Never really had much luck with jigs, any advice?

That is an open ended question, but without knowing anything more about what you are asking for help about, you can never fish a jig to slowly.

This will probably get moved/deleted because you should refer to the jig thread for this.

But until then... try crawling it on the bottom, try hopping it, try stroking it. Whatever gets you a bite, do that some more. If it's not working at all switch to something besides a jig.

I fish from shore with a jig on rivers ponds and lakes. I always use 3/8 chompers brush jig green pumpkin with a brown or cinnamon ultravibe speed craw. Works year round I hop it crawl it and swim it slow or fast whatever they seem to react to. Hope this helps

I agree that fishing jigs from shore is more difficult than from a boat, you must work the jig uphill and that reduces your options greatly.

I don't fish jigs from shore very often, then Inuse a swim jig style head to reduce snags and use nothing heavier than 3/8 oz. The lighter weight jig is a lot easier to prevent snagging and the head design goes through weeds good, brush and rocks fairly good as long as you keep it moving. Another option is use a plain sled head jig with a hula grub, Owner makes a good sled head.

Tom

You need to crawl it along whatever cover there is -- there will be something in open water that the bass will associate with, or ther won't be bass.

Also, parallel the bank.

Josh

First concern is vegetation, casting a jig from the bank means you're fishing more horizontal which makes it more difficult to work it through.

Stay as vertical as possible!

Flipping, pitching, & punching is easy from the bank.

The OP needs to better define what he means by "open water".

To me this means casting horizontal where there isn't much aquatic cover.

Tom

I'm assuming you're referring to weedless jigs with rubber skirts . Simple , work it through any and all  cover you can find . Throw it right in the thick of things ,  thats what they are designed for .. 

As you can see, most of the respondents throw jigs around cover -- not open water from shore. But if open's the water you intend to fish, and a jig is what you intend to throw, just do it. If the fish are there and they're hungry and they see it, they'll eat it. Reel in the slack without delay and set it hard. Good luck. Have fun.