Digital Strategies: Getting More Bang For Your Buck

Yesterday I gave a presentation at the Publishing Business Conference & Expo called "Digital Strategies: Getting the Most Bang For Your Buck". LOLcats! Norm Abrams! Do you have a hammer strategy???

Find it here. My lame notes are also included - I need to be tightly scripted or I'll come out with just about anything.

Register at LibreDigital to get your white paper!

LibreDigital and I have collaborated on a white paper called "The Insider's Guide to Internet Viral Marketing for Book Publishers" - you can register to receive it here.

HP: There is no other news this week

No, there is no other news this week. My poor daughter, who turns 9 on the 18th of this month, is watching her birthday get swallowed up in Harry Potter madness. It's all her friends can talk about. Meanwhile, we're scraping the bottom of the barrel here for book-tech news, but nobody's going to make product announcements this week.

Digital Standards

Yesterday's meeting of the Digital Standards subcommittee of BISAC was actually less fractious and more consensual than I'd anticipated. (For starters, Google and Microsoft were on the same page regarding formats - neither is particularly interested in proprietary formats, but are looking to differentiate their services with their own search capabilities once files are delivered to them.)

The committee is chaired by Kent Freeman, of Ingram Digital Group, who's found himself in a Michael Corleone-esque position regarding BISAC: "Every time I try to get out, they keep pulling me back in!" Attendees ranged from Google/Microsoft to publishers (Random, Wiley), to service providers (Quality Solutions, FYI, Bowker, yrs truly) to distributors (Ingram). Peter Brantley of the Digital Library Federation also attended (by phone), as did Nick Bogaty of IDPF.

Essentially, Chris Hart of Random House discussed the issues he'd brought to AAP regarding digital distribution, and with his help the committee was able to divide issues into those around "discoverability" vs those around the actual content itself. Kent decided to keep us focused on discoverability and search at first, and gradually lead in to the sticky issues surrounding content delivery between trading partners.

Google presented its Book Crawl specification, which was really interesting but only in the beta-est of betas right now. All in all a terrific and informative meeting. You can join up here.

POD at TOC

The Big Picture

In this issue of The Big Picture:

THE DOWNLOAD: - by industry consultant Laura Dawson
TIA - THIS ISSUE'S ACRONYM - BISAC/BISG
INTEL: COMPANIES - R. R. Bowker buys Medialab Solutions by Amsterdam
INTEL: PEOPLE - SirsiDynix names new CFO
THE JOB EXCHANGE - Listing the hottest jobs in the sector

"Amazon’s Kindle shows no sign of being born and the thundering hordes are not stampeding to buy Sony’s Reader.

Meanwhile, the digital revolution in publishing is happening…more or less around this e-book problem, the elephant in the living room.

As Mike Shatzkin et al told crowds at Klopotek’s Digital Asset Distribution conference last week – and as a host of panelists parsed at O’Reilly’s Tools of Change conference – publishing is taking a great leap forward into the realm of the technological.

(Well, there’s some argument as to whether publishing is leaping or being pushed, but that’s another column; I’ll let Jim Lichtenberg address that one.)

This, despite a viable e-book reader..."

Click here to access our newsletter archives and read the June 26, 2007 issue in full.

Who's your DADdy?

Unfortunately I had to miss yesterday's Klopotek conference over at the Hilton, led by Mike Shatzkin, about digital asset distributors (DADs). My oldest daughter was graduating from middle school, a ceremony peppered with buoyant speeches from local dignitaries, and a variety of performances.

I have to say, the speech given by the valedictorian was ridiculously boring and predictable, and I wondered if this poor kid had sacrificed all personality and quirk to please his teachers and parents. He seemed to have nothing to bring to the podium but good grades. I've been listening to Seth Godin's "Small Is the New Big" on my iPod, and he elaborates a little on his Purple Cow theory - what differentiates you (or your company) from everybody else? How do you stand out and show that you are like no one else, so that people will notice you and hire you/buy your product - as opposed to hiring someone else or buying something else.

