Two Very Different Magazines, One Similarity.

To compare ads in magazines, I grabbed two random magazines in our apartment's living room. I grabbed an edition of GameInformer (GI) and Eastbay (EB). One is a magazine about video games and the latter is a magazine that sells sporting equipment and apparel.

Both magazines were scarce with advertising, which made it feel like a more rich read. The advertising it did have was mostly relevant to the content. GI had ads for upcoming games and EB had ads with sports athletes, such as Eddie Lacy, previewing the sportswear they promote. GI did have one Progressive advertisement that felt out of place. EB lacked editorial content, aside from the pictures of professional sports athletes. The other magazine, was full of stories from game developers, pictures from gameplay, and rankings of video games.

In the situation of these two magazines, I would say that the content influences the advertisements. These are two magazines that can stick to their guns and people who purchase them know exactly what they want out of them; and they get it. I find it very professional to keep out the clutter of non-related advertisements. It keeps a nice smooth flow to the reading. I might have just gotten lucky and picked up two magazines that are pretty static, but it seemed pretty balanced overall.