Welcome to the Digital Magazine Revolution - MagCast
Friday, October 5, 2012 at 10:29AM 
Back in the summer of 2011, I was at WWDC when Newsstand was announced as part of iOS5.
As a content provider, I was intrigued at the concept and realised that this was the boost that digital publishing needed. The iPad had always been touted as the saviour of digital print since it’s inception, but had never delivered.
Traditional publishers created huge digital facsimiles of print magazines that needed manual download. Poor image rendering. Expensive content. No easy way to find digital content. Digital magazines on the iPad didn’t really didn’t take off at all.
Newsstand was Apple’s strategy to address some of these issues.
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A new container folder permanently wired to the iPad home page, specifically for newspapers and magazines.
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A new type of app - the Newsstand app - closely modelled on traditional print magazines, the Newsstand app uses the cover of the latest issue of the magazine as it’s icon.
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A new push distribution mechanism - Magazines and newspapers are episodic in nature. You expect a new content on a regular basis. Once subscribed to a Newsstand app, any new issues are pushed to you automatically, without any action from you. True push distribution. No longer did a user have to notice a new issue of a magazine was available, then download it before they could read it. Newsstand just delivered the magazine to the iPad. Not only that, the magazine icon in the Newsstand container updates automatically to display the new issue cover and you get a “new” marker on the magazine.
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Purchase and Subscription - Apple nailed the difficult problem of charging for your content with a whole range of options available via in-app purchases. Want to buy a single issue - no problem. Tap purchase and Apple will do the entire transaction, take 30% and pass the rest on to you. Even better, Apple allow you to create subscriptions to your magazine - Monthly, six monthly, annual - all available via in-app purchases. A customer just taps a button and Apple will set up the subscription, process the financial transaction and start downloading the current issue. They take their 30% and from that point on, Apple will deliver new issues automatically and even handle the recurring transaction when the subscription is up for renewal. Mind bogglingly simple.
For years, I’d been using the magazine analogy when describing my podcast - you susbcribe and we deliver episodes. Now we had a mechanism that was the exact copy of the magazine subscription analogy - in fact it wasn’t a copy at all. It’s a digital magazine subscription, where Apple does all the hard work (well other than provide the content of course).
But it gets even better!
People are subscribed to your magazine using their Apple ID and the credit card associated with that ID. If there is one account that people make sure is up to date with a valid credit card, it’s your Apple ID. You use it to buy all your music and your Apps. It has to stay current. No more messing about with failing PayPal accounts, the Apple ID purchase is magic!
So it’s been well over 12 months since Newsstand was introduced, so how did I get on?
Not very well up until 4 months ago.
It became apparent during the WWDC sessions I attended that I was out of my depth from a technical perspective. There was no way I could create a Newsstand app from scratch, so after WWDC, I started looking at services that I could use to create Newsstand content.
Ouch!
They took a while to appear but when they did. Ouch!
Hugely, hugely expensive to setup and some of them even wanted payment based on the numbers of issues created.
Much too expensive for a small content provider like myself.
So I abandoned the idea of a Newsstand presence - something probably only the large publishers or traditional media outlets could afford. I was disappointed but not surprised.
Until fours months ago when things changed - very rapidly!
At the end of last year, I’d met up with a good guy called Ed Dale at the Blogworld and New Media Expo. We were on a panel together (unrelated to Newsstand) and I learnt a bit about his organisation and what he was involved in. He seemed like a really good guy, and we kept in touch.
At the time, although I didn’t know it then, Ed was working with a partner, John Bass, to create a Newsstand Publishing platform - MagCast.
I heard about it four months ago and it’s significance hit me like a ton of bricks.
This was what I’d been waiting for!
MagCast is an all encompassing solution to enable content creators to create and distribute interactive digital iPad applications via Newsstand.
The works - the whole enchilada!
App creation, support for ad integration, analytics, issue creation and conversion, testing, distribution to Newsstand, full support for all in-app purchases, push notifications... basically, everything you need to create a Newsstand iPad magazine wrapped up in a single solution - no programming skills or technical know how required - seriously. Access to MagCast also includes full training in the form of comprehensive video tutorials taking you through the entire process from start to finish - from setting up your Apple developer account to publishing your first magazine to the Newsstand. As well as full technical support and a wealth of marketing advise and guidance.
Incredibly, creating the magazine content is based on the PDF format - you can use any application you want to create the magazine issue - KeyNote, Pages, InDesign... basically any application that allows you to layout text and graphics and export to PDF. Once you have your PDF, upload it to MagCast and add in your links and interactive content and MagCast transforms it in to a magazine issue ready for distribution via Newsstand.
