Tag: publishing

Categories
Writing and Publishing

The Price of Information

information

If I subscribed to every email newsletter and information service that was offered me, there would not be enough time to read them all.

So when a newsletter offer appears in my in box, which frequently happens, I give it only the briefest of consideration before pressing delete. Last week, however, I paused long enough to give one such solicitation serious consideration.

As a magazine publisher, a newsletter about publishing seemed worthy. I looked at the sample issue. It was a PDF file of eight pages in length. Eight pages is a bit too much to read online, yet I dislike printing a document merely for the sake of portability and convenience.

I scanned the contents. One article was of great interest and a second of passing appeal. Perhaps, I considered, this newsletter might be worthy of my time. I clicked on the “subscribe” link and was shocked with what I saw. It was not a free publication, but one with a cost—945 dollars. Not 9 dollars and 45 cents, but nine hundred and forty-five dollars! When I assumed it was free, I was mildly engaged, but at 945 dollars I was appallingly disinterested.

How can someone have try to charge for news that is free and readily available? What impudence.

Yes, information does have its price, but unless it’s unique or protected, the appropriate price in today’s information laden society approaches zero.

Learn more about writing and publishing in Peter’s book: Successful Author FAQs: Discover the Art of Writing, the Business of Publishing, and the Joy of Wielding Words. Get your copy today.

Peter Lyle DeHaan is an author, blogger, and publisher with over 30 years of writing and publishing experience. Check out his book Successful Author FAQs for insider tips and insights.

Categories
News

Good News: Reading Is Here to Stay

As Long as There are Readers, Writers Will Have Work to Do

“Reading is here to stay,” wrote Robert M. Sacks in the November/December 2012 issue of Publishing Executive magazine. His astute observation caught my attention, captivating my thoughts, both then and even more so today.

Discussions and speculation about the rapid evolution in the book publishing industry threaten to overwhelm us; considerations abound:

  • Options such as traditional publishing, self-publishing, and assisted publishing
  • More options in the form of indie presses, outsourcing, and support services
  • Help from consultants, coaches, and editors
  • Requirements for the platform, promotion, and marketing
  • Social media to blog, tweet, and message
  • Communication through e-newsletters, RSS feeds, and subscriptions
  • Technologies of e-books, e-readers, and e-publishing
  • Changes via consolidation, closures, and layoffs
  • Audiobooks, foreign rights, translations, screenplays, and movie deals

My brain’s about to explode with all these developments, options, and choices. Readers will always need authors to write things for them to read.

Yet one thing remains: reading is here to stay. And with the future of reading secure, the future of authors and publishers is promising – for all of us willing to change, adapt, and dream.

Tomorrow will be interesting, exciting, and exhilarating, because reading is here to stay, and those readers will need authors to write content for them to read.

Learn more about writing and publishing in Peter’s book: Successful Author FAQs: Discover the Art of Writing, the Business of Publishing, and the Joy of Wielding Words. Get your copy today.

Peter Lyle DeHaan is an author, blogger, and publisher with over 30 years of writing and publishing experience. Check out his book Successful Author FAQs for insider tips and insights.

Save

Save

Save

Categories
Writing and Publishing

When it Comes to Writing Submissions Are You a Rookie or Professional?

Consider these traits that separate a rookie and professional writer.

When you submit your writing, do you come across as a rookie or a professional? Consider these rookie traits to avoid and these professional characteristics to pursue.

