Faith-based magazine reinvents itself

DANBURY — The magazine Guideposts has been a part of CEO John Temple’s life for as long as he can remember.

Temple’s father worked at Guideposts during his childhood in Carmel, N.Y., but the publication, which was always around his house, is going to look slightly different moving forward. Since stepping into his role at the Danbury-based nonprofit organization four years ago, Temple has worked to connect more with the magazine’s audience and step-up their digital presence.

While many legacy print magazines are struggling financially or even closing their doors, this 76-year-old faith-based magazine is revamping its digital and print assets to better meet the demands of the time and their audience of roughly 4.5 million readers.

“We’ve been breaking down that wall between the two platforms,” said Editorin-Chief Edward Grinnan.

The magazine touts itself as the “the go-to publication for positive, uplifting personal stories from celebrities and everyday people alike,” which are told through a spiritual and Christian lens.

“We have this wonderful, engaged, dedicated, loyal audience, and we wanted to make sure we were giving them the best product we could possibly produce for them,” Grinnan said.

On the print side, they’ve cut down from 10 editions to six, but each will be a minimum of 100 pages, according to Grinnan. It will be printed on higher quality paper, with a more modern look, and the storytelling will lend itself better to translation between the digital and print sides thanks to more visual storytelling.

The June/July issue is set to feature Michelle Williams, former Destiny’s Child singer and actress, along with other celebrities, media personalities, and authors.

“It’s a 76-year-old organization that has done wonderful things for people in a lot of different ways, but was in need of a digital transformation where we can help people with modern technology in a lot more robust ways than simply through a magazine or a book or other products,” Temple said.

Currently, Temple said they have about 3 million followers on social media platforms and several millions of visitors to their website. He noted that at this point, they reach more people digitally than through their physical products.

Temple’s decision to move to Brookfield and work at Guideposts was spurred on by a deep connection with the mission and an admiration for the people at the organization, he said.

“We don't proselytize, we don't tell you what to believe, we don't do politics,” he said. “In everything we create we try to be the voice of a trusted friend.”

Guideposts prayer events, which used to be live but went virtual, went from hundreds of people to thousands.

While they’ve been working on the digital transformations for several years now, Temple said the pandemic has accelerated some of the incorporated changes.

Grinnan said that the pandemic also renewed the staff’s commitment to their readers, “fulfilling their needs for inspiration and hope.”

“I think that just shows the reach of some of the things we can do,” Temple said.