Media 24’s new My Edit news aggregation app won’t impact on print sales of the titles from which it pulls content. In fact, it will benefit them.
Willem Breytenbach, general manager of the Media24 Magazines Digital Division, told The Media Online the app will help titles grow their audience and increase their exposure to new readers. “Many readers of the print publications are also willingly embracing the accessibility and functionality of the MyEdit App,” says Breytenbach.
The app, launched earlier this month, pulls stories from a wide range of titles such as YOU, DRUM, Fairlady, tvplus, Men’s Health, Finweek, Go!, Move! and True Love and aggregates it into 20 different categories that readers can then tailor to suit their reading tastes. Categories include news, sport, fashion, entertainment, food and finance.
Breytenbach says mobility and accessibility are “now more than a mere luxury and are instead absolute necessities for the modern consumer”.
That’s why Media24 Magazines wanted to “make sure that we followed our readers in their shift to mobile devices. Therefore, we developed a new digital platform called MyEdit which offers the content from our wide range of publications as well as external sources in print, image, video and audio formats”.
He says the app offers content from all Media 24 magazines and newspapers, which accounts for over 40 publication feeds and excluding the external bloggers and websites.
Breytenbach says although MyEdit has similar functionality to other aggregators such as Flipboard, it was not inspired by it. “The big difference between MyEdit and other aggregators is that we are aggregating our own content from our top brands and magazines which isn’t available on other online platforms,” he says.
How will it impact on advertising? Breytenbach says the app offers exisiting advertisers more options. “Advertisers who advertise on either digital or print magazines are also able to advertise on MyEdit due to the wide range of advertising opportunities available. MyEdit has taken a very unique approach to advertising as we do not want the ads to hamper the user’s experience. Instead, we offer many different types of advertising avenues for advertisers to enjoy and we can even tailor the ads to a specific type of user, meaning that only your exact target market will be reached if desired,” he says.
MyEdit is free to download from Apple app stores, but users need to buy ‘bundles’ of which there are five alternatives. Roann Louw, project manager of Visual Innovation for MyEdit, says bundles are convenient as they allow subscribers to choose what content they want. “In this way you can ensure that you read only what you’re interested in,” Louw says.
MyEdit puts the power in your hands,’’ says Nerisa Coetzee, head of digital product and brand at Media24 Magazines: Digital.
“The app is about putting you in charge; it’s about allowing you to create your own online platform where you decide what you want to read when you want to read it. Essentially you become the editor-in-charge of your own online platform,’’ says Coetzee.
Go to www.myedit.me or download MyEdit from the Apple App Store or via Google Play.
