Publishing a magazine is like delivering a child! The joy of grabbing the first crisp copy from the press outweighs the labor of compiling it page by page, word by word. At the end it all, the birth pangs are worth the sheer creative bliss of producing a magazine that will stand tall in the stands.
Put the best brains to work
A job is half done when it is managed by an energetic and expert team that can work in unison, complementing each other in the process. An experienced team leader at the helm of affairs and a young creative crew, preferably from language and journalism background are indispensable to the publishing success.
A voracious reading habit and eye for detail should be the criteria for selecting the editorial team. The proof readers and DTPs should posses sound language skills to detect flaws in writing. An effective art department and marketing staff to handle advertisements and administration to orchestrate it all is essential.
Select good topics
Regardless of the frequency of issue, choosing good topic to include in the magazine is extremely important. Choose your topic(s) with the target reader in mind; pick the ones that are the most relevant and timely. The magazine can carry an assorted collection of articles under one broad topic or a medley of topics with a cover story which will determine the cover page design.
Solicit articles
A list of authors, freelancers, and students willing to contribute material should be ready with the research associates who would procure articles, correspond with authors, decide deadlines, and clear deals regarding copyright and payments for the author.
Grab the Red Pen
Once the articles arrive, the vital job of editing starts which involves a series of tasks - omitting poorly written articles, deleting repetitions, simplifying jargon, and checking for plagiarism.
Encapsulating the article in a synopsis at the beginning, providing an executive summary, inserting appropriate subheads, highlighting new ideas through bullet points, substantiating an example through box items, fillers, illustrations, all demand tremendous dedicated involvement of the editorial team.
Rewriting articles by over enthusiastic sub editors should be avoided as that would mar the original flavor, be too much time consuming and a gross insult to an author. Edited articles should be sent back to authors to approve any change, clarify doubts or provide photos or fillers if needed. Allow a thousand thoughts to bloom and encourage articles that handle a topic in an unconventional manner.
Any sort of plagiarism should be dealt with strictly and blacklisting of authors who indulge in it. You can use websites such as duplichecker.com for this purpose.
Proof-reading and DTP-essential appendages
Making an article flawless, checking for spaces, spellings, adjusting paragraphs, verifying headers is the meticulous job of a proof reader. Rigorous checking of footnotes and numbering of graphs and diagrams demands sincerity, patience and vigilant eyes. The DTP and the art people have to place photos, grid, page numbers, and adjustments of space through blurbs. For the layout, any software such as QuarkXPress or PageMaker can be used.
Cover page design
In today’s era of packaging sheen, selecting a classy and meaningful cover page design can add the ultimate zing factor to your magazine and grab attention. The theme should focus on the cover story or on the overall focus of the issue.
Deciding page size, page numbers, inside and outside ads, typeface, spine etc are logistic issues each of which are important in their own way. The final success story will be related by the number of subscription. But whatever be it, remember beauty and not the beast lies in the detail and each minute detail is just not a cog in the wheel but the movement of the wheel as a whole.
Chillibreeze's disclaimer: This is a contributed article and was published on Chillibreeze in March, 2010. The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author(s) and do not reflect the views of Chillibreeze as a company. Chillibreeze has a strict anti-plagiarism policy. Please contact us to report any copyright issues related to this article. The relevance of the facts and figures cited (if any) could change after a period of time.
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