The Layers of Magazine Editing

Michael Robert Evans

• Publisher: Columbia University Press
• Year: 2004
• eBook ISBN: 9780231502788
• Topic: Personal Development
• Subtopic: Writing & Presentation Skills

Unlike the myriad writing manuals that emphasize grammar, sentence structure, and other skills necessary for entry-level editing jobs, this engaging book adopts a broader view, beginning with the larger topics of audience, mission, and tone, and working its way down, layer by layer, to the smaller questions of grammar and punctuation. Based on Michael Evans's years of experience as an editor and supplemented by invaluable observations from the editors of more than sixty magazines—including The Atlantic, Better Homes and Gardens, Ebony, Esquire, and National Geographic—this book reveals the people-oriented nature of the job.

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Layers 1

The Big Picture

Be fearless.

Margot Slade, editor, Consumer Reports

1. From Spark to Flame:
How to Conceptualize a Magazine

So. A woman marches into the room and plunks $250,000 onto the table.

“I have a job for you,” she says without a smile. “I want you to take this money—a quarter of a million dollars—and use it to create a magazine. Any magazine at all. I don’t care what it looks like. I don’t care what it is about. I don’t care about any of the decisions you make. I have just one demand. I’m going to return in five or ten years, and I’m going to want my money back—with interest. Deal? Deal.”

And with that, she turns and walks out the door.

Once your pulse returns and you are again able to breathe, you realize that despite the remarkable opportunity that has been tossed your way, you face a considerable challenge. How will you go about creating a magazine from scratch? And one that will be commercially viable at that?

What on earth are you supposed to do next?

Few editors are handed such a delightful surprise, but by working through the problems inherent in this challenge, we can explore the situations that occupy most magazine editors’ days. Contrary to popular opinion, editors don’t spend the bulk of their time fidgeting with arcane rules of English grammar. They don’t devote their lives to arranging words on a page. They don’t grind away from nine to five trying to capture the most elegant way to describe the first lady’s evening gown or the homeless man’s shoes. They do those things, to be sure—but such tasks don’t take up the majority of editors’ daily schedules. Editors spend most of their time working not with words but with people. Editing concentrates on the magic of human communication, and so its primary attention is directed to the people involved in that communication.

Mercifully, that’s the fun part.

In the Beginning

So—we have deposited the $250,000 into our shiny new bank account, and now we’re sitting at our kitchen table wondering what to do with it. Sure, we’ll have to hire some editors and writers, some graphic designers and photographers. We’ll have to negotiate a contract with a printer and figure out how to distribute the magazine to subscribers and newsstand shoppers.

But first we have to decide what our magazine will be. What will we write about? What will we focus on? What will make our publication shine in the midst of a muddy morass of mediocre magazines?

It is said that magazines rank second in the Grand List of business start-ups and failures. Restaurants are first. In other words, except for restaurants, more magazines are born each year—and more magazines are buried each year—than any other business. The failures often follow a common theme. A magazine emerges with fanfare and enthusiasm, holding forth great promises of outstanding writing, riveting graphics, stunning photography, and solid editing. People buy copies off the newsstands because they are curious about the newcomer, just as people flock to the new restaurant in town just to see what it is all about. Some of the newsstand buyers become subscribers to save money and make getting the magazine more convenient. Armed with figures showing the rising trend in subscriptions and newsstand sales, the advertising team marches from one corporation to another, chatting up marketing directors and ad-placement specialists, lunching with vice presidents and managers, pushing demographic statistics in front of owners and CEOs. It is at this moment that the fate of the magazine is cast. If the circulation is strong, if the demographics are impressive, if the look and the feel and the character and the tone of the magazine all seem right, then advertisers smile and reserve full-page ads and double-page spreads with color pictures and expensive fold-outs. But if the numbers produce a shrug or a frown, the advertising dollars fall short of expectations.

