• MARCH 2020 •

THE MAGAZINE
INDUSTRY

THE DEVELOPMENT FIVE MAJOR TYPES DIGITAL

OF MAGAZINES OF MAGAZINES MAGAZINES

The history of magazines | 3 The contents of a magazine | 7 Future of magazines in the

digital era | 11
 GLOSSARY

03 MAGAZINE
a collection of materials (stories, ads,
poems, and other items) that editors
believe will interest audiences

8 ISSUE
all the copies of a periodical with the
same cover date and distributed at the
same time

9 MAGAZINE
PUBLISHER
the chief executive of a magazine,
who is in charge of its financial health

10 MAGAZINE
DISTRIBUTION
the channel through which a
magazine reaches its exhibition point.

12
SUBSCRIPTION
a long-term order, paid in advance, for
the receipt of a magazine for a
predetermined period of time or
number of issues
 HISTORY
The
Development
of Magazines
Nowadays, it seems that magazines shape our lives,
telling us what to wear, what to eat and what to
think about. Although this is the age of the internet,
we continue to enjoy magazines, admire their
pages, photos, illustrations and headlines. This
popularity is due to the fact that magazines cater to
all sorts of interests and passions. Most magazines
look more or less the same at first glance, but they
target different audiences.
The word  magazine comes from French; it means
storehouse.  Magazineswere, and still are,
collections of materials (stories, ads, poems, and
other items) that their editors believe will interest
their audience.
"THERE MIGHT BE NEW
TECHNOLOGY, BUT
TECHNOLOGICAL PROGRESS
ITSELF WAS NOTHING NEW -
AND OVER THE YEARS IT
HAD NOT DESTROYED JOBS,
BUT CREATED THEM."
MARGARET THATCHER
By the 1700s, magazines were being published
regularly in England, as the growing power of
Parliament allowed for more public arguments
about governing than in the past.
Political magazines and literary magazines made
their debuts. Some, such as the famous  Tatlerand
Spectator served up both politics and literature by
famous writers of the day. Of course, these
magazines were aimed at, and were read by,
England’s wealthy elite. The same was true in the
American colonies of England.
Similar to newspapers, magazines aimed at
relatively wealthy people, often merchants or
plantation owners with literary and/or political
inclinations.
The first magazines appeared in 1741 in
Philadelphia; Benjamin Franklin was one of the
printers who tried his hand at publishing a
periodical.
In fact, most editors and writers for American
magazines during the first quarter of the nineteenth
century received very little compensation for their
work, or didn’t get paid at all.
Magazines were a labor of love that reached a small
community of readers.
Page | 3
THE
TRANSFORMATION
OF MAGAZINES INTO
MASS MEDIA

Between 1825 and 1850, the number, the nature,

and the business of magazines changed
dramatically. In this period, from 1825 to 1850,
between four thousand and five thousand new
magazines were introduced in the United States.
Most of them died quickly, but the fact that new
periodicals continued to be launched meant that
business people were beginning to see that there
was a large market emerging for magazines.

The magazines that survived were still more

expensive than newspapers, and they assumed a
higher intellectual level. But even so, as a group
they began to exert increasing influence on the
nation’s cultural life. Magazines dedicated to
diverse subjects began to draw audiences that
numbered in the tens and hundreds of thousands.

