It has been about two months since Tina Brown launched her redesign of Newsweek after the merger with the online news site The Daily Beast, where she served, and still does, as the editor-in-chief.

The two titles merged in a 50/50 joint venture, The Newsweek Daily Beast Company, owned by Barry Diller, who supports The Daily Beast through his media conglomerate IAC and former U.S. Congresswoman Jane Harman, who succeeded her husband, Sidney Harman, who bought Newsweek from the Washington Post in August 2010.

As from the March 14 issue, both the 77-year-old magazine and two-year old website have been under the aegis of Ms Brown.

In April AdWeek noted that while the first issues were a hit on newsstands, advertising pages results didn't do as well.
As the article reported, newsstand sales of Newsweek's relaunched first issue were up 19 percent from the magazine's average last year and the second and third issues beat the 2010 average by 7 and 21 percent respectively. First-quarter ad pages however were down 31 percent year-over-year, the article said, and the April 12 issue had just six ads.

AdAge reported today, May 16, that the magazine's latest issue will include 32 ad pages, the most in two years. "But a lot of ad buyers still aren't sold on the most-watched media mash-up going", the article added.
It also reported that, according to the Media Industry Newsletter data, Newsweek's ad pages have declined 34% this year from last year, but fell less sharply -- 22.5% -- in the first nine issues from March 14 onward.

Regarding the advertising market, Stephen Colvin, CEO of the Newsweek Daily Beast Co, said - as it was quoted in the article - that between the two titles there is some crossover potential. Despite this the two publications have separate advertising ambitions "which may be a function of the fact that, for all the talk about integrated ad buying and breaking down the so-called silos between media, advertisers still set their budgets by discrete categories whether print or digital."

As it was originally said, the merger could be beneficial to both parties as The Daily Beast brought 5 million online viewers and Newsweek brought a pre-established audience and a print component, which could attract high advertising revenues.

The AdAge's article however noted that "given then the lack of an immediate advertising upside to a combined online and print operation, it's unclear how the fused newsrooms will bring in more dollars".

Critics - the article continued - argue that the merger welded together two businesses but not particularly complementary ones.

Will integration - also regarding advertising - be the way to follow for the two publications?

Sources: AdWeek, AdAge