Once this kid gets out of school, his grades will be pretty meaningless. I hope he spends high school actually living a little and developing as a person...because that's ultimately what people will pay attention to and hire.

Meanwhile, I'll be in the park pretty much all day today, as both Miss Personality and her little sister have class picnics....I'm expecting reports from the DAD conference to trickle in and I'll be posting more next week.

BISG talks to libraries

One of the great things about Michael Healy's directorship of BISG is his attentiveness to issues in the library market. As former director of the ISBN agency in the UK, Michael's got a lot of library experience, and it's terrific to see him applying that to BISG, which has traditionally focused on the bookselling market. For too long in the book industry, there's been this weird wall between the two sectors, and as technology invades and makes new things possible, it seems that the wall should be breached...and BISG seems poised to do that.

At any rate, BISG has teamed with NISO to give a presentation at ALA on Friday. It's called "The Changing Standards Landscape: Creative Solutions to Your Information Problems", and essentially it will tackle how new developments in digital asset management and distribution are affecting the library world. In addition to Michael and Todd Carpenter of NISO, one of the speakers there will be Carolyn Pittis from Harper, who has given many presentations on how she's using new technologies (widgets, XML) to expose more Harper books to more people.

Cool beans!

BEA gettin' all podcasty up in here

Staying true to the "holy shit, everything's digital" theme of this year's Book Expo, BEA has released podcasts of the show. According to the press release that came out this morning:

BookExpo America’s goal to become a “convention without walls” has become a reality with the announcement of its ambitious podcast and digital coverage of the recent trade event which took place in New York City, June 1 – 3. Podcast coverage of BEA has been a key part of an aggressive program to provide digital and online services and entertainment not only to book industry professionals, but to the general reading public as well. BEA put a dedicated podcast team in place during the convention which spread itself out to cover all aspects of the show in order to provide a record as well as a permanent history of the significant and entertaining content that the show provides.

Get'cher podcast here.

The Big Picture

In this issue of The Big Picture:

THE DOWNLOAD: - by industry consultant Laura Dawson
TIA - THIS ISSUE'S ACRONYM - GDSN – Global Data Synchronization Network
INTEL: PRODUCTS - 979 ISBN prefixes on the horizon
INTEL: PEOPLE - Founder of Questia leaves to start new project
THE JOB EXCHANGE - Listing the hottest jobs in the sector

"An interesting private meeting at BEA…not back-room politics, but an outgrowth of the fantastic discussions we’ve been having at the BISAC Identification Committee. A group of people faced with the collision of digital distribution into physical products – the heads of Nielsen Bookscan, US ISBN, ISBN International, BISG, BISAC, Ingram Digital, and several publishers ranging from large (Random House) to midsized (a university press) to small…as well as a smattering of consultants (me and Michael Holdsworth) – well, we all got together around a table and just talked.

The meeting covered a range of topics, but we began with the proliferation of formats of digital content: Different codecs of audiobooks, for example; different formats of ebooks to suit different readers. Should each of these formats get a separate ISBN? The ISBN standard says yes, each one should..."

Click here to access our newsletter archives and read the June 15, 2007 issue in full.

O'Reilly Offers Tools for Change

On the heels of BEA/ALA, O'Reilly is launching a new conference series called "Tools of Change For Publishing". This looks to be an amazing conference - in addition to the usual suspects (Chris Anderson, Tim O'Reilly) speakers include:

Cliff Guren, Microsoft
Michael Healy, BISG
Amy Brand, CrossRef
Kelly Gallagher, Bowker
Michael Holdsworth, BIC
Jim Lichtenberg, Lightspeed LLC
Niko Pfund, OUP
Matt Shatz, Random House
Robert Martinengo, Univ. System of Georgia

I am devastated that I am not able to attend - please send me feedback from this most juicy event!!!

