Content for sailing magazine?

[Nostrodamus]

Following on from a post about the cover of sailing magazines lets help them out a bit here and start a fresh.

What would you like to see in a sailing magazine?

Ok we will go back to the nice slightly raised cover they used to have rather than the glossy thing they have now. We will have a good photo on there without all the writing but what about the content?

Should we have a “stig” of the boating world racing boats round a course and non-sailing celebrity doing the same? Should Jeremy Clarkson edit it?

Do you want to see new boat trials or some super yachts we can never afford?

What about your ideas for content. What would you really like to see in a sailing magazine?

 

[Lakesailor]

Ok we will go back to the nice slightly raised cover they used to have rather than the glossy thing they have now. We will have a good photo on there without all the writing but what about the content?

Doesn't matter about the content really as no-one will pick it off the shelves and buy it.
Magazines don't splash their content all over the cover for fun. It's what makes people buy the mags. It's a jungle out there.
Your new-look mag will sell about 30 copies.

 

[awol]

I would have thought articles on why Johnny Foreigner won't speak English and a simple guide to unfurling in-mast mains and how to pull strings to move the sails would guarantee a readership of at least 1. But how would we know it was a worthwhile buy if the cover didn't give us a clue?

 

[Sandyman]

I would have thought articles on why Johnny Foreigner won't speak English and a simple guide to unfurling in-mast mains and how to pull strings to move the sails would guarantee a readership of at least 1. But how would we know it was a worthwhile buy if the cover didn't give us a clue?

 

[dancrane]

My 1980s memory of those lovely 'pebble-dash' Yachting Monthly covers, is equally a memory of the pictures on them.

I have a feeling there were never any exclamation marks used, to excite the cynical newsagent's customer.

The lurid print and quantity of articles hinted at on today's covers, may attract my interest initially, but they're equally a reason not to shell out nearly £5 to give the mag house-room for the next month or six. There's plenty of superficial over-lit trash on every internet page; if I pay for a magazine, it'll have to appeal after just catching my eye.

And surely, any one of us who goes to WHSmith's etc for a glance at the yachting press, doesn't need fireworks and competitions writ large on the cover - we'd easily find the mag, even if it showed b&w pics of Jolie Brise passing Eddystone. In fact, I'd far more likely buy it if it had!

Strangely though, I don't often buy any of the mags that show glossily, beautifully photographed golden-sunny scenes of Grand Banks schooners undergoing restoration, or descriptions of the infinite care required in building a reconstructed Norse longship. They're admirable projects, lovingly performed, but not interesting to me at a practical level.

I reckon, some of everything would succeed. So:

1) a few articles on ground-breaking technology that anyone may soon benefit from, be it antifouling or radar-reflection;

2) plenty of actual, practical seamanship - little lectures by experts, on everything from distress signals to barber-haulers and how to de-gunk an infected diesel tank. They ought to form a really readable dozen-page sub-section, rather than be pasted here and there;

3) some coverage (but just a very little) on races going on worldwide - but not necessarily the biggest events, which are often disproportionately dull to read about;

4) plenty of decent boat-tests, particularly of anything that propagates a taste for non-BenJenBav designs (so tedious!);

5) some 'what would YOU do?' editorial, that challenges skippers with scenarios that arise every day at sea, and are the mainstay of discussion on this forum...with the conclusions of an experienced panel;

6) FOOD on board. Got to be worth one page each month? In-season stuff, and how well it lasts, rolling round the bilge?

7) What about a liveaboard's journal? Ideally not in Hawaii, but somewhere where issues which affect UK readership, like yacht central heating and harbourside crime, are relevant and relatable.

8) Cruising experiences - always interesting because no two accounts of any passage are alike.

9) Maybe an 'Anchorage of the Month'? Favourite spots, with the available facilities, views, hazards.

Superyachts are comprehensively covered by dedicated magazines, so they don't warrant a mention.

Most of all, from my point of view...make sure the cover doesn't resemble shrieking stop-press tabloid headlines - I want to have that magazine close to hand in the coming months, for times when I'm wishing I was on board. No horror-headlines in 72-point, no competitions, minimal small additional photos. Keep the contents for the inside, and Jolie Brise on the cover. Simple!

 

[Nostrodamus]

Like your thinking Dancrane.. want an editorial job?

 

[dancrane]

Keep talking, Nostrodamus, I'm definitely interested!

Glad you approve.

 

[dancrane]

Surely the point is, in 2012, NOBODY buys a yachting mag for fresh news, or even for classifieds, because whatever you might want to know or look for, is only ever three clicks away on your computer.

The only mags I buy, contain interesting, evocative writing and considered articles that compare the virtues of things to do, and share practical shipboard wisdom, and describe items available for sale. If there's anything brash about the cover, I lower my expectations...and at today's prices, that means I don't even glance through it.

I bet the creatures responsible for most magazine covers today, are decades younger than the majority of their readers.

 

[snooks]

I bet the creatures responsible for most magazine covers today, are decades younger than the majority of their readers.

Ultimately the editor is responsible, and he's just about to retire at the young age of 64 years and 348 days, so you're probably right

 

[Nostrodamus]

Ultimately the editor is responsible, and he's just about to retire at the young age of 64 years and 348 days, so you're probably right

Dacrane...I would get that CV in quick

 

[armchairsailor]

Erm, Nostro: I think PBO and YM have about got your list covered...

 

[snooks]

Erm, Nostro: I think PBO and YM have about got your list covered...

I wasn't going to be the person to point that out

 

[Richard Shead]

May I ask why no competitions?

