New Zealand Marketing Magazine is the leading trade industry magazine in New Zealand. The brand delivers marketing intelligence and best practice for marketers and their advertising and media agency partners in a visually appealing, easy to read, contemporary style. Our brief was to design the cover for the annual Agency Perceptions issue, where top senior marketers assess their perceptions on creative and media agencies in New Zealand.

The budget for this was $8,000 and readership is estimated at 10,000.

Our creative idea was to celebrate and demonstrate great clients and ad agencies working together. The cover is representative of the creative filter that an agency

puts over a brief in order to generate ideas. The target audience is people working in marketing, advertising and media in New Zealand, communication specialists who, combined, specify over $2.5 billion per annum in marketing spend.

For this design the client brief lies on a page beneath the vibrant orange

cover. We chose orange because of its association with creativity and determination

and the opposing purple inside because of its association with wisdom and

communication. The Agency Perceptions subheading and Henry Ford’s

name are in a UV over gloss, playing on the idea of perceptions and what is not

immediately obvious in the creative process.

Through die cuts on the cover, made to emulate a highlighter, we see words from the brief underneath. Upon closer inspection

we see that the words form a quote by Henry Ford, the quote emphasises the success

that is born from collaboration.

According to Marketing Magazine:

Value added to brand: Raises brand equity in readers eyes, with visual appeal while intelligently epitomising best practice. Value for consumer: Consumers are predominantly those in advertising, media and design industries, this cover gives motivation to readers with an interest in creative design while highlighting the importance of the creative brief. It helps draw marketers responsible for this activity to improve their actions in this regard. Reach/cultural impact: Commanding attention and inspiring readers to look closer, raises brand equity in the readers eyes. Sales: A subscription magazine with a strong base, retail sales are a very small component of total sales. Anecdotally there already seems to be an increase in the pass-along copies and it is hoped this will convert to additional subscriptions in the future. Achievement against brief: The cover superseded the expectations inherent in the brief. Other KPI's: Too early to tell.