How to Make a Free Magazine

You can make a free magazine for your community or industry. Learn how to use grant money, sponsorships or advertising revenue to pay for the printing of a magazine that you can give away for free. Many communities have free magazines. Just because they don't charge for each issue doesn't mean they're losing money each month.

Instructions

1. Discuss printing options with a local printer. You can pick up a few free magazines in your community to see where they're printed. Your local newspaper printing press can sometimes accommodate a magazine printing job. Other times you'll need to contact an independent printing house. Many communities have free magazines for parents, brides, house-hunters and even shopping guides.

2. Sell advertising space after you've calculated your printing cost. Once you know how many square inches of paper you'll be printing, decide what percentage of your publication will be devoted to ads. It's the advertising that will pay for the printing expenses, delivery expenses and your salary. Divide the cost-per-publication by the square inches of available adspace to determine what the cost-per-square inch should be.

3. Give your advertisers plenty of ways to "get in" by creating adblock sizes that fit every budget. You might want to scale the adsize packages so that advertisers have more incentive to upgrade their ad size.

4. Create a business plan that shows what your target audience is. If you're distributing to parents, you'll want to state how many families live in your community. If you're magazine is for the retired community, you'll want advertisers to know how many retired people are in your community and what features your magazine will have that they will enjoy.

5. Write out your distribution plan. Your advertisers will want to know how you plan to distribute the free magazine. Will you be mailing subscriptions, or will they be free pick-ups at a grocery or convenience store?

6. Ask for editorial submissions from a local writers group, or hire an editor. Be sure their salary is figured into the cost of the publication. Discuss creating an editorial budget. You're more likely to get high-quality articles if your writers are paid.

7. Invest in a stock photography license, hire a photographer, or accept submissions from local photographers. Hosting a photo contest is one effective way of gathering images and inspiring community enthusiasm.

8. Secure the help of a graphic designer or learn to do the layout yourself. Work closely with your printer if you plan to do your own layout because you'll need to watch your color settings and your image file quality to ensure that everything looks just as nice on your screen as it does on paper.

Tips & Warnings

• Use reader-submitted material and contests to drum up excitement within your community.