Rookie or Professional:
You May Be a Rookie Writer If You…

  • Forget to spell-check your work: This is simply inexcusable.
  • Leave “Track Changes” on and include your reviewer’s edits: This means you were in a hurry or haven’t yet mastered your word processor.
  • Submit the wrong version: This error tells me you’re not organized.
  • Assume the submission guidelines don’t apply to you: Guidelines are for the writer’s benefit. Therefore, learn them and embrace them.
  • Insist no editing or require approval of all changes: All submissions will receive a robust edit. That’s a reality of periodical publishing. The only exception is publishers who don’t care about quality 0151and do you really want to be associated with poor quality?
  • Think artistic formatting equals creative writing: The use of italic, underline, bold, and all caps to add emphasis is not a sign of writing creativity but a lack thereof.
  • Insert needless self-promotion: If you do this once, I may edit it out; if done too much, I’ll simply reject your submission.
  • Argue to have your work accepted: No means no—and there’s no discussion.
  • Beg for feedback: A writer who needs help with his or her craft should seek it from a different source prior to submission.

Rookie or Professional:
You Are a Professional Writer If You…

  • Produce articles that require few edits: You do whatever it takes to submit your best work.
  • Do what you say: When you promise a piece, you always deliver.
  • Meet deadlines: Deadlines keep a magazine’s production schedule on time. Therefore you respect deadlines, always meeting or exceeding expectations and never requesting an extension. You also understand that merely submitting your piece on time doesn’t guarantee a place in the next issue.
  • Know your target: Be familiar with the publication you’re submitting to, understanding its style and content.
  • Understand how the industry works: You comprehend periodical lead times and space limitations; you accept edits and deferred publication.
  • Minimize non-work-related communication: You keep your communication focused on business and don’t engage in superfluous interaction.

I’m not expecting perfection, but striving for excellence is a worthy goal all writers should pursue.

Learn more about writing and publishing in Peter’s book: Successful Author FAQs: Discover the Art of Writing, the Business of Publishing, and the Joy of Wielding Words. Get your copy today.

Peter Lyle DeHaan is an author, blogger, and publisher with over 30 years of writing and publishing experience. Check out his book Successful Author FAQs for insider tips and insights.

Categories
Writing and Publishing

The Work of Publishing Periodicals

I publish four periodicals: two magazines, an e-publication, and an e-newsletter. There is an established workflow to each, with every day requiring that some task be accomplished for at least one of them.

Additionally, one of the magazines has an overlapping production schedule, meaning that sometimes I have to start the next issue before the current one is finished.

The result is that at any given time, I am working on four or five publications. Given a bit of discipline, it is all quite manageable — when I am in the office.

Two weeks ago, I missed four days in the office due to traveling to and covering a convention. I began my preparations in earnest two weeks prior to departure, working in advance and accomplishing tasks ahead of schedule to the degree it was possible.

Essentially, this meant doing three weeks of production work in two weeks. Some ancillary things, such as blogging, fell by the wayside.

Then I was gone for a week. Then I spent a week getting caught up from being gone. This included doing those tasks that could not be done in advance, responding to issues that arose while I was gone, and following up on everything from the convention.

So, the essence is that being gone for four days required a concerted effort lasting four weeks.

Although this may sound like complaining, it is really explaining—why it has been 21 days since my last blog entry.

[If you are interested, my publications are Connections Magazine, AnswerStat, TAS Trader, and Medical Call Center News.]

Learn more about writing and publishing in Peter’s book: Successful Author FAQs: Discover the Art of Writing, the Business of Publishing, and the Joy of Wielding Words. Get your copy today.

Peter Lyle DeHaan is an author, blogger, and publisher with over 30 years of writing and publishing experience. Check out his book Successful Author FAQs for insider tips and insights.

Categories
Writing and Publishing

Magazine Goes Green – Sort of

A weekly (or almost weekly) magazine that I receive, recently announced that it was going to have four “green” issues this year, with the goal of being “carbon neutral” in 10 years.

I was curious how they would handle this “green” issue.  o their credit, they emailed me when it was ready and I went online to check it out. (Even though I proof the magazines I publish on a computer and online, I greatly dislike reading magazines on my computer.  To be direct, I don’t have a computer where I do my magazine reading.)

Upon clicking on the link, it took me to a sign in page, where I essentially requalified my subscription, which was a good idea on their part, as it will save extra work and effort for them later. Additionally, I didn’t need to pick a password and login, which is a good thing, too, as I have over 150 logins and passwords for the various sites I need to use and will thankfully be spared one for this site.

