The revamp of Young Parents, the 17-year-old title owned by SPH Magazines, is adding fresh excitement to the new parents market in Singapore.
Young Parents now sports a new masthead, along with a cleaner and more reader-friendly layout. Content-wise, it has added new columns, more snippets, more features and new sections looking at families, babies, toddlers and health issues.
On the new look, editor Crispina Robert says: "We wanted the quality of international titles (such as Junior and Parents), but for the local audience. Also, we felt it was time for a change. To stand out from the rest, we needed a complete change. The team believed that going modern, simple and pared down was the best way to go."
And indeed, visually, the new Young Parents does stand out from the crowd, which in Singapore, consists of two other local titles, Motherhood, published by Eastern Publishing and Today's Parents, published by Panpac Media.
"Young Parents now has a more international look and feel," says Elaine Poh, associate director at Starcom Media Worldwide in Singapore. Poh is familiar with the 'new parents/baby' market, handling the Mead Johnson account for the past five years. Mead Johnson makes milk powder brands Sustagen and Enfagrow.
Poh noted the increased emphasis on babies in the revamped Young Parents and believes that the changes have been successful. "Current readers will continue with Young Parents and the new emphasis on babies will entice mothers with new-borns and infants."
On the advertising front, Poh believes that it is still too early to say if the change will lead to more ad dollars going its way.
Despite its pedigree (it is owned by publishing giant Singapore Press Holdings), Young Parents is not perceived to be the leader in the parenting titles category, though the issue is murky, as none of the monthly magazines in this category are audited.
Young Parents used to have an audited circulation of 13,187, but this number is outdated because it refers to the magazine's circulation in 2000. Motherhood claims a circulation of 35,000, while Today's Parents claims a circulation of 24,000, according to Poh.
The revamp had made Young Parents more attractive, said Poh, but given the relative numbers, she would only consider spending ad dollars on the title if the circulation figures improved.