I’ve been using the platform for four months and I’ve created the ScreenCastsOnline Monthly magazine available via the Newsstand. Three full issues published as well as a sampler issue. The magazine has been well received (a slight understatement) with over 170 five star reviews. I’ve just recently created a special “Subscribers Only” issue too - MagCast actually gives you more functionality than just producing a standard magazine, and they are continually adding performance and functionality enhancements to the core app and the platform.
Initially, I was inundated with requests for information about how I put ScreenCastsOnline Monthly together, and I decided to wait for a little while before “going public” as I wanted to see how things went and how the platform coped. After all, it all sounds a little too good to be true.
Four months down the road and I can unreservedly recommend MagCast - it’s a killer platform for any content provider wishing to create a Newsstand magazine.
To give an idea on what is involved in creating a magazine issue, I created the special ScreenCastsOnline episode embedded below. Check it out to see what I mean.
You can get more information on the MagCast platform by following this link - MagCast Invitation
Full disclosure...
If you sign up to MagCast based on my recommendation, I’ll get some commission from the Magcast guys.
As you’re aware, I don’t do any sponsorships via ScreenCastsOnline, neither do I accept any advertising or paid endorsements. So it has to be something pretty special for me to endorse it in this fashion.
The support has been top class and MagCast are committed to continually improving and enhancing both the platform and the app at no additional charge, once you’ve signed up for the platform. You become the publisher and you own your own content. There are no hidden charges and no matter how successful your magazine becomes, you are in full control of the costs.
They even offer a full 30 day money back guarantee, so it’s a completely no risk opportunity.
Of course, ultimately your success publishing a magazine is down to the content and not the creation or the delivery platform. I can’t promise you a pot of gold at the end of it, or even that you might replicate the success I’ve had with producing my magazine, but I’ve found that MagCast is probably the most frictionless way to create and distribute content via the Newsstand.
Reader Comments (12)
One would want to know how long it is going to take to get a return of investment. Could be a whole lot better to go to Lulu or similar and do the same as a book to see what sort of sales you could get of this type of material.
Don, I think the screencast you've posted is superb...very detailed about the process and the use of MagCast, which looks staggeringly easy to use. 3 questions...
* Having watched the screencast earlier today, I'm fairly sure you talk about MagCast converting the magazine to HTML 5, but I'm curious to learn more about that...is your PDF sliced up (text converted and selectable etc) or is (in reality) each page converted to 1 large image (ie, it's basically one HTML file per page with a large image as its contents)?
* You mention Amazon S3 a number of times, but I'm not clear if that is something you have to organise yourself or simply something that MagCast does (ie, they use Amazon) and if there is a charge for each download from Amazon S3 for an issue?
The third question is more related to iBooks versus magazines and not specifically about your video. Books are not available across the world on the App store unfortunately, whereas magazines have a wider reach around the world. Is it possible to sell a subscription that is not timed (ie, monthly, yearly etc) but is based on a number of issues? The reason I ask is that I am writing a "How To" book that I could reach a wider audience if I segmented the chapters and sold those as issues...giving a discount to those that signed up to receive all issues as and when I produced them. I'd love to commit to the issues being as regular as your screencasts, but at this stage I'm not sure if I'll meet that regularity. Hope that makes sense? Advice?
Cheers,
Phil
David - I didn’t want to get drawn into the subject of the pricing but since you brought it up.
You have to realise that you’re not buying a bit of software, you’re buying access to the MagCast platform and having the ability to have your content in the Apple ecosystem, with all the benefits that this entails. This includes:
* The full suite of training videos
* Full support to get you going (if required)
* The creation of a customised Newsstand application for submission to Apple - how much would this single item cost alone if you got an independent developer to create one from scratch.
* Ongoing performance and feature updates to your app and the platform
* Unlimited Newsstand issue creation and distribution - not just a single issue, but unlimited issues - including subscriber only issues, special issues and more
The ticket price reflects the value of the offering. There are no ongoing MagCast costs so you could produce a monthly magazine for five years and it wouldn’t cost you a penny more (other than the Amazon hosting and bandwidth charges).
I see it more as an investment over time and it depends on how you price your magazine subscription, how good your content is and how you market your magazine. You also have the option of including advertising in your magazine too.
If you can’t see how you could easily make a return on your investment within a few months, it’s not for you!
Hi Don,
These recent posts have been very insightful. Always fun to look behind the curtain. Do you have a working relationship with Apple directly? You seem to be a massive proponent of their services and produce content that is second to none IMO. Do you get any recognition from Cupertino?
