What do you think of writing a newspaper and magazine among readers?

What power does the seemingly ordinary magazine Reader have to impress millions of readers around the world?

core competitiveness

At first, readers imitated American Reader's Digest. Now, it has found a way of communication between foreign works and readers in China: when choosing foreign works, it will enrich readers' knowledge with practical information, enlighten readers' hearts with touching works and guide readers to understand various phenomena in western culture with China values.

The reader's evaluation of it is "the book is as light as a chrysanthemum". In this noisy era, readers really seem cold and quiet. As the dramatist Wei Minglun commented, "Readers can surpass the sales of books at both ends without relying on pillows or fists. With what? Literary appeal, knowledge and information, interesting viewing, moral education, intellectual education, aesthetic education, and multivitamins. " No kitsch, no hype, fresh and elegant cover, warm and smooth text, which has been the case since its establishment 23 years ago.

At a seminar, Peng Changcheng, editor-in-chief of Reader, summed up the reasons for the magazine's popularity so far, and said that constant innovation and concern for "truth, goodness and beauty" were the reasons for the success of Reader. "The magazine has a slogan, gambling at home and abroad, collecting the essence, enlightening the mind and broadening the horizon. Broad horizons have opened the window to the outside world, and at the same time, we have a deeper understanding of our own cultural roots. Many columns in the magazine are in real contact with people, paying attention to people's spiritual life, improving their literacy and releasing their feelings. "

pricing strategy

This 16 summary mass publication, which was founded in Gansu, is based on the purpose of "absorbing the strengths of China and foreign countries, gathering the essence, enlightening the mind and broadening the horizons". Published articles cover political economy, literature, art, history, science and technology, health, education and other fields.

Reader has been adhering to the principle of high quality and low price, with 64 pages of black and white text and 20 pages of color illustrations. The price is 3 yuan, which is the lowest among publications of the same kind and the same printing quality. All published articles are recommended by readers, and the names of referees will be announced when published. The original author, the original publishing media and the manuscript recommender all receive remuneration.

The road to popularization

Some people say that the reader seems to have been hiding in a corner, quietly making a certain sound, not strong, but very weighty. What makes this silence so weighty is the respect for readers and the responsibility to society. When we open the first issue of Reader, among the trivial things that are not so heavy, we are greeted with a deep human touch, a genuine concern for life and humanity. This kind of care exudes continuous magnetism and attracts souls seeking warmth.

Sometimes, this kind of direct care can also get rid of the fetters of different cultural backgrounds. The emotion of truth, goodness and beauty is an unimpeded language. More than 500,000 copies of Overseas Readers have been published, with readers all over the United States, Japan, Australia, Singapore and other countries and regions.

During the period of SARS, readers have a warm heart by donating money, giving gifts on Teachers' Day, expressing condolences to frontier officers and soldiers and participating in social welfare undertakings. In Liujiaxia, Gansu, there are 5,000 mu of forest land, named "Reader Forest", which was planted by readers from all over the country. Today, the scale of the "reader forest" has reached 20,000 mu. A middle school principal said that Readers planted flowers that can bloom today and seeds that can germinate tomorrow. (Right: The Reader's Era-A Magazine and the Life She Influenced).

Industrial chain extension

Peng Changcheng, editor-in-chief of Readers, once said that in the market competition, the crisis of magazines always exists. If this special commodity is to survive like an evergreen tree, it must be set up as a cultural undertaking and operated as a cultural industry.

In order to facilitate more readers, Braille and Uyghur versions of Reader have been launched one after another. In order to run a magazine belonging to farmers, the rural edition of Reader was born in 2000. In order to expand overseas markets-following the successful opening of the North American market in 2003, the reader successfully entered the European and Australian markets on the first anniversary. The original version and the English version being planned will also be available soon. With more and more loyal readers, the cause of readers is getting bigger and bigger, and the industrial chain of readers' brands is also constantly elongated and connected.

