Do you read any education/technology magazines at work?

[Net-Ctrl]

Morning all,

 

I’m looking for some help and advice from the EduGeek community. I get inundated with opportunities for adverts, advertorials and Q+A sessions in a wide range of education publications. They all claim that they have a huge circulation of readers, specifically in the IT department.

 

So I wondered, what, if any, magazines do you read at work? Any insights would be really appreciated

 

Off the top of my head some of the ones we get offered regularly are:

 

• Teach Secondary

• Technology and Innovation

• Education Executive

• Independent Executive

• Academy Guide

 

Thanks,

 

Josh

[GREED]

Looking from your perspective as a supplier current and former, in a previous role we (me and employer at the time) advertised several times in several magazines, all who purported to have wide national readership, and had virtually no ROI from it. Cannot remember the publications myself however all 5 you mention ring a bell.

 

I think it depends very much too on what you are selling (plus, to be fair, all the other marketing things like time of year!)

[Sagima]

I've not heard of any of those and noone in my department reads any magazines at work educational or otherwise. The Head gets most/all of his ICT knowledge/ideas from the Telegraph so you might catch his attention by advertising in there (but then we already use your services).

 

Gizmodo is the most popularly read tech website in this department if you can get their attention.

[Oaktech]

• Teach Secondary

• Technology and Innovation

• Education Executive

• Independent Executive

• Academy Guide

 

 

Spent 4 years working for secondary education - during 2 of those years it was an academy. Never seen any of those publications in the staff room.

 

The only things I see in staffrooms are TES, the union rags, TTS update and Consortium!

 

I tend to not read actual magazines - mainly I read Edugeek, Gizmodo and X-Bit sites.

Edited November 20, 2014 by Oaktech

[Net-Ctrl]

Thank you for all the feedback, it really is appreciated.

 

Print advertising is something I have steered away from to date, looks like i made the right decision

[Edu-IT]

Started to get this, but it's not really tech based. Academies Week | A new newspaper for all schools

[pete]

Whoever's offering you those publications thinks you're aiming at teachers/SLT. I've seen copies of "Teach Secondary" abandoned in the staffroom recycling bin, but I've never read it.

 

The TLDR is "We read the same mainstream stuff all IT people do".

 

The marketeer should be able to provide readership data to back up their claims (via ABC, for example - Home - ABC ). I can't remember if ABC do trade rags - it's been years since I used them.

[Oaktech]

Thank you for all the feedback, it really is appreciated.

 

Print advertising is something I have steered away from to date, looks like i made the right decision

 

A friend of mine advertised in a mag that contacted him - he's an electrician and install engineer who specialises in education - eventually he started asking where they heard about him and refusing to speak to people who said x-magazine as so many of them were 'the wrong sort of customers' just time wasters pumping him for information.

Edited November 20, 2014 by Oaktech

[localzuk]

Only magazines I read here are the TES (sometimes), Computing (News and analysis for UK IT directors, CTOs and CIOs - Computing - they do a print/pdf mag), and that's about it.

 

Even then, I never pay attention to adverts at all.

[tmcd35]

What's a magazine? Is it like a website you hold in your hands? How does it update itself? I've checked wikipedia, it suggests 'periodically', not sure what that means but it sounds slow

[sonofsanta]

There's the one what PC Pro do - ICT in Education or something similar? VeryPC asked about it a while ago - and I do read that when it lands.

 

But tbh, I skip past the adverts. Of course I do, the internet has trained me to. I'd say being on here is a) free, apart from time b) much more effective at hitting your target audience in educational IT...

[bossman]

Ditto @localzuk:

[tmcd35]

I'd say being on here is a) free, apart from time b) much more effective at hitting your target audience in educational IT...

 

This entirely. We've just had a PM conversation pretty much thanks to this thread reminding me I'd unintentionally forgotten about you! Suppliers on here who get good feedback from peers are more likely to get past our gatekeeper (receptionist) than someone advertising in the back of a magazine I've never heard of...

[Net-Ctrl]

Thank you all for the continued input.

 

I completely agree about print advertisements. The opportunities that I find more interesting are those that allow us to write an article about a product/sore point and solution etc, but if the market isn't reading the publication then it makes my decision much easier.

 

I'd say being on here is a) free, apart from time b) much more effective at hitting your target audience in educational IT...

 

EduGeek is a great way for us to speak to you all and hear about the problems you're faced with, and is something year-on-year we're very happy to support - i wish it was free though

[Net-Ctrl]

I'd unintentionally forgotten about you!

 

How dare you forget about Net-Ctrl, even if it was unintentional

[Meldrew]

I subscribe to PC Pro, but it seems to be doing its best to annoy its readership at the moment, but apart from that never read any magazines at work.

 

Meldrew

[sonofsanta]

EduGeek is a great way for us to speak to you all and hear about the problems you're faced with, and is something year-on-year we're very happy to support - i wish it was free though

 

Well, it's free for me

 

Think of it this way - the dues you pay directly support the lifeline many of us rely on for support/company/sanity, and thus generates goodwill alongside awareness. So that should be some comfort, right?

 

Plus @Dos_Box needs to pay for his gold-plated keyboard somehow. I hear his Caps Lock light is a genuine emerald!

[GrumbleDook]

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