Diving into ebooks can be profitable with right moves
A colleague friend and I used to have a running dialogue at the last place we worked, usually after a very long, busy day. “How does ‘our company’ make all its money?” we asked each other. “One word. Volume.” It appears that Canada’s National Post has followed this strategy, diving full-force into the ebooks pool. According to an article on the Nieman Journalism Lab website, Canada’s National Post has published six ebooks since December, in a range of forms. One compiles investment columns from personal finance columnist Jonathan Chevreau; another puts together the Post’s favorite films of 2011; another expanded a web feature exploring Canada’s role in the Afghanistan war; and the most successful ebook was written by “controversial columnist” Christie Blatchford who covered an honor killings trial in Toronto.
“We think the combination of it being a newsworthy story, and it being Christie’s writing, led to it doing well,” Duncan Clark, vice president of digital media at the National Post, said. “That’s been instructive of what we’re going to do afterward.” Clark added that the ebooks focusing on specific stories tended to outsell the collections of columnists’ work.
The ebooks sell for between 99 cents and $2.99. Kindle, Kobo, and iBooks are the three most popular formats. The National Post has a marketing advantage given that its parent company, Postmedia Network, extends throughout Canada. But editors have also been plugging ebooks in online chats with the authors.
In reading other posts about creating ebooks, a common mistake seems to be trying to replicate the format of a printed book. Wrote Peter Costanzo on the Digital Book World site: “…when considering a reading experience meant for a 10″ tablet you’re now designing for pages closer to 4 1/2 x 6 and smaller still if you include a device with a 7″ screen. Don’t get me wrong, we more than managed to get multiple images on a page for these digital editions, but during production it became pretty clear that things just weren’t coming together as originally planned.”
He decided to give each content element its own dedicated page (instead of side-by-side). It was also important that captions did not get separated from photos. He also recommended a graphical Table of Contents that presents thumbnail images for content element. “This concept adds a level of convenience for the user because it really helps to quickly decide which characters are of interest and prevents having to browse through each step-by-step demo.”
Thomas K. Billington, SIPA member and CEO of Billington CyberSecurity, advises that you ask certain questions when launching a new product such as: Does the topic help your customers make, or save money? Does this launch maintain your focus? Have you carefully reviewed the competition, including social media? And what is the time to produce—can you leverage existing content to launch it? (Billington’s father, Dr. James H. Billington, the Librarian of Congress, will be the opening keynote speaker at SIPA’s upcoming International Annual Conference, May 20-22, 2012.)
Ebooks can be a wonderful addition to your product repertoire. While repurposing your best content is certainly one key to success, it’s not everything. Be creative in what you can add to complement that content and how you market to make the book a valuable entity unto itself.
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Continuing the e-explosion,
SIPA announces a new webinar:
eLearning Fundamentals: A Step-by-Step Guide
to Launching Digital Training Content
Thursday, March 22, 2012 – 1 p.m. Eastern time
Sign up today – it’s FREE for SIPA members!!
Your Presenters:
• Jonathan Ray, associate publisher, Healthcare Group, Access Intelligence
• Bradden Blair, director of product management
and Dean of Education, Contexo University
eLearning programs comprise an ever-larger portion
of our spend on information and training. As a publisher,
make sure you’re prepared to take full advantage of this
growing market by registering to attend this webinar.
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