A difficult chess game in China's periodical industry

The success of readers is a miracle of China periodical industry, but it is only a miracle! While we are rejoicing, there are still many things that cannot be ignored:

In an article entitled "Left Magazine, Right Degenerate-How did my reading taste degenerate? In the article, there is a passage that truly describes the current situation of the periodical industry. Newsstands, large and small, are filled with colorful fashion magazines, supermodels, movie stars and pop singers, posing and occupying the cover; The popular intelligence of Jinyi Huafu, the introduction of European and American home classics, the attack of strange famous cars and the introduction of wine and coffee are all crowded in their cores. "

On the other hand, time warner Inc. Company of the United States set up their cinema system in Shanghai, Bertelsmann of Germany set up reading clubs all over the country, and News Corporation landed in Guangdong ... These cultural and media tycoons with a turnover of more than $/kloc-0.00 billion came across the border with various media. They are not only eyeing our newspaper industry, but also the "cake" with the richest returns and even huge profits. How will China's periodical industry compete with it? (Left: The cover of Reader has also become a collection of many people. )

In the face of domestic troubles and foreign invasion, how will China's periodicals accelerate their development and catch up? Perhaps we can get a glimpse by comparing the periodical industry between China and the United States:

Newspapers and periodicals respect each other and despise me.

Comparing the circulation and advertising revenue of the three major news magazines in the United States, there is not a truly powerful news weekly in China. Women's magazines, digest magazines, entertainment magazines and health magazines still occupy the main position in the magazine market in China.

In the middle and late 1990s, a number of "new generation" news weekly magazines appeared in China. Besides Sanlian Life Weekly, Shenzhen Weekly, Xinmin Weekly, New Weekly and China Newsweek all appeared in this period. However, after 10 years, these news weekly magazines are still in the stage of continuous growth and are still in an embarrassing and weak position in the whole media environment of China. At best, they are only a kind of "semi-mainstream" or "quasi-mainstream media".

Vertically, there are only three books, namely, southern window, Outlook Oriental Weekly and Caijing, which are outstanding in current political news, current commentary and financial news (of course, Caijing is not a current political news periodical in a strict sense); In terms of social news and cultural reports, China Newsweek and Sanlian Life Weekly have their own characteristics. In regionalization, Xinmin Weekly and Shenzhen Weekly are mutually dominant; "New Weekly" lingers between these fields without a clear positioning.

Price difference under different profit models

From the reader's experience, we can see that his success is largely due to his low price. Especially at present, the overall price of periodicals in China is generally high. Nancy, a former columnist of Sanlian Life Weekly, who lives in the United States, vividly described the huge difference in magazine prices between China and the United States in her collection of essays "Look East and Look West": "Speaking of magazines, my first feeling about China magazines is: expensive. American magazines make money by advertising and attract advertisers by the number of readers, so subscribing to magazines is extremely cheap. "

The huge price difference between Chinese and American periodicals is related to their different profit models: China periodicals rely on publishing to maintain their balance of payments, while the United States basically relies on a large number of advertisements to make profits, rather than relying solely on the publishing income of magazines, and adopts the strategy of publishing and advertising management simultaneously, so as to achieve all-round and comprehensive growth of magazines. Many magazines are even more dependent on advertisements. In China, because magazines are not the mainstream media, the pages of advertisements in most magazines are far less than those of editors. At present, China's periodicals still mainly rely on issuing money for a living.

The high price of periodicals in China restricts the number of readers, while magazines with a small number of readers will naturally not attract the attention of investors and advertisers. In the case of scarce advertisements, periodicals can only maintain their own economic balance at a relatively high listing price, which is a vicious circle.

The great difference between industrialization and collectivization

Let's look at this set of figures: at present, there are 39 newspaper groups in China, but the periodical group has only1; There are 500 periodical groups in the United States that publish more than three kinds of magazines. 9000 periodicals in China are scattered in more than 5000 magazines, with an average of 1.6 for each magazine. The periodical agency with the largest number of publications in China has 12 publications, while the major western periodical groups have 60 to 80 publications. (Right: The cover of each issue of Time has become the focus of attention. )

The most typical example is Time magazine. Since the establishment of 1923, Time Company has successfully launched a series of best-selling magazines such as Life, Sports Illustrated and People, and published international editions in dozens of countries around the world. Since the 1960s, Time Company has successively entered the fields of film entertainment, cable TV, music and Internet, and developed into a famous media group in time warner Inc..

