Emap boosts mags online

Emap Digital has revealed that all the major magazine brands in its stable that haven’t yet spawned websites are likely to get an online companion within the next year.

The plan to roll out a series of magazine companion sites will see titles such as Arena, The Face, Heat, J17 and Elle gaining an online presence for the first time. The sites will conform to a basic template, allowing them to be developed quickly and cheaply.

Under chief executive Paul Keenan, Emap Digital has also refined its portfolio of sites to concentrate on the eight key properties that it believes will prove most profitable. These sites, which will receive the lion’s share of the £120 million earmarked by Emap for digital projects, include Project Slam, the youth-focussed joint venture with Channel 4, which is due to launch in June.

The other consumer projects are FHM.com, Motor Cycle News, the Emap Digital Music network that has so far launched Q4music.com and Mojo4music.com, and the joint venture with France Telecom, EMW. Three business-to-business sites complete the line up, the recently launched giftware exchange Giftrack, Construction Plus and the motor trade site CAP.

A second tier of sites will include the new magazine sites and Emap’s other online properties, such as NewWoman, Whatsonstage, Bargainholidays and Escape Routes.

It is expected that one of these sites will be developed to join the “big eight” and receive significant further investment.