Libraries and Publishers

Publishers have, in the last 20-30 years or so, looked at libraries as barely worth the effort, because circulation has been steadily dropping and libraries buy relatively fewer books than the big-box retailers or bookstore chains. However, times have changed, Rawlinson noted:

She cited a recent Library Journal poll that found library budgets have recently increased by 44%. Libraries have the potential to be "the next Book Sense," she added, "the next big promotion vehicle for new titles."

Look for my upcoming white paper on the relevance of libraries to publishers - probably at the end of the month.

BEA digestion

The general consensus seems to be that this is the year of the digital. But many of us remember going through this in the 1990s as well - and I think it's important to keep in mind that with terms like "digital distribution", the emphasis probably ought to be on the "distribution" part. Technology isn't an end in itself - it's a tool. And while tools are fun and interesting (I happen to be particularly fond of certain kitchen implements), they inherently have no value unless they are helping you get from point A to point B.

And this is true both of companies and their customers. Each component of the supply chain has its own set of tools to assist them in getting from where they are to where they want to be.

So the takeaway (at least for me) from this year's BEA is that there is a vast proliferation of tools out there...and probably what ought to be done at this point is a real assessment of where you want your company to go (what markets are emerging now? how are USERS taking advantage of technology to get what THEY want?), and then an evaluation of the tools available to help you get there.

That's all.

Windows Live Search is...Live

The big news, of course, is that Microsoft's Windows Live Search is live. Cliff Guren explained all the features today, and it's very similar to Google Book Search except for this important differentiator - no scanning of books with dubious copyright status. Microsoft scans books that are out-of-copyright, and publishers submit in-copyright books for inclusion (giving their permission for scanning).

There's no cost to publishers for the service. And there's no print functionality, or even cut-and-paste functionality, in the search: "As we all know," Guren says, "hacks run amok." So expect a few wiseasses to create end-runs around the protections that Microsoft has installed.

Publishers are able to control how much of a book they want consumers to see - including blocking certain pages from view altogether (in the case of a mystery, for example), or images to which they don't have the rights.

Guren admitted that the primary reason behind Windows Live is competition with Google for "query share" - which has a heavy influence on ad revenue. Look for a Windows Live demonstration at the Crystal Palace - which sounds like a brothel but is really a section of Javits.

How many DADs do you have?

Shatzkin once more took the stage in the afternoon as he moderated a panel discussion on Digital Asset Distribution. This was a great panel which included HarperCollins, Random House, Holtzbrinck, and Ingram Digital Group.

Carolyn Pittis of HarperCollins began by talking about using book content "everywhere possible" - emphasizing that publishers should have control of how the content is used. She also noted that "those who scan books for free" (ahem! Google; ahem! Microsoft) don't always produce the quality that an individual publisher can produce if they maintain control of the content.

Pittis also noted that the new widget released by Harper earlier this year has proven to be the third most powerful driver of consumers to the HarperCollins website; 14,000 books have widgets so far.

Up next was Brian Napack from Holtzbrinck, who gave a very wry and witty presentation. Holtzbrinck has chosen Ingram to manage its digital asset distribution, and Brian stressed that a powerful digital infrastructure is key to succeeding in an era increasingly dominated by technology.

He also mentioned that Holtzbrick is launching a social networking site for books called Lovely Books. It's in beta at the moment.

Kent Freeman of Ingram Digital stated that Ingram currently has 170,000 ebooks archived and ready for distribution among a variety of channels - Lightning Source, VitalSource, and MyiLibrary. Their digital warehouse service supports a wide variety of formats (including audio)...and, Kent said, "We have not yet announced our widget, but we will shortly." Which is, of course, a form of announcement.

Matt Shatz of Random House also discussed the Random House widget, which is a bit different from the Harper one - there's no branding on the images, for example, and it includes a search function which the Harper widget doesn't have. Matt confirmed that Random House's marketing efforts amount to "fishing where the fish are" - and that the Internet is universally acknowledged as the space where consumers discover products, sample them, and do research online.