The presentation of the magazine was a PDF file (as I do with the electronic versions of my Connections Magazine and AnswerStat), with some hyperlinks in the table of contents to go directly to the articles. There were also links on the top and bottom of each page to speed readers back to the table of contents, to the next page, or to the previous page.

So, all is good — sort of.  The magazine had a green issue, it was relatively painless to access, and I could read it online — unfortunately, I don’t like reading magazines online.

Learn more about writing and publishing in Peter’s book: Successful Author FAQs: Discover the Art of Writing, the Business of Publishing, and the Joy of Wielding Words. Get your copy today.

Peter Lyle DeHaan is an author, blogger, and publisher with over 30 years of writing and publishing experience. Check out his book Successful Author FAQs for insider tips and insights.

Categories
Writing and Publishing

DMNews Scales Back

Weekly news publications, I am told, are the ones most squeezed in today’s markets.  They are wedged between the proverbial “rock” (instant news via the Internet that trumps weekly updates) and “hard place” (advertisers reallocating their ad dollars towards more established monthlies that target the same audience or online).

One of the magazines that I regularly read is DMNews, as in direct marketing news.  It is a weekly publication (actually 50 issues a year as I recall).  Although my work is on the peripheral of direct marketing, I find it an interesting read, usually picking up a tidbit or two as I thumb through.

It seems — this is not something I track, but I perceive it to be so — that in recent months, the number of pages in DMNews have shrunk, likely indicative of decreasing ad sales.  There is, quite succinctly, less of it to thumb through.

In the April 20 issue, in the “news briefs” section on page 2, there is a small notice that effective immediately, DMNews has switched to biweekly (an unfortunately ambiguous word choice that could mean twice a week or every other week — I presume it to be the latter).  It is again noteworthy that this comes just before the May 11 postal rate increase.

This is a wise move that I applaud.  Instead of a knee-jerk reaction that pulls the plug on their print publication (as I noted another publisher doing in “Another One Bites the Dust“), DMNews has a prudent plan to continue to serve their readers’ in a careful manner that addresses all stakeholders.

This should allow the page count to increase, as advertiser support is consolidated into 26 issues versus 50 issues, allowing them to be around for the foreseeable future.  Kudos for DMNews!

Learn more about writing and publishing in Peter’s book: Successful Author FAQs: Discover the Art of Writing, the Business of Publishing, and the Joy of Wielding Words. Get your copy today.

Peter Lyle DeHaan is an author, blogger, and publisher with over 30 years of writing and publishing experience. Check out his book Successful Author FAQs for insider tips and insights.

Categories
Writing and Publishing

Another One Bites the Dust

Today I learned that another magazine I read is ceasing publication.  This isn’t really a surprise to me.  In fact, I’m surprised that they have hung on this long.  They were an advertiser-supported magazine and their number of ads has been a bit sparse as of late.  From my perspective, their content focus and target market were never clearly defined, which makes it hard to attract and retain advertisers.

Interestingly they didn’t blame the economy, the rising cost of paper, or the upcoming postage increase.  (Postage and paper costs are huge expenses for magazine publishers.)  However, I have to believe that since their next issue would have been under the new, higher postage rates, that it must have been a factor.

What they did cite as justification was a change of advertiser preference from print ads to on-line ads.  Yet a perusal of their website failed to turn up a requisite amount of online ads to support this assertion.  I surmise that the truth is that their costs simply grew too much to be covered by the amount of advertising that they retained.

Having now slashed their costs by shuttering the print magazine, they are left with a website and e-newsletter.  They will have less revenue, but substantially lower expenses.  However, neither their website or newsletter are functioning at the same caliber as their print magazine.

I am not mourning the loss of this magazine, however.  Although I paged through it, I seldom read it (hence my claim that they lacked focus).