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MAGAZINES
LATER IN THE
TWENTIETH
CENTURY
The most popular magazines at the
turn of the twentieth century
provided their readers with an
exciting mixture of sensational news
about problems in their society with
entertaining stories and helpful
advice.
During the 1960s and 1970s, the magazine industry
again found itself in an environment that demanded
fundamental change, thanks to the new medium of
television. By the late 1950s, most U.S. homes (86
percent) had at least one television set; that number
had jumped to 93 percent by 1965. The huge popularity
of the television began to hurt mass circulation
magazines such as the Saturday Evening Post. Large
advertisers abandoned magazines for TV because it
could help them reach even larger portions of the U.S.
population than mass-circulation magazines at a
comparable cost. Not only that, but television allowed
for dynamic ads with moving pictures and sound,
features that print media couldn’t offer.
It took the magazine industry a few years to adjust to
these stunning reversals, but by the early 1970s,
executives had developed a new approach to their
business. Instead of trying to reach “everybody” and
compete with TV, magazine executives decided to
develop periodicals that were designed to attract
narrow slices of the population that certain types of
advertisers wanted to reach.
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Certainly, there were already magazines that were
tailored to particular ethnic, religious, occupational,
and hobby groups, but the new magazines tried to
go beyond those categories and tap into the newer,
narrower interests and lifestyles of the relatively
affluent in U.S. society—target audiences that
advertisers especially wanted.
Small, targeted audiences became especially
profitable for magazines as technology developed
in the 1970s and 1980s. New computer-driven
printing technologies allowed companies to make
substantial profits with magazines that reached
hundreds of thousands, or even tens of thousands,
of people instead of millions.
An Overview of the Modern Magazine Industry
Earlier, we described magazines as collections of
materials (stories, ads, poems, and other items) that
their editors believe will interest their audience.
While this notion of what a magazine is makes
sense on the surface, it still leaves lots of ambiguity.
But frankly, even people who work in the magazine
industry don’t seem to have a consistent definition
of a magazine. Some, for example, put comic books
under the magazine tent, while others don’t.
It took the magazine industry a few years to adjust
to these stunning reversals, but by the early 1970s,
executives had developed a new approach to their
business. Instead of trying to reach “everybody”
and compete with TV, magazine executives decided
to develop periodicals that were designed to attract
narrow slices of the population that certain types of
advertisers wanted to reach.
Certainly, there were already magazines that were
tailored to particular ethnic, religious, occupational,
and hobby groups, but the new magazines tried to
go beyond those categories and tap into the newer,
narrower interests and lifestyles of the relatively
affluent in U.S. society—target audiences that
advertisers especially wanted.
Small, targeted audiences became especially
profitable for magazines as technology developed
in the 1970s and 1980s. New computer-driven
printing technologies allowed companies to make
substantial profits with magazines that reached
hundreds of thousands, or even tens of thousands,
of people instead of millions. NOMADIC | 24
Page | 6
FIVE MAJOR TYPES OF
MAGAZINES
Today, there are thousands of magazines worldwide. They inspire, inform, educate and entertain audiences
across the globe. Nearly 600 years after the advent of the printing press, magazines continueto change the
nature of things throughout the world.

People who work in the magazine industry

categorize magazines in several ways, but there

N
seems to be general agreement that if a periodical
fits into one of the following five categories, it is to ewsletters
be considered a magazine:

B usiness or trade
magazines
C omic books

L iterary reviews
and academic journals 

C onsumer magazines 
Page | 7
BUSINESS-TO-BUSINESS MAGAZINES/
TRADE MAGAZINES
A business-to-business (B-to-B) magazine, also called a  trade magazine, focuses on topics
related to a particular occupation, profession, or industry. Published by a private firm or by a
business association, it is written to reach people who are involved with that occupation,
profession, or industry. Standard Rate and Data Service (SRDS), a firm that collects
information about magazine audiences and ad rates and sells it to advertisers and ad
agencies, devotes an entire reference directory to business magazines. The directory divides
business specializations into over 200 categories. Examples are: advertising and marketing,
automotive, banking, building, ceramics, computers, engineering and construction, healthcare,
and hotels, motels, clubs, and resorts.

CONSUMER MAGAZINES
Consumer magazines are aimed at people in their private, nonbusiness lives (magazines aimed
at the general public). They are sold both by subscription and on newsstands and magazine
racks in stores. They are called  consumer magazinesbecause their readers buy and consume
products and services that are sold through retail outlets and that may be advertised in those
magazines.

LITERARY REVIEWS AND ACADEMIC JOURNALS

This category includes hundreds of publications with small circulation figures.  Literary
reviews(periodicals about literature and related topics) and  academic journals(periodicals
about scholarly topics, with articles typically edited and written by professors and/or other
university-affiliated researchers) are generally nonprofit; funded by scholarly associations,
universities, or foundations, and sold by subscription through the mail. Because their readers
are often quite highly placed in academia, politics, or business, these periodicals often have
clout that far exceeds their small circulation. Moreover, journalists often look to some of
these publications for fresh ideas that they can discuss in broader-reach newspapers and
magazines.

NEWSLETTERS
A  newsletteris a small-circulation periodical, typically four to eight pages long, that is
composed and printed in a simple style, unlike the large, sometimes glossypage periodicals we
have discussed until now. Part of the reason is cost. Newsletters typically go to small numbers
of people at a frequency that would make a more production-heavy publication too expensive.
The rather plain look of a newsletter often matches its editorial purpose: to convey needed
information in a straightforward way. People receive these publications by mail, by fax
machine, or, increasingly, online.

COMIC BOOKS
As you may well know, many comic books are neither comical nor books. The term comic book
for a periodical that tells a story through pictures as well as words developed in the 1930s as
publishers of cheap (“pulp”) magazines that presented detective, romance, action, and
supernatural-science stories tried to take advantage of the popularity of newspaper comic
strips to boost sagging sales. They put their material into comic-strip form and sold it in a
complete story unit as a comic book.
Page | 8
PRODUCTION AND
THE MAGAZINE INDUSTRY
In the magazine industry, the term publisher refers not to
the company making the magazine, but to a person who
works there. A  magazine publisheris the chief executive
of a magazine and is in charge of its financial health.
Under the publisher are the business departments (in
charge of advertising and circulation), the technical
production department, and the editorial department.
The magazine’s editor-in-chief works for the publisher;
several editors may, in turn, work for the editor-in-chief. 

