Years ago when I started trying to write seriously I purchased a subscription to Writer’s Digest, and I kept it going for a few years. The more I wrote however, the less help I found the magazine as a whole. Part of the reason was that I found they often ran articles that were variations of ones they ran previously. Given that there are always new writers looking for the same information other new writers looked for first, this is a smart marketing tactic to bring in new readers. Writer’s Market is a huge business, books, website, etc., and I’m sure they look at the magazine as another way to draw writers into their brand market, which probably explains their attention grabbing headlines. While some of the other writing magazines, such as Writers’ Journal and Poets & Writers are a little subtler in their cover advertising, others such as The Writer are not. I feel like the Writers’ Journal and Poets & Writers tend to consistently have a little more that interests me than the other two, but I generally scan through them all at the newsstand, only purchasing them if there is an article I feel like I can use. Right now I am very focused promotion and publicity, so any articles on this tend to catch my eye, as do articles dealing with agents and rights.

Right now sitting on my shelf is a small stack of magazines I bought specifically for an article or two in each. The magazines that only had a couple of articles that interested me I used paper clips so I can open them up to those specific articles each time, and skip over the rest of the issue. Right now I have:

Writers’ Journal Jan/Feb 08 - for “Apples and Oranges: Adapting Your Novel”, as screenwriting really interests me. There were also a few secondary articles that interested me, “From Lowly Letters to the Big Time” and “Networking for $$$,” neither of which I would have bought the magazine for, but they did help me make up my mind about whether I should buy it for the first article. There were also other articles that I’ll refer back to as a bonus. (Didn’t paperclip this issue.)

Writer’s Digest Oct 07 - for a section they had on PR. There were three articles in the whole issue that interested me, but they were all worth it – “Get Your Money’s Worth” (self-promotion), “Sling Your Web” (web self-promotion), and “Marketing: Give a Good Reading” (obvious).

The Writer Nov 07 – “Making the Most of Minor Characters” (something I was focusing on) and “Using Podcasts to Promote Your Book.”

Writer’s Digest Writer’s Yearbook 2008 – “The Healthy Writer” (Health insurance), “Giving it Away” (giving away fiction and goodies on your website), “Get Good Press” (Building a PR kit), and two secondary articles – “101 Best Websites for Writers” and a small part of an article that talked about giving sneak peeks through mobile devices.

Poets & Writers Jan/Feb 08 – “Talent Search: A Special Section on Literary Agents” – a series of five articles. (I didn’t paper clip this one either.)

These are example of the kinds of articles that I have been looking for lately. Tomorrow I’ll follow up with marketing tie-ins from each of these magazines, and how useful I find them.