Besides, I’ve a backlog of other magazines to read anyway — so this actually helps me out!

Learn more about writing and publishing in Peter’s book: Successful Author FAQs: Discover the Art of Writing, the Business of Publishing, and the Joy of Wielding Words. Get your copy today.

Peter Lyle DeHaan is an author, blogger, and publisher with over 30 years of writing and publishing experience. Check out his book Successful Author FAQs for insider tips and insights.

Categories
Writing and Publishing

Periodical Publishing in a Down Economy

The trend in magazine publishing is to migrate to non-printed forms of distribution (such as email, PDF files, and online reading) in order to reduce costs.  While I see this transformation as spanning many years or even decades for most publications, I also noted that the recession is accelerating this trend.

The reason is that almost all printed media (magazines and newspapers) are mostly or completely dependent on advertising for the revenue they need to produce their product.  When advertising revenue falls, it becomes harder to cover the costs of each issue.  When this occurs, they reduce the number of pages.  Fewer pages means lower costs and the potential to still make money or at least break even.  For several of the magazines that I read (and especially newspapers), the page count has been decreasing in recent months.

Another sign that a publication is having trouble is when they miss their publish date.  This happens when they haven’t sold enough ads to justify printing any size issue.  That just happened to one of the magazines that I regularly read; they were several weeks late.  I don’t expect them to be around much longer.

The final sign is that they merely eliminate an issue, giving them more time to sell ads for the following issue.

Typically, publications that market leaders are not affected too much during difficult economies, but secondary titles are.  The above example is one such case.

(Happily, I have not had to take any of these steps with the two magazines that I publish; one is staying even and the other has been growing — so readers need not worry!)

Learn more about writing and publishing in Peter’s book: Successful Author FAQs: Discover the Art of Writing, the Business of Publishing, and the Joy of Wielding Words. Get your copy today.

Peter Lyle DeHaan is an author, blogger, and publisher with over 30 years of writing and publishing experience. Check out his book Successful Author FAQs for insider tips and insights.

Categories
Writing and Publishing

Internet Sales Rise and Fall With Catalog Mailings

The DMA (Direct marketing Association) recently released their annual report on the catalog industry.

The report indicated that in 2007, 36% of sales [for the catalog industry] were conducted online. What is shocking is that this statistic is a decrease from 2006, when it stood at 40%. In fact 2007’s percentage was lower than both 2005 and 2004. To find a lower number, we need to go back to 2003, when it was a mere 29%.

What’s the deal? Is there a backlash against online buying?

No, seemingly it was a postage increase! This convincing theory blames the huge postage increase in May of 2007 as the culprit. Many catalogers drastically scaled back their mailings when their postage costs jumped 40%. Although some Internet buyers function strictly online, others are driven online when they receive a catalog or other direct mail piece. Ergo, less mailings equal less orders, and a decrease in sales.

I, too, feel the pain of the catalogers, as I experienced similar increases in postage for my magazines: Connections Magazine‘s postage increased 39% and AnswerStat, 41%. As a result, I began scrutinizing my subscriber list much more closely. Some magazines were pushed to e-publishing, dropping their print versions altogether.

So it should not be at all surprising that the USPS is seeing a drop in mail volume, which caused them to suffer a $1.1 billion loss for the third quarter. As a result, next year’s postage increase is expected to be the maximum legal amount. Experts predict that could mean magazines and catalogs will face a 5 to 6% bump.

Of course that means the affected mailers will scale back more, further lowering mail volume, and necessitating another maximum increase in 2010 — as mailing costs and post office efficacy spiral further out of control.

Learn more about writing and publishing in Peter’s book: Successful Author FAQs: Discover the Art of Writing, the Business of Publishing, and the Joy of Wielding Words. Get your copy today.

Peter Lyle DeHaan is an author, blogger, and publisher with over 30 years of writing and publishing experience. Check out his book Successful Author FAQs for insider tips and insights.