Microsoft SQL Server
Customer Solution Case Study
Design Agency Builds Celebrity Magazine Web
Site in Just 11 Weeks
Customer: Heat Magazine (Emap)
Web Site: www.heatworld.com
Number of Employees: 5,500
Country or Region: United Kingdom
Industry: Periodical Publishing
Partner: How Splendid
Customer Profile
Heat magazine is the leading celebrity
weekly published by Emap. The magazine
has a circulation of more than 550,000
readers and is renowned for its unique
editorial style.
Software and Services
 Microsoft Server Product Portfolio
− Windows Server 2003
− Microsoft SQL Server 2005
 Technologies
− Microsoft .NET Framework 2.0
− Microsoft ASP.NET
− Microsoft Visual Studio 2005
For more information about other Microsoft
customer successes, please visit:
www.microsoft.com/casestudies
London-based publisher Emap enlisted the help of user-centred
design agency How Splendid to build a Web site for its leading
celebrity weekly, Heat magazine. Under pressure to meet a tight
launch deadline, How Splendid used Microsoft® .NET Framework
2.0 connection software to build an engaging Web site, hosted on a
Windows Server® 2003 operating system, with Microsoft SQL
Server™ 2005 database software. The Heatworld Web site
launched on time, and, in its first month, generated more than five
million page impressions.
Business Needs
London-based Emap Consumer Media is
responsible for one of the United Kingdom’s
leading celebrity weeklies—Heat magazine.
In recent years, Heat’s circulation has risen
to more than 550,000, with a readership of
2.1 million, making it one of the country’s
most successful consumer titles. The
magazine’s blend of celebrity news, gossip,
and fashion has earned it a dedicated,
predominantly female, audience that buys
into the Heat philosophy.
As part of the Emap ambition to create a
truly multiplatform brand, Mark Frith, Editorin-Chief at Heat, and Julian Linley, Editor at
Heatworld, created the concept of
Heatworld. Designed to represent all the
brand values of Heat in a digital
environment, Frith wanted Heatworld to
extend the touch point between brand and
reader from a weekly connection to an hourly
one. The Heat team recognised that by
incorporating video, audio, and user
interaction, the site could add a third
dimension to the brand. But it was conscious
that the site should complement the
magazine rather than take readership away
from it.
Frith decided to adopt a blog-style format for
the Heatworld Web site. The Heat team was
aware that this medium offered it exciting
new opportunities. Rebekah Billingsley,
Digital Business Director, Emap
Entertainment, says: “We wanted the Web
site to break stories as they happen, and
provide engaging multimedia content.
Basically, it’s about all the things that a
digital platform can offer that a magazine
can’t.”
In the world of celebrity gossip, timing is
everything. “We’re breaking news and
seconds can make the difference between
being the leading site and being a follower of
other sites,” explains Billingsley. With the
magazine team under time pressure and
charged with providing unique content for the
Web site, it was essential that Heatworld had
a user-friendly content management system
(CMS).
The Heat team also wanted the Web site to:
 Give visitors easy access to the latest
stories.
 Foster an interactive Heat community.
 Attract leading brands to advertise on it.
Solution
In February 2007, Heat decided to work with
Microsoft Certified Partner How Splendid to
develop Heatworld. The user-centred design
process adopted by How Splendid had
impressed Emap on previous projects for
brands such as New Woman and Empire
magazine.“When How Splendid came in and
pitched to us, they took the blog idea and
really expanded it. They understood the
brand, the audience, and what Heatworld
needed to be,” says Billingsley.
With How Splendid onboard, there was only
one other challenge for the Heatworld
development team. The site had to be ready
for the start of the eighth season of UK reality
TV show Big Brother. Billingsley says: “The Big
Brother deadline was massively important.
Our view was that if we didn’t hit that, then it
didn’t matter whether we launched in three
months or five months because all the traffic
would have gone to a different Web site.” This
gave the development team 11 weeks to
create Heatworld and deliver a rich user
experience.
Once the Heat team had worked through the
concepts and design of the site with How
Splendid, the development team had four
weeks to build the site. From experience,
developers at How Splendid knew that using
the Microsoft .NET Framework 2.0 and the
Microsoft Visual Studio® 2005 development
system they could develop the site quickly.
Paul Bishop, Managing Director at How
Splendid, says: “We use Microsoft .NET
technology at How Splendid because it’s
quick and reliable to develop on, and you
can reuse components you’ve built before. It
also gives us the flexibility to implement the
best user experience.”
By reusing components from the New
Woman site, the development team reduced
the amount of code duplication. Developers
took advantage of many out-of-the-box
features to meet the deadline. The caching
facility in Microsoft ASP.NET was easy to
implement and increased the performance
of the Web site, while integration with the
Windows Server 2003 and Microsoft SQL
Server 2005 hosting environment at Emap
was straightforward.
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Benefits
How Splendid met the Heatworld launch
deadline in May, and has subsequently
integrated a mobile environment, and an
application for social networking site
Facebook. In its first four weeks, Heatworld
generated five million page impressions. The
Web site is ahead of its competitors in the
Comscore Internet traffic rankings and is
already attracting big name advertising
clients.
 In September 2007, Heatworld received
400,000 unique visitors and generated
eight million page impressions.
 Heat journalists can break stories quickly
with two user-friendly content
management systems (CMSs) at their
This case study is for informational purposes only. MICROSOFT MAKES NO WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, IN THIS SUMMARY.
Document published November 2007
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disposal. Heat employees use one system
to upload content and the other for page
layout. Sebastian Wells, Lead Developer,
How Splendid, explains how these were
developed in time for the launch: “We
reused the CMS frameworks and user
controls, so we only needed to make
visual changes.”
The development team created a userfriendly page layout system by
incorporating drag-and-drop features such
as voting modules and feedback boxes.
Editors can easily arrange pages to their
preference—for example, they could use
the CMS to incorporate six gallery modules
and one voting module.
Heatworld uses the CMS to deliver highly
customised advertising campaigns. At its
launch, the Web site had already agreed
advertising deals with media company
Virgin Media, and cosmetics companies
Rimmel and No.17.
By meeting its deadline to launch in time
for Big Brother 8, Heatworld secured
sponsorship from Virgin Media for its
coverage of the reality show. Billingsley
says: “It’s the first digital project that I’ve
worked on that’s launched on time. We
were impressed that How Splendid took
the basic concept and worked it into
something exciting.”
Heat editorial employees can link stories
in the magazine to content on Heatworld,
which adds value to the magazine.
“Heatworld adds another dimension to
Heat,” says Billingsley. “In the magazine
we can write a celebrity story, but on the
Web site we can often show footage of
that story.”
The Heatworld interactive forum is one of
the most popular areas of the site. With
Heat readers commenting on the latest
stories, it generates nearly a quarter of all
Heatworld page impressions.