Meet Lisa Smosarski, Editor-in-Chief, Stylist
Launched at a time when women's print magazines were on the wane, Stylist has bucked trends to achieve phenomenal growth in the last 13 years. Richard Dunnett talks to Lisa Smosarski about how the brand's success relies on a unique relationship with its audience.
Lisa Smosarski is Editor-in-Chief and Board Director at Stylist. Founded in 2009, this multi-award-winning women's magazine originally targeted affluent commuters and has since expanded beyond the city centres to boast a readership of over 420,000, with numerous events attended by women in their thousands. Lisa - who has worked in women's titles for almost two decades - has been at the helm of the brand from the very first issue…
I decided I was going to be a journalist when I was about 14. I was a huge consumer of teen magazines, and I loved the TV show Press Gang. When I got my first job as junior writer on Bliss magazine, I hadn't decided what area of journalism I was going to go into, but I walked in the door and never left. I was Smash Hits Editor by the time I was 25 years old, then when onto to become editor of Bliss and then More!
People thought it was risky for me to leave the security of a big publishing company [Bauer] and a traditional publishing model. But I believed so much in what we were going to do. It was very liberating to have a new model; it allowed us to speak to the audience differently, and it paved the way for change within our whole industry.
Stylist intentionally offered something completely different to more traditional ‘women's magazines'. When we launched, we weren't seeing a richness of conversation or diversity of content in women's media. At my previous role at More! magazine, I'd gained a lot of understanding of the audience and where they were ‘fatiguing'. I loved what the team had done with Shortlist, the predecessor to Stylist, and the idea I could create something like that for a female audience felt like an amazing opportunity.
When we launched, we were proudly feminist - though I was advised by some advertisers not to use that word. Now I don't think any woman's magazine would say they were anything but feminist.
"Stylist's model paved the way for change within our whole industry"
Stylist reflects the fact that women are multifaceted. I wanted the magazine to feel like an intelligent conversation between friends. On a night out, our women might talk about politics, wanting a promotion, what they're going to wear to an event, about NFTs, their relationships. This approach has meant that readers feel the most phenomenal ownership of the brand. It's this relationship that has given us longevity.
The last three years, while challenging, presented a brilliant opportunity. Our original demographic was young, city-based women - which limited us at the height of the pandemic. But we also saw the explosion of our digital platforms. We still distribute 350,000 issues, but now new readers might also discover us for the first time through social media or digital. Our daily email, Stylist Loves, goes out to over 120,000. Our audience are still united by an intelligent curiosity for life - they just access that content via the platform that work for them.
I'm proud of what we've done on Stylist. One of my favourite covers from a few years ago showed a packet of straws in a cigarette packet, with the line: "One day plastic will be as fashionable as smoking". It was ahead of the curve, and beautifully simple. Similarly, we wanted to do something that responded to the #MeToo movement but without giving Harvey Weinstein extra airtime. Eventually the art director scaled down his image so he was in the corner, and the line was "Not so big and powerful".
We're keen to find the best way to work with PRs. And we are hungry for content. My ultimate recommendation is: make sure you're getting to the right person. We are producing so much content, that targeting it is critical. Also: pitch two to three months ahead of schedule.
We're interested in content that's valuable to readers. We had a successful campaign with Google this year, championing small businesses - a content area that has always been particularly strong for us. We also did an initiative with Samsung, focusing on their products in an ‘interiors' setting - another big growth content area.
Commercial partnerships are important to us. We love to work with brands who have a shared mission and purpose, and want to speak to our audience the way we would. There are myriad different ways to get involved, from product grid slots on emails to cover ups, to headlines and sponsorship, from TikTok to the Remarkable Women Awards or Stylist Live.
Our live events present a lot of sponsorship and retail opportunities. Stylist Live is our biggest consumer event, with up to 10,000 people coming through the doors. We have Stylist Restival, our festival of sleep - sponsored in the past by brands like M&S. Next year, we're taking The Strong Women Trek to Glasgow, and we're hosting a Strong Women Wellness Summit in January too. We're also hoping to bring back the Stylist Network, as there's a huge trend around entrepreneurialism and careers.
"We really love to work with brands who want to speak to our audience the way we would"
I joined the board because I am so excited about where we can take Stylist as a brand. As an editor, you already learn a lot about the business and commerciality of magazines, but I was delighted to get the opportunity to be part of a bigger conversation. I think that's why this job has kept my attention so long - because I've learned how to adapt my skills beyond content creation to business.
We have always really listened to our audience. On launch day, I had hundreds of emails saying, "This is the magazine that I've been waiting for." That came from listening to what women were saying - and we continue to do that.
https://www.linkedin.com/in/lisa-smosarski-5b662522/