Seven Mistakes I Made When Starting A Magazine
And what I learned from them
In February 2011, I created a company and published the first issue of H2Open, a printed magazine for open water swimmers (now called Outdoor Swimmer). My experience in publishing up until then was limited to freelance contributions to a handful of magazines, primarily Triathlete’s World and Africa Investor. I knew nothing about design, advertising sales, subscriptions management, or the publication process. I found out enough to get started through Google. The rest I learned through trial and error. Naturally, I made a few mistakes. Here are some, along with what I would do instead, with the benefit of hindsight. I hope they’re useful.
Mistake #1. Not offering a recurring payment option
I started by selling annual subscriptions for a one-off credit card or cash payment. The good thing about this was it brought in funds quickly and gave me an early taste of success. I thought: “This is easy.”
Wrong!
The problem manifested itself one year in, once those first subscriptions lapsed. For 12 months, I had straight-line growth in subscribers, adding about 100 each month. After that, subscriptions started lapsing. It turned out that subscription renewal rates from one-off payments were around 20 to 25%, and it was hard work to achieve even that. This wasn’t because people didn’t like the product. It’s a result of inertia and forgetfulness. A magazine about swimming is nice to have but not essential.
Consequently, subscriber growth plateaued. I was only able to fix this once we could offer subscriptions on recurring payments on direct debit. These have a renewal rate of around 80% and were a game-changer for continued subscriber growth.
We still accept one-off credit card payments for subscriptions, but we encourage people to subscribe through direct debit. It’s worth offering a discount for these because of the improved retention.
Mistake #2. Not charging enough
This is a common error but easy to make. I based the starting price on what competitor magazines were charging. I assumed that was the market price and nobody would pay more. This overlooked three points. Firstly, as a small, independent publisher, I couldn’t access the economies of scale that a large publisher can achieve. Secondly, large publications are (or were) partially funded through advertising (see below for more on this). Thirdly, if you produce something that is different enough from everything else on the market, you don’t need to compete on price. Yes, H2Open was another magazine but it was the only one for outdoor swimmers.
Interestingly, I was advised at the time by someone with publishing experience to charge more, but I didn’t have the confidence.
Mistake #3. Choosing the wrong name and sticking to it for too long
Picking the name H2Open for a magazine about open water swimming was a stroke of genius, I thought. Turns out, it was too clever by half. The problem was it didn’t immediately and unambiguously explain what the magazine was about. When selling subscriptions at events, I had conversations along these lines:
“Can I interest you in a subscription to H2Open Magazine?”
“What’s that then?”
“A magazine about open water swimming.”
“Oh yeah, I get it. Very clever.”
At this point, the potential customer would give an indifferent shrug and move on.
Our current editor, Jonathan Cowie, eventually persuaded me to change the name to Outdoor Swimmer magazine, and I resisted. The idea of rebranding terrified me. I was emotionally attached to H2Open. I knew that some of our readers liked it too. But I understood the rationale. If you have to explain what your product’s name means, you have already decreased your chances of a sale.
Jonathan’s instincts were correct. We announced the rebrand at the same time as a price increase (see mistake number 2, above) and a switch from bi-monthly to monthly publishing. We then had our best sales month ever.
Mistake #4. Waiting too long to start a mailing list
It didn’t occur to me to create an email list when I launched a magazine. Why would someone want an email when they can get a printed magazine? Our email list is now our most effective tool for selling magazine subscriptions. Email is perfect for potential customers who are interested in your product but not yet ready to buy. It takes time and effort to build your list and to regularly communicate through it. You may wonder why you’re spending time on it when you have few readers and pressing print deadlines. It’s an investment in the future of your business and it’s worth the effort to do it well.
Mistake #5. Thinking advertising sales would be easy
Pre-launch, I phoned some potential advertising clients. They were encouraging. They suggested that if I built an audience, they would pay to be in front of it. For my first issue, I even secured paid-for advertising from a major swimming brand (Speedo), plus they provided me with goggles I could offer as subscription gifts. It was a brilliant start and I thought I must be a natural salesperson. I’m not. Selling advertising takes time. So does writing articles, organizing production, and managing a website. It’s hard to make a high volume of sales calls when you’ve got so much else to do. It’s also hard to find good salespeople to work for you when you have a tiny budget. The mistake, really, was forecasting a much higher sales revenue than I could realistically achieve. Advertising sales revenue is wonderful to have but it’s fickle and hard to come by. It would have been better to charge more for subscriptions and lowered expectations around advertising sales.
Mistake #6. Trying to do too much
During my second year of publishing Outdoor Swimmer (or H2Open as it still was), I decided to put on an event. Not only that, I thought it would be a good idea to create the H2Open Awards. Publishing in print is a relentless business. Deadlines come with frightening regularity, and when you’re rushing to get an issue to press, everything else goes out of the window. Taking on an event and creating awards was madness. I’d hoped to get a sponsor for the awards. Needless to say, I didn’t. Luckily, I found someone to work with for the event otherwise it would never have happened. As it was, I was working every available hour for about two months and not sleeping enough. The event and awards ceremony went well, from a customer perspective, but I could barely function. The small profit we made (a few hundred pounds), was disproportionate to the effort that went into it. I nearly gave up.
Be ambitious, by all means, but building a business an endurance event, not a splash and dash. You need to pace your efforts.
Mistake #7. Not getting investors
When I had the idea to create a magazine about outdoor swimming, I dived straight in. I thought I had the skills, energy, and resources to do it all. Moreover, I liked the idea of doing it on my own, being in charge, and reaping all the rewards if it went well. I’ve listed this mistake last, but maybe I’d have avoided the others if I’d have had investors from the beginning.
Adding investors into the mix is a complication. You have to convince them that your project will make money. They want to know why you choose some options and not others. They hold you accountable. On the other hand, the right investors add skills that you don’t have and can help you deal with difficult issues that inevitably arise when running a business.
Finding investors isn’t easy. Few people will invest in an idea, especially if the person behind that idea has no experience in the industry they’re trying to enter. You may need to prove your business is commercially viable first, which was how I had to do it. This doesn’t necessarily mean profitable, although it will have to be in the long-term. If you can demonstrate there’s a market for your product and potential for growth, and you can tell a good story, you’ll be halfway there. Networking and a dose of luck should do the rest.
Starting and running a business involves a steep learning curve. You will inevitably make mistakes. Don’t beat yourself up about it. Learn from them and move on, and share them in places where other entrepreneurs might find and learn from them too.
