The Three Pillars of Magazine Publishing

Folio: The Magazine for Magazine Management, July 1, 1999 by Helen Berman

By Helen Berman, author of Ad Sales: Winning Secrets of the Magazine Pros.

Communication among the circulation, advertising sales, and editorial departments is crucial to a magazine's success.

Here's something you 'II never hear a magazine reader say: Wow! Check out this circulation statement! What a renewal rate!' Readers don't buy magazines for their great newsstand draw or audit statement. They buy for editorial. That's why most magazines have a strict church-and-state policy, separating their editors from their business and sales staffers usually by a couple of floors.

While it's important to protect the editorial integrity of a magazine, it's just as important to understand that every magazine department is interdependent with every other. In a sense, magazines operate a lot like cars. The editorial is the fun part: the exterior, the stereo, the rack-and-pinion steering. The business side is the engine. Buyers may he drawn to the way a car looks and handles, but unless something's going on under the hood, that car isn't going anywhere.

Sales, furthermore, is the ignition of publishing. Just as nothing happens in a car until you crank the engine, nothing happens in publishing unless somebody sells something. With very few exceptions, magazines have to be sold to advertisers and/or readers, or they cease to exist.

For that reason, the goals of salespeople, circulation staff and editors are often more in alignment than most people might think. The editor's job is to show the reader that this product is special, unique and different. His or her task is to create a credible, trusting bond with readers in order to ensure that they will return again and again.

Sales and circulation staff, similarly, demonstrate to advertisers that this product is special, unique and different. Using circulation statements, reader surveys and reader response cards, a salesperson shows advertisers evidence of the bond the magazine has with its readers. Advertisers know that the more readers love and trust their magazines, the more they'll pay attention to what advertisers say

Editors, then, tend to focus on the quality of a magazine's editorial, and how it relates to readers. Sales and circulation staff focus on the quality of a magazine's readers, and how they relate to advertisers. Readers are the advertisers prospects, and it's the job of the circulation staff to define the reader quality, and of the salesperson to demonstrate that quality to advertisers.

Because all three divisions complement one another, the magazine industry benefits by having at least some open communication between them. Each department has particular knowledge that can benefit every other department, as well as the entire magazine. Here's a short summary of what each department does, and how each helps out the other.

CIRCULATION DEPARTMENT:

BENEFIT TO ADVERTISING: Readers are advertiser prospects. The more salespeople know about a magazines readers, the better they can educate and convince advertisers that this magazine can deliver customers.

Collects data on who reads the magazine, and why. Conceives ways to maximize sales and profits from subscriptions, newsstands and renewals. Captures research on reader interests, job titles, demographics and sometimes lifestyles.

BENEFIT TO EDITORIAL: Circulation staff are the first to know when a magazine's readers are declining, increasing or changing. Knowledge of renewal rates, new subscribers, newsstand sales and other circulation indicators can help editors determine if their magazine is reaching the right readers with the right editorial.

ADVERTISING SALES DEPARTMENT:

BENEFIT TO CIRCULATION: Salespeople know everything about readers (who are, of course, advertiser prospects), from demographics and lifestyle data to which other magazines they read. This kind of input helps the circulation staff focus its renewal and subscription efforts.

Convinces advertisers to buy pages in the magazine in order to expose product and services to potential customers. Shows advertisers that 1) the magazine's readers fit the advertiser's customer profile, and that 2) readers pay attention to advertising because of their interest and trust in the magazine.

BENEFIT TO EDITORIAL: A magazines top advertisers are usually also a top source for editorial Information. Because salespeople personally know these top players, the sales department is often a great source of information for industry news and trends. Moreover, salespeople are the magazine's first line of offense and defense in the marketplace. Their job is to talk up the magazine's assets and benefits within the very arena the magazine covers.

EDITORIAL DEPARMENT:

BENEFIT TO CIRCULATION: A magazine's editorial determines the readers it will attract. Without input from the editorial department, the circulation department cannot pursue the right readers with the right message in order to maximize reader quality.

Creates and develops all the editorial copy in a magazine, in addition to determining the magazine's overall look, tone and purpose.