Any start-up requires some money, but you don’t necessarily need a lot.... WoodenBoat was started with only $14,000, one-third of it borrowed, [and it now has] a market value of perhaps $2–4 million. So, if the idea is really a good one, it has the ability to grow in value. In fact, if you’re both impassioned and ambitious, you can create an extremely successful publication enterprise.

Jon Wilson, editor, WoodenBoat

At this point, some magazines vow to produce outstanding issues anyway, spending money to support the quality of the publications and hoping that the advertising will catch up. If the gamble pays off, a magazine can continue into the future without having tarnished its look—or its credibility. But if the gamble fails, the magazine empties its bank accounts and screeches to a shuddering stop. Such was the fate of New England Monthly, an excellent magazine that attracted top-quality writers, photographers, illustrators, designers, and editors. The magazine began with promise, producing issue after issue that offered readers tough reporting and engaging writing. (And boosting the career of Jonathan Harr, the eventual author of A Civil Action.) But, as editor Dan Okrent lamented to me one day, corporations in New York were unconvinced that New England was a community, and so they were reluctant to spend money pursing that community. The advertising dollars diminished, and the magazine eventually folded.

Other magazines fade out gracelessly. As income dwindles, a magazine’s budget is trimmed, with less money available for top-notch writers and photographers. The cutbacks take the shine off the magazine’s image, frustrating efforts to attract new readers and faithful subscribers. The circulation numbers begin to wane, reducing advertising revenue even further. The magazine’s budget is scaled back even more in an effort to stretch the remaining revenue until advertisers and readers finally come to their senses. Talented employees are laid off. The quality of the paper is downgraded, so the magazine has a less sophisticated feel. The pay for writers is slashed, so only untested writers respond to the call. Less color is used throughout the magazine, issues grow thin and offer fewer articles, and photography and art are kept to a minimum.

With the reduction in quality comes another drop in circulation; fewer readers feel that the magazine is worth its subscription price. But still, the money continues to cascade out the door like sand through a sieve. Further cuts are inflicted on the staff. The magazine reduces the frequency of its publication from monthly to quarterly, or from quarterly to semiannually. The look and feel of the magazine continue to decline, making advertisers even more reluctant to buy ads in it. Desperation measures fail to reinvigorate the cash flow. The magazine’s quality continues to plummet as good, hardworking employees are laid off. Eventually, the magazine declares bankruptcy—and its ability to influence the world comes to an end.

Eureka!

Magazines collapse for many reasons—indecisive leadership, insufficient capital, and so on—but perhaps none is as important as the initial idea. The best writing in the world won’t salvage a magazine that focuses on a useless topic. The Sandpaper Collector has no chance of success if the number of sandpaper collectors in the country hovers around three. Bad writing can kill a good idea, but good writing can’t save a bad one.

The process of thinking broadly about a magazine goes on for the life of the publication; it doesn’t end once the first issue is on the stands. Editors think continually about the character of their magazines, the tone of their magazines, the content of their magazines, and the changing nature of their magazines—and they work hard to make sure that their readers’ needs are being met.

But how can an editor tell whether the idea will fly or die, or whether the current idea is still standing tall or is getting weak in the knees? The answer lies in the rational decisions that people make.

National Geographic follows a 113-year tradition of exploring the world under the Society’s mission: “For the increase and diffusion of geographic knowledge.” The magazine and all aspects of the Society, including television, Web, and Traveler, Adventure and World magazines, view geographic knowledge in the broadest sense. The magazine fulfills this mission by mixing stories on Minor League baseball and stockcar racing in with more traditional historical and topical pieces. Also, since September 11, National Geographic aims to provide more stories contributing relevance and perspective to news events. We do this while working ahead under a longer planning time than most weekly news magazines and other magazines. Above all, the magazine stresses strong storytelling.

