Magazine Startup Checklist
Business Startup Checklist
By Steve Milano
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You can greatly improve the chances your new magazine will succeed by creating a go/no-go list before you launch. Measuring objective aspects of your planned title, such as circulation, ad rates and manufacturing expenses, is a better strategy than using focus groups or a lack of competition to gauge whether the magazine will be accepted in the marketplace. Creating a magazine startup checklist using objective criteria will increase your chances of a successful launch.
Subscriptions vs. Advertising
If your magazine must make a profit, determine whether you wish to make money from subscriptions or advertising sales. Attracting and retaining subscribers is costly and requires industry expertise. Top circulation directors are highly prized and well paid. It may be easier to sell display advertising in the magazine, banners on your website, blow-in cards and other types of ads.
Create a detailed profile of your readers. This will help you sell advertising. Many advertisers care more about who is reading the magazine than about what your editorial content covers. You may have the best editorial coverage of local children's sports, for example, but if most of a potential advertiser's customers are single, they won't buy advertising with you. Determine your target reader's age, gender, educational level, marital and parental status, income and education level and ethnicity, or as many of these demographics as possible. Once you know your audience, determine whether you will be able to get the magazine into their hands. Find out if you can buy mailing lists or find places that will let you set up free magazine racks.
Create an annual editorial calendar for your magazine to determine if you have enough content to publish monthly, bi-monthly or quarterly. Break your editorial calendar into sections, such as features, columns, instruction, new products or other, regular areas. Determine whether you can generate sufficient editorial each issue to make the magazine viable.
Create a budget that takes into consideration your manufacturing costs, such as printing, postage, editorial and design, as well as overhead, which includes office space, equipment, insurance, legal fees, supplies and other normal operating expenses of a business. Determine how much advertising you need to sell each issue to pay your expenses and make the annual profit you wish to make. Determine how much advertising you will need to sell to hit your budget numbers.
Set your advertising rates based on the number of advertising pages you will have available each issue. For example, if your budget calls for a 48-page magazine, and you have 20 pages available for advertising, divide your expenses per issue by 20 to determine your page rate. You can sell smaller ads, such as half- or quarter-page ads, for more than their percentage. This gives the impression you are giving advertisers a discount for buying a larger ad. For example, if you need to make $2,000 per page, sell half-page ads for $1,250 or quarter-page ads for $750. This gives your sales people the opportunity to offer discounts.
Meet with Potential Advertisers
Before you rent an office, hire staff or spend any significant money on starting your magazine, meet with potential advertisers to gauge their interest. Let them know the number of copies you will print and distribute, who your target reader is, and your projected advertising rates. Ask advertisers if they would buy advertising in such a magazine, and how much. In effect, you are asking advertisers if they want you publish this magazine for them. If so, you likely have a magazine with a good potential for success. You may find that potential advertisers are very interested in your magazine, but at a lower per-page rate than you are offering. They may suggest a slightly different audience or a certain, regular editorial feature.
Meet with Experts
Check with an attorney to make sure the name of your magazine is available. Meet with your local postmaster to learn what you will need to do to mail your magazine, if you plan on doing that. Have an accountant review your budget. Set up a meeting with your local Service Core of Retired Executives chapter. SCORE provides free advice on business plans from retired executives. The Houston chapter of SCORE has 12 locations in the greater Houston area where you can meet with an advisor.
Publishing Business Group; 10 Hot Tips for First-Time Publishing; Cheryl Woodard; October 2008
MagazineLaunch.com; Magazine Publishing Concepts You Must Understand; Sept. 17, 2009
Laughing Bear Newsletter; The Surviving Small Press: Starting a Magazine; Tom Person; 1999
SCORE Houston: Locations
Sam Ashe-Edmunds has been writing and lecturing for decades. He has worked in the corporate and nonprofit arenas as a C-Suite executive, serving on several nonprofit boards. He is an internationally traveled sport science writer and lecturer. He has been published in print publications such as Entrepreneur, Tennis, SI for Kids, Chicago Tribune, Sacramento Bee, and on websites such Smart-Healthy-Living.net, SmartyCents and Youthletic. Edmunds has a bachelor's degree in journalism.
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1 How to Start a Magazine Business
2 How to Budget for Owning a Magazine
3 Starting a Small Print Magazine
4 How Much Does Magazine Advertising Cost?