Selecting a team for an on-line magazine : My experiences

This is a first in a series of posts I’m writing before the launch of my first magazine.

In 6 days I’ll be launching my first on-line magazine - A project I have been planning in the back of my mind for about 5 months. It feels exciting - this project has really let my imagination go wild with ideas for the content, design and features.

I’ve spent quite a bit of time researching on-line for help and advice on setting up an on-line magazine but haven’t really found anything worth reading. Hopefully I can change that.

Selecting a Team

I probably have more of an uphill start starting the magazine here in Thailand than I would have if I started in the UK in terms of finding quality writers. The first thing I did was to hire the best local copy writers I could find - I managed to get someone who works for BK magazine (a free English language magazine offered here in Bangkok) on board which was a good find. However, this wasn’t enough, I needed more. I started to brainstorm other ways I could get other creative writers know about our project and our offerings.

I have a handful of writers that I have worked with during the past for my in-house sites so I gave each of them a quick email. I have also advertised for writers on forums and places where writers hang out. I’ve also contacted friends that are passionate about some topics that I want to cover on the mag.

Before sending out emails and posting on job boards/forums, I wanted a system that would easily cut out the crap and be left with seriously creative people that had a passion for writing and researching.

I asked each applicant to follow some simple instructions. The instructions were so simple but still, 60% of applicants failed to carry them out. Even if the applicant had great working examples, or had experience, if they didn’t complete the easy instructions like I had asked, they went straight into the bin.

The second step was to check each applicants previous work - I got to admit, this was soooooooo boring! Topics such as insurance, mortages, horse riding - subjects that bore the fuck out of me! Anyway, after the checking I was left with 5% of applicants that I wanted to move onto the next stage with.

One thing I asked for when applicants apply is to tell me what their interested in. There were a lot of people that couldn’t tell me, or simply wrote “I like everything”, or “I can write about anything” - These automatically went in the bin. Come on, it’s not that hard to list your hobbies is it?

The next step was dealing with the remaining 5% - I sent each a nice email explaining that I want to start with a test article to see how things go. I think the test article is a really important step - I want to give each writer a chance to show me how their on-line researching skills are along with how creative they can get. I spent hours thinking of articles I gave them.

After I received the articles back, I paid for them and selected 2 I wanted to work with. I passed their details onto my PA for future contact and also added them to the writer’s forum.

What’s the writer’s forum?

I wanted a place whereby all of our copy writers could communicate with each other, share ideas, for me to hold competitions, a place where we could release company announcements and also a place whereby I could recommend copy writing, journalism type articles I’ve found across the net. I will also use the writer’s forum to share success, as well as failures so everyone can improve their skills.

I understand from research that most copy writers are undervalued and underappreciated. Like I have done in the office, I want to create a great working environment and become an admired company to work for.

As well as a handful of bright, creative copy writers I have gathered I also have one webmaster (a wordpress/css expert) along with the help of a really experienced PHP programmer working on the magazine’s infrastructure - I may add more in the future but right now they work great as a team and can currently handle the work load by themselves.

I also have my PA slash Operations Manager who will liaise with the writers and a co editor who will share the responsibility of approving articles that we publish. As my English skills are not that good, my role, apart from marketing will be approving ideas and content.