 

[dancrane]

Ultimately the editor is responsible, and he's just about to retire at the young age of 64 years and 348 days, so you're probably right

Okay, I'm decades younger than him, then!

I really believe though, that the brash in-your-face approach to 'selling' each month's edition, doesn't in fact appeal to a readership that was looking for that magazine, anyway! Preaching to the converted.

All that's wanted is a pleasant, evocative pic, and discreet print suggesting that when we buy it, open it and read, we'll learn useful stuff and feel immersed in the happy camaraderie of boat-folk. That's what we want, and routinely don't get!

Here's a weird comparison...

...I used to like the early episodes of Poirot, from the late 'eighties, early 'nineties. They were one hour long, light and humorous, and in very good taste - rather old-fashioned, but fun...

...but I CANNOT watch the episodes made this century. They're movie-length now, and slow to start/resolve. The wit has evaporated, and in its place we get fairly starry casts, mostly of very young actors and very pretty actresses, and the adaptation is keen to make the characters look outrageous in every thought, word and deed...

...And good god, it's dull! If we were actually still in the 1930s, it would be tantalizing. But in 2012, the only appeal about the 1930s is the innocence. That's nostalgia - remembering the past, with all the uncomfortable corners knocked off. Fat old David Suchet, greasing his moustache and eyeing the totty, is foul, not fun. It's not his fault - but the writer and director have gone wrong...

...and in yacht-mag terms, the sexed-up hard-sell isn't what we want for our £4.95. The glossier it gets, the less I like it.

Let's have some substance instead. Actually, I'd readily fork-out for a sort of "Old Ted's Quayside Advice", printed exclusively in black-and-white, covering rivets and whippings and ColRegs and tricolour bulbs, and the countless themes that aren't frothy enough to excite editors.

I'd buy that.

Come to think of it, I reckon there's already a magazine that's mainly about whippings...

 

[Richard Shead]

Again, why no competitions?

 

[Twister_Ken]

I would happily refer the OP to...

 

[samwise]

I have to say that Yachting World ticks most of my boxes -- even though the majority of the boats are well over my budget horizons. Great pictures and good writing. I have just moved my sub to YW from PBO ( Relax Snooks, I still get Yachting Monthly!)

 

[madabouttheboat]

Ask 1000 sailors what they what from their magazine and you'll get 1000 different answers. That's why any specialist mag will never be full of interesting stuff for every reader. I guess the aim for the editor is to come up with a mag that has something for everyone, but even that can't be easy.

I read not only two or three boating mags each month, but a couple on other subjects as well. Some months one will contain more relevant stuff to me than the others. Some months I feel a particuar mag wasn't great value for me, but the next month they might turn it around and fill it with stuff I enjoy.

As long as I feel I get somethimg out of each mag almost every month I'll keep on buying. As my knowledge increases, there will be less that I can learn from a mag but I understand the mag has to keep putting the beginners stuff in cos they hopefully have a regular batch of new readers that need this stuff.

Imagine the variety of readers a mag like YM has to appeal to. Newbies, very experienced, every level in between, people with small budgets, people with big budgets, small boat owners, large boat owners, fin keelers, bilge keelers, lifting keel boats, Slab reefers, in-mast merchants, sailors from the North, South, East and West, readers that are looking for one particular bit of kit out of all the bits of kit all the readers are looking for etc etc etc.

In fact, when I think of it like this I am often surprised just how much I do find in each issue that is interesting to me.

 

[snooks]

All that's wanted is a pleasant, evocative pic, and discreet print suggesting that when we buy it, open it and read, we'll learn useful stuff and feel immersed in the happy camaraderie of boat-folk. That's what we want, and routinely don't get!

I refer the honourable gentlemen to post no.2

"Magazines don't splash their content all over the cover for fun. It's what makes people buy the mags. It's a jungle out there."

News stands sales are needed, and the fact is on the shelves you wouldn't get to see the evocative pic, just something like this:

So cover lines are needed to sell the magazine and you get to see something like this:

I know it's an unpleasant thought, but ignoring what you would like to see, ask yourself "which image would sell more magazines?".

Now imagine you were unaware of Yachting Monthly and you wanted to buy a magazine about sailing, which one sells the content of the magazine more?

Now put yourself in the shoes of a PBO reader, you always buy PBO, which image would make you pick up Yachting Monthly (instead or as well)?

And so it goes on....

I agree with you that a full page picture would look better, but sadly the magazine market place is full of other magazine screaming "BUY ME!" so if Yachting Monthly says nothing....where does that leave us?

 

[dancrane]

I beg pardon, was too busy editing my own words to notice RichardShead's question.

Competitions?

As you're at IPC, are you privy to just how financially worthwhile the yachting magazine competitions are? I mean, do you sell enough additional copies that month, to cover the cost of the prizes and the use of print that their descriptions require? Or, are the prizes all sent free to the editor's office, with the compliments of the manufacturer, whose name is then printed large and lauded in the text?

Fair enough, if you do profit thereby. I will have to stay unhappy about what I see as the descent in copy-quality. Competitions in the yachting press, to me, are like unsolicited pizza take-away leaflets, stuffed in with the post and obstructing the things which I go through my mail to find.

We're constantly surrounded by opportunities to gamble/compete in competitions rigged up by wholly cynical scam-merchants; the internet has become a veritable iVegas. I despise it.

And while I hope the yachting press isn't so mean-minded, I find that reading 'competition' or 'win' on a cover, has the opposite effect from that which I presume you hope for: to me, it really lowers the magazine's happily serious tone, which becomes urgent and ephemeral, completely at odds with enjoyment of the sea and sailing.

I don't have to buy it, though...so I won't! No hard feelings.