Peter Porteous, assistant editor, National Geographic

A classic Psychology 101 statement goes something like this: people spend money for two reasons only—to solve a problem and to enhance pleasure. That statement is a good beacon for those who want to edit magazines. If we don’t enhance pleasure (say, by publishing funny spoofs of political bickering) or solve problems (say, by teaching readers how to dress well on a tight budget), we don’t stand much chance of success.

That’s what happened to the general-interest magazines—Look and the original Life, for example—that were so popular around the middle of the twentieth century. By reaching for audiences that were too broad, they were unable to deliver enough material to solve enough problems or enhance enough pleasure for each individual reader. The reader who wanted political articles found a better supply of them in Time, The Nation, and other publications. The reader who wanted sports information was happier with Sports Illustrated and Field & Stream. The reader who wanted fashion tips gravitated toward Cosmopolitan, Vogue, Glamour, and similar magazines. When television—the ultimate general-interest medium—came along, Look and Life and their counterparts lost their last unique angle, and advertisers departed in droves.

I encountered this problem personally when I became the father of twins. My wife and I, brand new to the child-raising business, decided to subscribe to a parenting magazine. We were looking for tips, tricks, hints, shortcuts—anything that would let us sleep an extra hour, worry a little less, maintain some semblance of order in our overrun little house, and file away into permanent memory all the moments of joy and beauty that were taking place around us.

But the magazines we looked at didn’t do the job. Most of them were divided into sections by age group; each issue had one article about raising newborns, one article about six-month-olds, one article about one-year-olds, one about two-year-olds, and so on. So in any given issue, this fat and expensive magazine gave us just one article that mattered to our lives. And we could tell that unless we had more kids, that would never change. We would always care about just one article in each issue.

So we didn’t subscribe to any of them. We bought a few good books, talked a lot to family and friends, and muddled through as well as we could.

American Archaeology is a popular archaeology magazine. I want it to inform and entertain a broad audience. My magazine has to be more sophisticated about archaeology than, say, a general-interest publication, and it has to present archaeology in a way that most everyone can understand.

Michael Bawaya, editor, American Archaeology

The problem was that the magazines we looked at were too broadly defined, too loose, too wide open. They weren’t focused enough to help us.

The solve-a-problem-or-enhance-pleasure reality also means that we have to stuff our egos in a drawer. Putting out a magazine that features “whatever we happen to think is interesting this month” isn’t likely to survive. Why should anyone trade their lunch money for a haphazard collection of articles that might—or might not—be useful or interesting to them? Potential readers are much more likely to buy magazines that they can count on, magazines that are clearly focused and that attempt to do something beneficial for the people who purchase them.

What this means to us is simple and painful. We might know in our hearts that a magazine about the interpretation of cloud shapes is just what this country needs. It would be riveting, engaging, dynamic. It would make people laugh; it would make people cry. We’re just sure of it. And besides, our immediate circle of friends agrees that it would be a great publication.

So we cash in our savings bonds and launch Water Vapor Wonderland. And then, much to our astonishment, we discover that hardly anybody from Maine to California is willing to hand over the change in her pockets for our precious magazine. We love it, but it doesn’t solve anyone’s problems or enhance anyone’s pleasure. Copies of the first issue dry up and die on the newsstand shelves. And then we quietly “suspend publication” and send our résumés to fast-food outlets and car washes.

So basing a magazine on our personal whims is probably not a great idea. What can we do instead? Smart editors turn not to their own psyches but to their readers. What audiences out there have needs that aren’t being met? If you can find a good number of people who are not being served well by other magazines, you have an opportunity to create a winner.

Car and Driver is about 50 years old. It’s a car magazine. The concept is simple: We test cars. We are the biggest car magazine in the world possibly because we are more honest in our opinions and ...

Table of contents

• Cover 
• Half title
• Epigraph
• Title
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents 
• Preface
• Layer 1. The Big Picture
• Layer 2. The Big Questions
• Layer 3. The Small (but Important) Stuff
• Say What? Some Important Terms and What They Mean
• A Brief Bibliography
• Index