Publishing consultancy

Producing a publication is a complicated business. If your organisation is handling a number of publications - customer or member magazines, staff newsletters, annual reports, directories or catalogues, sales brochures, marketing literature (any of which, of course, might also have online equivalents on your website) - getting the balance right can become very taxing indeed. Publishing is also an expensive business; getting it wrong means wasting money, as well as not achieving your aims.

Getting your publishing strategy right requires expert understanding, so that you can answer questions like these with confidence:

• Are our publications delivering what our business strategy wants them to deliver?
• Are our publications produced efficiently, without duplicating effort or missing areas of importance?
• Do we have the expertise in-house to publish effectively, or are there some aspects of publishing which we should outsource?
• Are we paying too much? Or are we doing them on the cheap, and getting a shoddy job as a result that lets us down?
• Could our publications attract advertising sales or sponsorship? What about paid-for subscriptions? Or increasing the circulation?
• Have we got the frequency right - are we publishing more issues than we need to, or by contrast not enough issues to do the job?
• Is the format right? Do we have the right number of pages, the right shape publications, the right design? Does the content of each publication work for its target audience?
• Do our publications work coherently as a package - do they complement each other and successfully carry out clearly-defined roles?
• Should we be aiming to publish mainly in print, mainly on the web, or a mixture of the two? And how can we get the balance right between online and offline publishing?
• How does our publishing strategy compare with what competing organisations are doing? If our approach is different, are we ahead of the game - or have we just missed the point?
• Can we develop our publications or launch new ones that will give us an edge in the marketplace?
• Why do we publish in the first place?

If you have a full-time publications manager, you should have the in-house expertise to answer all these questions. If you don't, you should consider taking some expert advice.

We offer a range of confidential publishing consultancy services, both to commercial and membership organisations; our basic charge for the time of each of our principals is £600 a day, plus any travel or accommodation expenses. The initial consultation is free and without obligation, while both we and you work out exactly what your needs are. Then, if you decide you want to take up our consultancy service, we'll put a proposal to you, offering one or more of the following packages:

• SUMMARY REPORT
  This service examines your publishing activities, and offers professional tips to tighten them up and make the most of what you're already doing. It will focus on such issues as format, size, content, frequency, design and distribution. There will also be a financial section benchmarking your costs, and advising on whether what you're paying is appropriate. Delivery is via a report, written in plain business language and free of meaningless sub-MBA jargon - you use a spade to dig a hole, you don't use a soil leverage device to incrementally maximise the vertical ground deficit within a three-dimensional spatial locality. We also don't pull our punches; if we think you're making a complete hash of things, we'll tell you so (but please don't shoot the messenger!).
  Who should take this service?
  Organisations which have a clear understanding of their publishing strategy and which already publish; organisations which have well-developed plans to launch a new publication, and want them professionally vetted before going ahead.
  What will it cost?
  Between £750 and £1,500, depending on the number of publications involved and/or their complexity. We will, of course, give you a firm price before you agree that we should go ahead.



• MARKET REPORT
  This service looks at your publishing activities in the context of the marketplace you're working within, and assesses: how your strategy measures up against what your competitors are doing; whether you are adopting the right commercial strategy in terms of advertising, sponsorship or subscriptions; and how you can adjust your publishing activities to improve performance in all these areas. To do this, we will need to spend some time debriefing people within your organisation as well as engaging in a full market assessment. The Market Report also includes the work contained in a Summary Report. Delivery is via a personal presentation, plus a full written report.
  Who should take this service?
  Organisations which feel they need to improve their performance within their marketplace; organisations which are encountering problems in achieving their publishing strategy; organisations which want to attack a new marketplace, or which want a plan for the launch of a new publication; organisations which have a clear publishing strategy, but now need to create or develop publishing activities to deliver that strategy.
  What will it cost?
  Between £2,000 and £6,000, depending on the complexity of both the market and your issues. Again, we will give you a firm price before starting work. There will likely be some modest travel expenses.



• STRATEGIC REPORT
  This service builds a five-year, fully-costed publishing strategy for your organisation from the ground up. We will need to interview the key stakeholders in your organisation, and assess the capabilities of any staff resources you intend to use to carry out your publishing activities, both online and offline. We will also advise on how you can achieve best value from the budget you have assigned to the project, or come up with a range of budget plans if the financial resource has yet to be firmly allocated. Delivery is via one or more personal presentations, plus a full business plan complete with financials.
  Who should take this service?
  Organisations which want to develop a publishing strategy for the first time, or whose publishing strategies have fallen into disrepair; organisations which have changed shape, for example through sale, merger or acquisition, and which wish to rethink radically their publishing strategy; organisations which wish to set up an entire in-house publishing operation from scratch; organisations with extensive publishing activities which wish to dismantle their in-house publishing team and outsource instead.
  What will it cost?
  We can either work to a predetermined timetable and cost, or to a daily rate with mileposts and regular reports on progress back to yourselves. In either case, there is a minimum charge of £5,000, plus travel and accommodation expenses.

A final thought...

• Summary Report - free
• Market Report - £2,000 off (so, at the least complex end of the scale, this too could well be free)
• Strategic Report - 50 per cent off or £3,000 discount, whichever is the greater

We also offer clients free design and redesign services.

Interested in exploring further? Get in touch. If you want some reassurance that we know what we're talking about, take a look at the organisations we've worked for and their comments about the service they've experienced from CPL. Please feel free to get in touch with any of them for a reference.