the Boston bombers. Notably, four of the five top Web stories were digital exclusives.

According to NewYorker.com editor Nicholas Thompson, the magazine’s editorial team has become much more engaged with the digital side, especially as its quality (and, in turn, traffic) increases. “We’re definitely encouraging writers to do more Web-original stories,” he said. “When the site is better, people are more enthusiastic about writing for it…There are some positive feedback loops that are created by the excitement for the Web.” A new emphasis on breaking news stories has also attracted readers, Thompson added: “When the Boston bombings happened, we knew how to react. The Internet wants to read smart takes on what’s in the news right now.”

Technical changes—from basic SEO improvements to tweaking the magazine’s Facebook open graph integrations, among various other back-end repairs—have also helped to boost traffic, said Thompson.

While traffic increased, advertising also saw a sizable boost. Between January and April of 2013, NewYorker.com ad dollars were up 118 percent year-over-year, with growth coming from sectors like enterprise technology, financial services, luxury and automotive. (The introduction of the Business and Tech verticals played a big part in attracting these new advertisers, according to a magazine rep.)

Media Industry Rallies to Help Magazine Designer Bob Newman

Emma Bazilian — Wed, 08 May 2013 17:42:39 GMT

Charitable crowdfunding gets plenty of attention whenever there’s a newsworthy disaster (take the recent Boston Marathon bombings, for instance), but plenty of homegrown efforts are constantly providing help to individuals in need across the country—like Bob Newman, a media industry vet whose friends and colleagues are now rallying to raise money for his recovery following a severe head injury.

Newman, a graphic designer, has a long history in the magazine world. He’s been the design director of New York, Details and Fortune (among others), creative director at Real Simple and Reader's Digest, and currently runs an independent design firm that has worked with titles like Southern Living, O, TV Guide, AARP magazine, and Adweek, where he consulted on our very own iPad launch last fall.

In March, while visiting his mother in Florida, Newman suffered a seizure and collapsed, suffering severe head trauma and a brain hemorrhage in the process. Newman fell into a coma and was put on a respirator. Following several days in critical condition, he stabilized enough to be transferred to the Weill Cornell Presbyterian Hospital in New York and is now at an NYU rehab facility.

By then, his friends had already started a Friends of Bob Newman group on Facebook, but wanted to do something more—especially as Newman’s medical bills piled up, many not covered by insurance. Newman, a freelancer, doesn’t have a regular salary, and after Reader’s Digest filed for bankruptcy (again) earlier this year, the company suspended the severance pay owed to Newman after he left his post as creative director.

So Newman’s friends launched a monetary fund to contribute to Newman’s recovery via crowdfunding platform DonationTo. Their initial goal was to raise $50,000 and thanks to the help of Newman’s friends and magazine colleagues—the contributor list reads like a who’s-who of the media industry, including Time Inc. editor in chief Martha Nelson, former editor in chief John Huey, designer Joe Zeff, Bloomberg Businessweek creative director Richard Turley, and longtime Time magazine art director Arthur Hochstein—the fund has already raised nearly $34,000.

Click here for more information and to donate to the Friends of Bob Newman fund.

Jill Abramson Isn't a Fan of Native Advertising

Emma Bazilian — Wed, 08 May 2013 14:59:37 GMT

New York Times executive editor Jill Abramson isn't a fan of native advertising. At yesterday’s Wired Business Conference, which attracted some of the biggest names in tech and media, Abramson essentially wrote it off as confusing for the consumer.

In a Q&A with Wired editor in chief Scott Dadich, Abramson expressed reservations about sponsored content. “What I worry about is…leaving confusion in readers' minds about where the content comes from, and purposefully making advertising look like a news story,” she said. “I think that some of what is being done with native advertising does confuse a little too much.”

BuzzFeed CEO and founder Jonah Peretti and a cheerleader for the medium, for his part, told Wired editor Bill Wasick that one of the biggest mistakes content creators make is churning out native ads that are “second rate news articles” rather than entertaining, sharable stories. “You have to do a test where you say, ‘If I we a consumer would I click on this or share this?’”

Perhaps the best-known example of a failed native ad—The Atlantic’s much-maligned Scientology post—didn’t pass that test, said Peretti. But the backlash, he said, was not simply because the ad was about Scientology; it was also due to the ad’s poor execution. So what would be a “clickable” Scientology ad? Peretti suggested a video of Tom Cruise getting his e-meter reading. (Then again, he added, “If what you're doing is corrupt and evil and shrouded in secrecy, it's much harder to do authentic advertising.”)