Response from Don Friday, October 05 2012:
I've had a few contacts within Apple, most of whom have moved on. No direct formal connections although they have been kind enough to link to ScreenCastsOnline from the iLife and iWork resource pages.
I still have to buy all my own stuff, never had a review unit, don't get invited to any of the press events (even the UK ones) and still do battle with the App Store review teams just like everyone else.
So, no, no recognition from Cupertino ;-)
Phil,
* Having watched the screencast earlier today, I'm fairly sure you talk about MagCast converting the magazine to HTML 5, but I'm curious to learn more about that...is your PDF sliced up (text converted and selectable etc) or is (in reality) each page converted to 1 large image (ie, it's basically one HTML file per page with a large image as its contents)?
I’m not involved in the technical side, and it really doesn’t make any difference to me as a user of the platform. Basically I don’t know! All I know is that the page is optimised for the iPad app to produce both standard and Retina versions of the magazine and also to enhance scrolling performance.
* You mention Amazon S3 a number of times, but I'm not clear if that is something you have to organise yourself or simply something that MagCast does (ie, they use Amazon) and if there is a charge for each download from Amazon S3 for an issue?
It’s something you organise yourself but is integrated into the plaform i.e once setup, MagCast does all the file transfers for you seamlessly. You use Amazon S3 (or any other file hosting service such as FTP) to host the magazine pages. When a magazine is purchased or downloaded, the pages are downloaded from Amazon S3. There are costs associated with hosting the pages and the data transfer but these are handled by yourself and not MagCast. But as a magazine issus is 10 − 40MB, the costs are very small.
* The third question is more related to iBooks versus magazines and not specifically about your video. Books are not available across the world on the App store unfortunately, whereas magazines have a wider reach around the world. Is it possible to sell a subscription that is not timed (ie, monthly, yearly etc) but is based on a number of issues?
One thing I didn’t cover in the video is the different types of issues that you can create - you can create:
Free Issues - just give them away
Normal Issues - These can be setup for individual purchase or on subscription
Subscriber Only Issues - Not available for individual purchase but downloadable by subscribers.
Special Issues - Not included in a subscription - only available for individual purchase
These options are usinque to MagCast
* The reason I ask is that I am writing a "How To" book that I could reach a wider audience if I segmented the chapters and sold those as issues...giving a discount to those that signed up to receive all issues as and when I produced them. I'd love to commit to the issues being as regular as your screencasts, but at this stage I'm not sure if I'll meet that regularity. Hope that makes sense? Advice?
I don’t think this would work as the subscriptions are usually based on regular output.
Nice post Don. How on Earth did you get 170 five star reviews?
Response from Don 6 October 2012
Thanks Graham. A good quality product (if I say so myself) and a loyal following!
That's globally too - you might not be able to see all the comments from just one iTunes store - I use an app called CommentCast to collate all the reviews - now up to 175!
Magcast platform is really powerful. Some more with Apple News Stand.
Hi Don,
As a fellow Magcast publisher I can only concur that the Magcast platform is amazing! We are now about to publish our 6th edition of Ziimeo Travel Mag this month. Initially I found the process challenging, but once I sorted out all the nuances and capabilities of the system I now find that it is relatively straight forward so long as you know what you are doing.
However, I would not recommend it to the complete novice! You still need a reasonable amount of technical knowledge. Which I don't have. That is why I engaged iStaffSource.com to take care of all the techie aspects of the process, so I could concentrate on the content where my expertise lie.
I am not a technical guy - my strength is editorial content and photo editiing - but took the plunge with MagCast and really it is a very simple and easy to use option to get on Apple Newsstand with a weekly or monthly magazine.
Have been with other providers and you in the dark about the whole production side. With MagCast you are doing the whole iTunes connect process - you're in the drivers seat with a very, very good instructor beside you. If you go from A to Z as they suggest when you sign up then the whole things is extremely simple. Bravo!
Whilst Magcast's concept is good and their backend getting published to Apple takes the pressure off first time publishers, the front end is very limited, by the front end I mean the editing facilities. Interactivity is limited to links and video, you can try to use code but they take no responsibility for any problems and don't offer support, so if your looking to have scrolling frames, pans, slideshows its just not happening. Though they say you can have long scroll pages, there are problem with these as well as they don't snap and are not anchored consequently they float around. For just a simple magazine with links at the single page size and the odd Youtube video its adequate. The backend as I say, is good and you will get published even though your mag will be limited in interactivity.
How do you record your slide show video? I've been looking at Camtasia but I think whatever you are using is better.
I use ScreenFlow on the Mac