Magazine publishers today typically work with their

editors to build their magazines around distinct topics
that they hope will attract distinct slices of the American
population. In turn, the publishers hope (or expect) that
their magazines will pull in advertisers who need to reach
those population slices with the best medium possible.

MAGAZINE PRODUCTION
GOALS

What makes a magazine the best medium possible?

To advertisers and publishers, the answer is a magazine
that:
■ Draws an attractive audience 
■ Draws an audience that is loyal to the content and
personality of the magazine—its “brand” 
■ Provides an environment conducive to the sale of the
advertisers’ products 
■ Provides this audience and environment at an efficient
price
■ Provides a way for advertisers to associate with the
magazine’s brand and audience beyond the magazine’s
pages

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DRAWING AN ATTRACTIVE
AUDIENCE
Typically, magazine publishers want to reach what they
call  upscale readers. These are upper-middle or upper-
class people with substantial disposable income—that is,
money beyond the amount needed for basic expenses
that they can spend on special or expensive items.
Because so many periodicals reach these sorts of people,
a magazine has to be distinctive enough to draw
particular upscale readers whose social characteristics
and lifestyles fit a profile that interests enough
advertisers to support the magazine.
DRAWING A LOYAL AUDIENCE
In today’s competitive media environment, it is not
enough for a magazine to have a distinctly attractive
audience on its rolls. Several other magazines, or radio
stations or cable stations, may make similarly alluring
claims. A magazine’s business executives therefore must
convince advertisers that the magazine is edited so
effectively that the people who receive it read it
consistently and thoroughly—presumably so thoroughly
that they pay attention to the ads.
CREATING A CONDUCIVE
ENVIRONMENT
Advertisers particularly like magazines with
articles and photos that fit with the tone and spirit
of their products or services. Publishers and
editors often develop new magazine sections with
an eye toward specific types of advertisers that
would find these sections good places to parade
their goods. As far back as 2000,  National
Geographicwas pretty explicit about the favorable
environment it presents for advertisers. The
magazine said in a trade magazine ad that it “brings
unique portraits to readers who have an insatiable
curiosity of the world we live in with a truth that
compels them to embrace our brand and your
advertising message.”
SETTING AN EFFICIENT
PRICE
Publishers know that they must present
advertisers with a competitively low  cost per
thousandreaders if they want to get or keep
business. Of course, a cost per thousand is truly
low only if the consumers the magazine reaches
are the consumers that the advertiser is targeting.
PRODUCING THE
MAGAZINE AS BRAND
An increasingly important way that a major
magazine company tries to keep advertisers and
get new ones is to position every title not just as
paper-bound reading material but as a personality
—a brand—with which readers want to engage in
many areas of their lives. Doing this, magazines
have become central actors in the movement of
materials across media boundaries. One major way
in which they interact with their audience is
through digital media. Another is by expanding into
other media and staging events.  In both, the
magazines invite strong advertising participation.
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 DIGITAL
MAGAZINES
FUTURE OF MAGAZINES IN THE
DIGITAL ERA
Increased competition, penetration of
online and e-formats and cross media
ownership negatively affect the print
media sector.
News magazines join the market
regularly and the existing ones
disappear for want of readers, lack of
finance or due to take over. This
tendency is called 'magazine churn'.
Advertising revenue (much more than
circulation revenue) seals the fate of
most consumer magazines.
The shift of advertising revenue to
the web is the biggest problem faced
by broad-circulation magazines
today. While they are becoming
increasingly adept at generating
revenue from their web sites, web-
only publishing models substitute print
magazines.
Therefore, digital magazines are set
to grow fast over the next several
years in the magazine industry as
publishers begin to enter the digital
arena.
Until around 2001, magazine
companies hardly used the Internet or
any other digital platform. Publishers
didn’t think it was cost-effective to
create material just for the Web, and
they were afraid that if they posted
their magazine content online, it
would discourage readership of the
hard copy magazine issues.
In the next few years, though, their
attitude changed drastically. They
realized that their audiences were
increasingly using the Internet,
sometimes to the detriment of reading
magazines.
Advertisers noted that too, and
magazine executives began to worry
that they might lose readers and
money to the Web. The result was
that many magazine firms are moving
strongly to use the Web to extend
relationships with their readers
beyond the printed page.
That is the case with trade (business-
to-business) magazines, as well as
consumer magazines. Even though
the Web still contributes only a very
small portion of revenues (around 5
percent with consumer magazines, 8
percent with business-to-business),
executives see it as key to their
future. Most observers believe that
consumer magazines have not been
as aggressive as trade magazines in
reaching out to their audiences online
and drawing advertisers.
The Web has become a big selling
point with advertisers. The digital
magazine has a lot of undeniable
advantages. It brings about more
earnings, more readers and
environmental sustainability.
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