Abramson was also much more conservative when it came to the role of reporting via social media. While she said that she was most concerned with Times being competitive and getting the story as quickly as possible, she also made sure that nothing would be reported before it had been absolutely confirmed. In the case of the Boston Marathon story, Abramson said, “what was first and foremost in my mind was that our standard was understood by everyone,” adding that she had gone into the newsroom at 1:15 A.M. on the night of the manhunt because she was worried that reporters might pick up a story from an authoritative outlet that “looked” right but wasn’t. “It’s really important to lower the noise,” she said.

Peretti and Abramson also shared what they learned from recent Boston coverage. At BuzzFeed, according to Peretti, the Boston bombing proved the site’s growth as a destination for breaking news: When the news first broke, traffic to the BuzzFeed homepage began spiking even before any stories had been posted, he said. Meanwhile, Abramson saw the Times’ bombing coverage as a marker of its digital maturity when asked by Dadich to compare it with the newspaper’s 9/11 coverage. “Back then,” she said, “the only thing we were worried about was the next day’s paper.” Now, “it seems like a completely different news operation.”

The conference’s last speaker, Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer, said pushing media content—especially video—is important for Yahoo’s growth. The company’s approach, she said, is a tiered one: It will continue to create a small tier of original content (like its web series “Burning Love,” which was picked by E!), curate a larger tier content from outside sources, and the majority of content will be user-generated videos. Mayer described herself as a newbie to the world of content creation. While the tech side of her new position came naturally, given her Google roots, “the media aspect is new and different for me,” she said.

Mayer also addressed her decision to end the work-from-home option for Yahoo employees, which has been the source of much media attention. “I didn't mean for it to become an industry narrative, but it’s just not right for us right now,” she said. “People are more collaborative and inventive when they work together.” (Such was the case with Yahoo’s new photo-enabled weather app: It only came together because one of the Flickr developers ran into someone from the weather group in the office.)

When asked what her ultimate goal for Yahoo was, Mayer was bold in her prediction: “Being on every smartphone, tablet and PC, every day for every Internet user,” she said. “It’s not that far off…But we need to grow.”

Associated Press Updates Social Media Guidelines

David Taintor — Tue, 07 May 2013 21:53:53 GMT

The Associated Press announced an update to its social media guidelines, with a focus in part on potentially dangerous or sensitive stories, like the recent terrorist attack in Boston.

"When there’s been a mass killing, a natural disaster or a breaking event in a war zone, AP journalists need to use every tool at their disposal to get the story—and, when possible, the images," AP Social Media Editor Eric Carvin and AP Standards Editor Tom Kent wrote in a blog post. "As always, we need to work quickly. But when potential sources of newsworthy tips, witness accounts and amateur content are in dangerous or otherwise sensitive situations, it’s critical that we make smart and ethical news gathering decisions."

While that last sentence will surely evoke images of the Boston Marathon bombing, given the misinformation that flowed on Twitter from various media sources, Carvin told Adweek that the guidelines actually predate the attack. "We've been working on this for several weeks," he said.

The AP's official guidelines encourage staffers to be "sensitive and thoughtful" when reaching out to potential sources on social media who might be in harm's way or who have suffered a personal loss. "Staffers should use their journalistic instincts to determine whether inquiring through social media is appropriate at all given the source’s difficult circumstances, and should consult with a manager in making this decision," the AP's social media guidelines say.

The guidelines also urge AP employees not to circulate rumors. "Staffers should always refrain from spreading unconfirmed rumors online, regardless of whether other journalists or news outlets have shared the reports; because of staffers’ affiliation with AP, doing so could lend credence to reports that may well be incorrect."

Carvin explained the reasoning behind this particular point: "We see a tweet as publishing, just as if we were to put something out on the AP wire or distribute it through one of our digital products or broadcast it in a live TV feed."

Other updates refer to handling news that breaks on prominent social media accounts and how staffers can use personal websites to show off their work for the news organization.

Read the updated social media guidelines here.

Dove Magazine Ad Uses Carbon Paper to Show How Abusive Words Don't Fade

David Gianatasio — Tue, 07 May 2013 15:07:30 GMT

The Dove Self Esteem Project and agency Torke+CC in Lisbon, Portugal, placed an ad (and a pen) in a parenting magazine and asked adults to write down the worst thing they remembered being called as a child. When they turned the page, the disparaging remark was printed (thanks to a hidden layer of carbon paper) across the shirt of a child—to illustrate that "Words mark children forever." The initiative increased the project's local Web traffic 20 percent and helped get schools involved in the program. That's all to the good, but I can't help feeling that the campaign's central metaphor is lacking and dilutes the overall message. A shirt is easily removed and discarded. It's highly impermanent. The pain of verbal abuse is more like a tattoo or a wound, something carved or seared into flesh that leaves its victims more permanently disfigured. Of course, attempting such visceral imagery, especially when kids are involved, might have provoked an outcry against the campaign itself. As it is, the work is well-intentioned and makes its point, but doesn't truly capture the lasting horror of abuse that can indeed scar or brand children for life.

