Pasta or Perish
Pasta sticks to the ceiling when it’s just right and a magazine sticks to an industry when it’s just right, as well. Publishing is a far trickier business than pasta, however, and these days few magazines stick when they’re thrown at the ceiling. They’re either too gummy, or too soggy, and can’t seem to do what it takes to generate traction and readership. Why is that? It’s because there's an inherent tension in publishing. It's the tension between money and independence. In my opinion, there’s only one way to solve this, so when I’m ready to open my magazine, I’m going to jump in as if money were no object, and independence were the only object. This is the only way to make the thing stick, the only way to make a magazine that’s real, that’s quality, and that's got what it takes to gain traction in an industry. For starters, I’m going to hire a full-time Editorial Director, full-time Editor-in-Chief, full-time Managing Editor, full-time Copy Editor, full-time Editorial Assistant, full-time Web Master, and a full-time Art Director. They’re going to be full-time employees, complete with benefits. And they're all going to be paid the same amount. (A radical idea, but not to worry. The revolution will neither be televised nor published, I can assure you.) Putting out a magazine is a punishing sport and neither a publisher nor an editor has enough skin in the game to tough it out through the inevitable rough spots if anybody - and I mean anybody - in the equation is simply a contractor. Second of all, I’m going to give the Editorial Staff free reign, because that's what it takes to make a real magazine - a real fine magazine. At my magazine, Editorial is going to drive Sales. This really isn’t an option, it’s a necessity, and the only way that a magazine can make a long-term play in any market. When Editorial drives Sales, you've got something worth reading. When Sales drives Editorial, you've got infomercials. Articles that are written for a magazine that allows Sales to drive Editorial are articles that are glib, polished, ghost written by people who don’t really participate in the industry, and usually devoid of any real information - no matter how well written or edited. The end product is boring, readers quickly sense it, and when the magazine arrives in the mail, it goes straight from the In Box to the Round File. This is particularly true in publications intended for engineers. Trees die for no reason. Which brings us to the matter of the business of publishing. Like money, magazines don’t grow on trees. Magazines need revenue to survive and thrive, but if the revenue’s coming just from advertising, it's inevitable that Sales will drive Editorial and everybody suffers. Readers are hungry for real fine magazines with authentic content. Advertisers, however, usually are not. They're pretty unwilling to support magazines with their ad dollars, unless they can be reassured that their product message will be Job No. 1 for the magazine. But, any editor worth his salt will push back when told to cover Company X just because Company X is an advertiser. However, Company X won’t advertise if they’re not covered, so they pull their ad dollars, the revenues shrink, and the magazine folds. The pasta falls to the ground and the meal is ruined. This situation is common knowledge, particularly in the technical publishing paradigm. In fact, right now the situation is downright awful. High-tech companies, and EDA companies in particular, aren’t really that interested in supporting technical magazines for one of two reasons, depending on who you talk to. Reason A - The companies are hurting and don’t have any discretionary money with which to pay for ads. Reason B - The companies have the money, but they've decided to spend it elsewhere. They’ve realized a less-than-stellar ROI from placing ads in magazines, and have decided to spend their money instead on specific, focused, info-gathering enterprises such as industry analysts - or on their own company specific conferences. In the end, it doesn't matter if it's Reason A or Reason B. There are fewer and fewer ad dollars available for publishing, and fewer and fewer print platforms as a result. So here I am with my full-time staff on my real fine magazine. How can my print magazine have a future if there's a market for it, but no money to pay for it? Well, there actually is money to pay for a real fine magazine. It's subscriber money. It's money that the readers themselves are willing to spend to get a quality publication that's got real content because it's independent of the influence of the advertisers. They pay for Newsweek. They pay for Time. And, they'll pay for my magazine because it's got buzz. It's got class. It's a quality product with engaged readers who learn something every time they pick it up. It's a good read, cover to cover, and never ends up in the Round File. In fact, it ends up on the shelf, issue after issue, saved for future reference because the content it useful, authentic, and true - not to mention, interesting! Readers are willing to pay for a magazine that provides that kind of worthwhile content. And as soon as that happens, look what happens next. Suddenly, the advertisers are back in the game. They can't afford to let this opportunity pass them by. They want to be in the magazine because their ROI is guaranteed. They need to have their product associated with the buzz, the quality, and the authenticity of the magazine. And, then something even more fundamental happens. Conversation ensues. When an industry doesn’t talk, it doesn't progress. Without editorial platforms that are good, authentic, decent, independent, and honest - there's no real conversation and no real progress. There's business, of course, but it's monopolistic. The companies who can afford to buy editorial platforms to showcase their technology end up winning - big time - but everybody else loses and that's not a good thing. So, that's it. That's my read on how great magazines function. That's how the concept of a Free Press is preserved and how conversation and progress are nurtured and enhanced. But there's something else. **************************** What about on-line? Well, what about on-line. A lot of people have stopped reading print publications and get all of their information, news, and analysis on-line. Okay, but am I the first to tell you that the business model on-line is really obscure, tough, difficult, almost incomprehensible? Who pays for that information, news, and analysis to be written, edited, and put up on-line? Things are different in the world of on-line publications. Nobody's going to pay for a subscription - that's so "90's" - but apparently, if I can prove to you that there are enough clicks and clacks happening on my web publication, enough "eyeballs" coming to visit (a pretty gross metric, if ever there was one), then you'll place your company's ad on my web publication so as to be seen by the visiting eyeballs. But, wait - apparently, the terminology's not right. A good friend recently told me that the terminology is changing. We don't have "advertisers" on-line anymore. We have "sponsors." Okay, I can work with that. So my print magazine will have advertisers, but my on-line magazine will have sponsors. Sponsors will display their logo/info in a discreet and tasteful way, which enhances both their classiness because they're associated with a classy publication, and helps to defray the costs of the on-line content, which is the companion to the print content. Pretty straightforward. The real fine magazine lives, and so does the companion web publication. (Just as a thought ... shall we skip the print magazine altogether?) (You're asking this from the owner/operator of EDA Confidential?) **************************** And, one last thing. At my magazine, everybody will be encouraged to use "Reply All." Sometime back I was working at a magazine and I got an e-mail from the associate publisher. The e-mail said, "Naughty girl! Have you been using Reply All again?" Yeah, Naughty Girl confesses. I'm a mega-fan of "Reply All." Everybody's on the same page when everybody uses "Reply All." I'm not a fan of the Kremlin style of management. That's when information crucial to the running of the enterprise is closely guarded and held by only a select few. Of course, that's more the norm than not in business - particularly in the business of publishing - but I don't have to like it. And I don't have to play along. On my magazine, "Reply All" will not be required, but it will be strongly encouraged. I'm not the first one to conceive of this sort of thing. That's what the whole world of Open Source is all about. But that's for a different article. This one's about pasta. Because pasta and publishing have a lot in common. It looks simple, and it is simple. Quality pasta and quality publications stick when they're just right. Forget Publish or Perish. In my world, it's Pasta or Perish. Bon Appétit!
October 25, 2004 Peggy Aycinena owns and operates EDA Confidential. She can be reached at peggy@aycinena.com
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