In fact, the China periodical market has developed a large number of periodical agencies with group management capabilities, such as Reader, Companion and Fashion. Periodical collectivization is a historical necessity. It is increasingly unprofitable, even almost unrealistic, for a publishing house to publish only one magazine. In particular, the increasing costs of distribution, advertising, publicity and management will make it difficult for publishers with only one publication to survive in the competition.

Press rectification

How to take this move well

The national newspaper reorganization in 2003 was the most extensive and influential change in newspaper work since the founding of the People's Republic of China. As far as periodicals are concerned, it mainly stems from the purpose, direction and a series of related problems brought about by the move of "turning"

Mobilization, as the name implies, is a planned transfer of the competent organizer of periodicals from the original party and government organs to other units or groups. Second, the purpose and direction of periodical reporting has changed from simple guiding work to marketization. In both cases, we need to study how to attract readers and open up markets. What about the transferred periodicals? He has a good stone on Fangshan, which can be used to cut jade. The management ideas of famous foreign periodicals are worth reading.

Strictly separate editing from management.

Famous foreign journals generally regard the quality of content editing as the core competitiveness of publications and pay attention to maintaining their own brands. In order to ensure that the content is not affected by advertisers and business links, most publications strictly separate the editorial department from the advertising and business departments, and the advertising and business departments have no right to ask about the affairs of the editing and business departments. This system ensures the publication orientation and the realization of editing policy to a certain extent. (Left: China's periodical market is mixed)

Pay attention to brand strategy and extend brand effect

Well-known foreign periodicals attach great importance to the development of brand resources and gradually build media groups with periodical brands as the core. National Geographic magazine promotes its brand to books, photo libraries, educational products, maps, TV programs, websites and so on. And give full play to its powerful influence. TV Guide magazine has a series of sub-magazines, such as TV Guide-Celebrity Stories and Cable TV Guide, and has successively developed TV Guide channels and TV Guide online websites. Reader's Digest and Newsweek also integrate different media resources with their own brands to form a multimedia group.

Make full use of high technology and actively develop new media.

The popularization and application of high technology can often bring new growth points to the development of the media industry. In the 1920s and 1930s, Time Company seized the opportunity of the emergence of photography technology and became the pioneer of photo news and the leader of publishing industry. In the 1950s, when television hit the publishing industry, it invested in radio and television and cable television networks. Warner takes off with new film technology. AOL has developed into the largest ISP service provider in the world by using Internet technology. The merger of time warner Inc. and AOL is a model of media integration under the "big media view". Periodicals such as Reader's Digest, Newsweek and Time have all developed their own portals. The portal website of Time not only translates the contents of the publication to the Internet, with more comprehensive reports, updated angles and more thorough and in-depth analysis of problems, but also can be published in a rolling way, continuously reported and followed up, giving full play to the advantages of strong timeliness and rich content on the Internet.

On the basis of maintaining the traditional editorial policy of periodicals, we should innovate constantly in combination with the needs of the times.

Famous foreign journals attach great importance to readers' reading needs and constantly innovate in content to maintain the long-term publication. People magazine in America was originally a fan magazine. In the 1980s, the magazine expanded its coverage and strengthened its in-depth coverage of major emergencies of concern to the general public, such as the assassination of Reagan and the San Francisco earthquake, which made the social news more and more intense. In the 1990s, while reporting instant news, the magazine focused on strengthening reports on long-term social problems such as cancer, early pregnancy, hunger, child abuse and racial discrimination, trying to guide readers to fully understand society.

To meet the reading needs of different readers, the content style tends to be refined.

Famous foreign journals attach great importance to market research, and study the age structure, gender ratio, professional income and reading habits of different readers, so as to determine the ideas and content orientation of running journals. Businessweek, Fortune and Forbes are three famous business and financial journals in the United States, but their contents and styles are significantly different. Business Weekly is the most newsworthy and the only one among the three. Fortune emphasizes the influence of enterprises on society and economy, and pays more attention to the reports of enterprises, especially large companies. Forbes praised the influence of elite groups on society and economy, and always spared no effort to introduce the success of entrepreneurs and enterprises.