Hearst Reaches Goal of 1 Million Tablet Subscribers

Maura McGowan — Mon, 06 May 2013 15:59:32 GMT

Hearst has met what seemed like a lofty goal, according to Mashable: 1 million tablet subscribers for its print portfolio—which includes Cosmopolitan, Esquire and Popular Mechanics. This is an increase of 400,000 since the end of 2011.

Hearst did not meet its goal until the end of March because of a surprise slowdown in the digital subscription market. Growth rate fell from 10 percent to15 percent at the end of 2011 to 5 percent to 7 percent in the summer and fall of 2012; since then, it has climbed back to 10 percent.

Cosmo alone boasts a digital circulation of 175,269—6 percent of the magazine's total circulation.

John Loughlin, executive vp of Hearst, attributes digital subscription expansion to better-targeted email campaigns and a marketing campaign by all-you-can-read monthly tablet app Next Issue Media. Loughlin told Mashable that sampler issues in Apple's newsstand led to "meaningful conversions," boosted by app content pulled from magazines' websites.

Hearst's digital subscriptions still only represent a little over 3 percent of its total customer base. The numbers reflect the fact that tablet subscriptions were not common until iTunes began supporting them in mid-2011, and Hearst has been slow to adopt a digital model because profit margins for digital are far lower than those for print. Another factor is affordability for the consumer. Because digital storefronts like iTunes take a 30 percent cut, Hearst's digital titles tend to be more expensive than their print versions, and Hearst also does not give away a free tablet edition as does Condé Nast.

In February, president David Carey said that he thinks Hearst will have 3 million digital subscribers—10 percent of the company's total subscribers—by 2016.

Fortune 500 Issue Boasts Record Ad Paging

Emma Bazilian — Mon, 06 May 2013 12:00:02 GMT

The economy may still be in recovery, but the indicators are good for Fortune magazine: this year's Fortune 500 has the most ad pages of any Fortune issue since 2004. With 193 ads (and a total 356 pages), the magazine's biggest franchise is up 36 year-over-year in ad pages, including 75 advertisers who didn’t appear in last year’s issue.

Jed Hartman, group publisher for news and business at Time Inc., said some of the issue’s biggest ad growth came from the automotive, travel, and fashion categories (auto was up 79 year-over-year, while fashion rose 21 percent).

Major ad buys came from clients like tech company Box, which bought banner strips across 26 pages in the print issue and on Fortune.com, as well as a custom mailing that went out to Fortune 500 CEOs and CMOs. The Hartford, CDW and Nationwide participated in a new series of branded advertorials called “company spotlights” that puts custom company profiles (written by Fortune’s marketing team) next to their regular ads.

Hartman said this year’s Fortune 500 issue will also look different from its predecessors, due to the oversight of Fortune’s new creative director Brandon Kavulla, who joined the magazine from Wired in March.

The issue, which ranks the top U.S. companies by gross revenue (the total for 2012: $820 billion), is being fêted with the second “Fortune 500 Day,” which includes a reveal on CBS This Morning and a special Empire State Building lighting in red, white and blue.

Michael Smerconish Says Talk Radio Is Like Pro-Wrestling: Fake

Katy Bachman — Mon, 06 May 2013 03:08:12 GMT

Specs
Who Michael Smerconish
Age 51
New gig Host, Michael Smerconish Program on SiriusXM’s P.O.T.U.S. channel
Old gig Midday host, WPHT-AM, Philadelphia. Continues as fill-in host on MSNBC’s Hardball, Philadelphia Inquirer columnist, author.

Why leave 80 stations and a big audience for sat radio?
Talk radio has changed since I cut my teeth in the business. It’s all about fake fights, the pro wrestling of the new millennium. It’s evolved into something that is too old, too white, too male and too nasty. It’s all about this false, ideological divide that I’m not a part of. This will allow me to deliver a program without regard for the fact that I’m surrounded by people who want to kick the crap out of Obama whether he deserves it or not.

