Promotional Consideration: Advertising with Power, revisited

by Eric Caoili { May 11th 2008 at 7:00PM }

If you recall, back in November, we put up a short piece on the increasing number of ads in Nintendo Power after the magazine was handed over to Future US, the same publisher behind the official Xbox and PlayStation magazines.

Chris Slate, Nintendo Power's new editor in chief, explained the ad-bloated issues: "Love or hate the ads, their number should go down significantly over the next couple of issues as we move away from the busy holiday selling season. We saw a huge upswing in ad pages last month because more games than ever are being released right now for the red-hot Wii and DS. However, new titles will slow down midway through December, and the ads will follow suit."

So, now that we've put a few months in between us and December, has the magazine kept its promise, scaling back the number of ads in favor of delivering more news, reviews, and previews? Jump past the post break for the breakdown.

Nintendo Power (Future US),
Holiday 2007/V223

100 pages
Poster ads: 2
Two-page ads: 3
One-page ads: 29
1/2-page ads: 4

Nintendo Power (Future US),
June 2008/V229

100 pages
Two-page ads: 3
One-page ads: 22
1/3-page ads: 1
1/2-page ads: 1

True to its word, the magazine has decreased its advertising content since November, though that's not saying much, considering that 37% of the Holiday issue was an ad of some sort.

This month's Nintendo Power was still 28.88% ads, not counting the magazine's contest announcements, subscription offers, and other miscellaneous pages with little useful content for the average reader. To further illustrate just how much advertisements have taken over the magazine since the Future US switch, let's compare the numbers against Nintendo Power's Nintendo-published June issue from last year.

Nintendo Power (Nintendo),
June 2007/V216

116 pages
Two-page ads: 3
One-page ads: 10
1/2-page ads: 1

What a difference just a year makes! Our math shows 2007's June issue ad content at only 14.22%. The magazine had 16 more pages then, too, compared to the 100 pages that has become the norm. What does it all mean? Less pages and even less content.

Whatever keeps the magazine going, we suppose ... Considering the current market for video game magazines, what with DoubleJump cutting Hardcore Gamer down from a monthly to a quarterly publication and Ziff Davis Media terminating Games for Windows altogether, we're just happy to see Nintendo Power still alive.

Promotional Consideration is a weekly feature about the Nintendo DS advertisements you usually flip past, change the channel on, or just tune out.

Tags: advertising, future, magazine, nintendo-power, promotional-consideration, promotionalconsideration

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

Roto13 @ May 11th 2008 7:11PM

Why read Nintendo Power when there's DS/Wii Fanboy?

Jake @ May 11th 2008 7:18PM

Totally agree, it used to be rad though. Future US is MURDER!

Fululian @ May 11th 2008 7:20PM

What with DSFanboy tellin you to "jump past the """break""" " and many many ads scattered around this blog? Thankgod there's such thing as Adblock plus for Firefox.

Gewurztraminer says: R.O.B. is the last Cylon! @ May 11th 2008 8:20PM

I still find Nintendo Power to be a good read. Every now and then it's nice to get away from the glow of the computer screen and read physical print.

As far as the ads go, I really don't pay much attention anymore. They're occasionally amusing but usually have no bearing on my purchasing intentions. Plus, they don't have loud volume or impossible to close pop-up windows so all in all they're pretty tame.

I do miss the posters from Nintendo Power. It was usually a 50/50 chance of being for a game I liked but now it's a 0/0 chance, because they're MIA.

da3dAlus @ May 12th 2008 7:24AM

I used to be an NP subscriber from their 2nd year of publication until about 1997 (when I graduated high school). I loved that magazine because it was pretty much the only thing available for N-gamers (since big-N was 2nd only to Sega at the time). Anyway, I decided to subscribe again just after getting my Wii, so I received issues from Feb 2007 to Mar 2008. I also noticed the immediate increase in ads once Future US took over, and it was my prime complaint from the holiday issue forward. All I can say is that I will never renew my subscription, and I'm glad now that I have this article and the numbers to confirm my theory that the magazine has turned to complete crap.

ash @ May 12th 2008 3:04AM

hey i've been wondering...does gonintendo copy/paste your articles or is it the other way around? cause a lot (if not, all) of their ds posts are almost identical rip offs of yours. either you guys are sibling sites or somebody is a copy kitty. hmmm
either way i still love your site. i just don't like discredited work. :/

Eric Caoili @ May 12th 2008 6:48AM

if you look at the bottom of gonintendo's post, there's a link back to us crediting this post. every promotional consideration is an original bit of text i've spent a good chunk of my sundays writing.

we both get tips from each other and credit the other site with via links at the bottom of our posts.

TheH2s @ May 12th 2008 7:47AM

Do people really care that much about ads? I am a NP subscriber and really could give two sh**s about the ads. I was really against Future taking over NP but they really have done a good job at keeping the look and feel right.

Get off their case.

Silverlotus @ May 12th 2008 8:32AM

My subscription ran out just after the first or second Future issue. I didn't re-subscribe because Future increased the price substantially for Canadian subscriptions. Clearly I made the right decision, as paying more or less content doesn't sound like a good idea to me.

Naruhodo @ May 12th 2008 10:57AM

Even 10-11 years ago when I was playing PokeMon I could recognize that Nintendo Power was a silly fan mag that could say nothing wrong about the big N. I mean, the phrase "fan magazine" should definitely be a tip-off, but the coverage was sickeningly pro-Nintendo. Games never got less than like 2.5 stars. I did like Alan Averill though. He told it like it was in game reviews and had that sweet RPG Center. But then he left. And so did my subscription :D

SephFinale @ May 12th 2008 6:12PM

At least DS Fanboy has a reason for it's ads (Hosting costs, yeah?). It's just...unruly with the amount of ads in NP. I think the only reason I'll still subscribe is for the free gift...

Also, Players Polls suck now. I don't have the money to go out and buy a friggin' post card.

Lucien Takar @ May 12th 2008 7:59PM

Free gift? What gifts?! I member there was a Phantom Hour glass guide at one point but you go to the site now and it doesn't even let you choose a gift or see if there are gifts. And I miss my posters. Im not renewing.

J.K. @ May 12th 2008 10:23PM

I found this magazine trustworthy on Nintendo ownership days up to the sale with the new format and pretty damn honest crew they had. With the switch I had 2 issues left and saw it get somewhat questionable which I guess maybe the fact some of those new writers perhaps wanted to be doing something else, or perhaps have other interests? Whatever the case I questioned the integrity and didn't like the general change in tone too so I let it go. Really pissed me off too as I had been with them since #1 and had all the Fun Club mags... Good job Nintendo getting me to finally go free of your magazine boneheads.

jamesFF @ May 13th 2008 12:35AM

Early Nintendo Power magazine had no adds in it.

Deozaan @ May 14th 2008 4:58AM

Not only are all the ads annoying, but they're they've become disgusting like the ones in all the other magazines. That stupid "My Word Coach" advertisement that suggests Little Timmy is going to get to home base? I always liked Nintendo Power because it was kid friendly and at least the subscriber bonus and yearly bonus issue was cool.

Now all three of those things are gone. Don't even get a calendar anymore. :-(

I also hate how they include 3 post cards for subscribing to the magazine but don't include 1 for the Player's Poll questionnaire.

I've been a subscriber since issue 57 and will not be renewing unless there is a vast change. All the news is two months late anyway.