Where did talk radio go wrong?
Conservatives rightfully believed they had no place to go pre-Internet. So they established a beachhead in talk radio. What it’s done is it has taken Washington with it.

Is that why our politics are polarized?
Absolutely. Capitol Hill is taking its direction from people with microphones … entertainers who rely on talking points to stir the pot. Polarized politics rose during the same period that’s seen the rise of the polarized media. They are directly interconnected.

Is there anybody in talk radio or on cable that is doing it right?
Larry David. He really understands what makes people tick.

So what should political talk be?
A more accurate representation of who’s out there. If you landed here from Mars and turned on a radio station or watched cable news, you’d think the world was divided from the left and the right. The single largest growing demographic is not Democrats and not Republicans; they are people like me who say, “I’ve had enough of both of them.”

How do you describe your politics?
Independent. I’m a believer in the death penalty. I believe in a strong defense. I’m a firearm owner. But I’m also pro-choice. I believe we should legalize pot and prostitution.

No wonder you gave Republicans conniptions when you flipped in 2008.
They demand purity. It’s a little creepy, frankly.

P.O.T.U.S. will accept advertising for the first time. How will you lure advertisers when many of them think talk radio is too controversial?
I am paying the price because of what Rush Limbaugh said about the coed from Georgetown [Sandra Fluke]. When it first happened, I said, “This is going to be good for my program.” What I learned is, there is a host of people that said they were done with spoken word generally.

How can you overcome that advertiser perception at SiriusXM?
This channel doesn’t have that brand problem. There are a number of advertisers that are coming over with me from terrestrial radio.

You’ve interviewed several presidents and vice presidents, including Obama seven times. Who did you like best?
Bush 41. I don’t think he gets his just due. If you came into my studio in Philly, there are two presidential portraits hanging there. Bush is one, and Obama is the other.

Anyone you didn’t like?
Jimmy Carter was a bit of a pain in the ass. When I asked him about Alan Dershowitz being unhappy with his book, Carter just exploded on me.

What’s your next book?
It’s a novel about a conflicted talk radio host who, the more he says things with which he personally disagrees, the higher his star rises. So the conflict builds over whether he’ll be true to himself or ride this baby to the end.

Is there anyone you had in mind?
A whole host of people.

New York Wins Magazine of the Year at ASME Awards

Emma Bazilian — Fri, 03 May 2013 02:45:01 GMT

New York was the big winner at tonight's National Magazine Awards, where it was named Magazine of the Year, beating out National Geographic, Time, Esquire and Glamour. New York also won the Magazine Section award for its “Strategist” section.

National Geographic, which led the nominations with eight nods, didn’t leave the ceremony at the New York Marriott Marquis empty-handed—in fact, editor in chief Chris Johns seemed to be a permanent fixture on the stage. The magazine took home four awards, for General Excellence in Print (News, Sports and Entertainment Magazines), Photography, Tablet Magazine and Multimedia.

Other General Excellence in Print winners were Vogue (for Service and Fashion Magazines), Martha Stewart Living (Lifestyle), Outside (Special Interest) and The Paris Review (Literary, Political and Professional). General Excellence in Digital Media went to indie music site Pitchfork, one of the night's two digital natives to win awards, known as Ellies for the elephant-shaped statuettes winners receive. (Slate also received an Ellie for Columns and Commentary.)

Other multiple award winners were The Atlantic and Texas Monthly, each of which took home two Ellies: The Atlantic for Website and Essays and Criticism, (which went to Ta-Nehisi Coates’ “Fear of a Black President”), and Texas Monthly for Feature Writing Incorporating Profile Writing for (“The Innocent Man: Part I” and “The Innocent Man: Part II” by Pamela Colloff) and Public Interest (“Mothers, Sisters, Daughters, Wives,” by Mimi Swartz).

Legendary graphic designers Milton Glaser and Walter Bernard received an honorary award for Creative Excellence, as well as a short video tribute and a standing ovation from the crowd.

The gala was hosted by Willie Geist, co-host of MSNBC’s Morning Joe and NBC’s Today show. (Geist noted that he also considered himself one of the evening's finalists, having contributed a story to Golf Digest's 2012 Masters Preview, which was nominated in the Leisure Interests category.) Aiding him in his presentation duties was Lucy Danziger, ASME president and editor in chief of Self, and Allison Williams, who presented the night's first award to Vogue editor Anna Wintour. Upon receiving the award—Vogue's first for General Excellence—Wintour gave a word of advice to the nominees who would be going home empty handed: "Just hang in there for 25 years and you might get lucky!"

The full list of winners can be found here.