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November 26, 2009

e-Book Alchemy – An Interview with Olive Technology’s Virginia Thomas

Posted by orionwell under Interviews, author tools, publishing technology | Tags: e-bbok formats, e-book, e-book conversion, e-book industry outlook, EPUB format, iPhone, Mobipocket, Olive Technology |
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By almost any reckoning, e-books are a fast growing segment of the book publishing industry. Many self-published authors and traditional publishers who have been reluctant to publish in e-book format are now considering it. However, because there are many competing standards, navigating the technical / logistical ins and outs of e-book publishing can seem a bit daunting at first.

We recently had the opportunity to discuss print to e-book conversion and the outlook for e-books with Virginia Thomas, the Business Development Manager at Olive Technology, a leading provider of eBook conversion services. Virginia has lived and worked in Alaska, Argentina, Oregon, California, Texas, Hawaii, India and Colorado and was previously in corporate sales with Paradigm Engineering. (One of her favorite book genres is confessional memoirs.)

FPP: What e-book formats should a publisher consider absolutely essential for their titles?

VT: Since the arrival of ebooks and eReaders, the number of digital content retailers has significantly increased. Each retailer would want to cover most device formats. Since the two most popular readers, the Amazon Kindle and Sony Reader use ePub and Mobi, it is recommended that Publishers should at least have these two formats available.EPUB is an open standard created by the IDPF, and is used on numerous devices such as the Sony Reader, the Barnes and Noble Nook, and the Stanza iPhone app. Mobipocket, or .mobi, can be read on the Kindle, but also on a Blackberry, Windows Mobile device, Symbian or Palm device. .azw is Amazon’s proprietary format for the Kindle, for which they provide free conversion when a title is listed in Amazon.com’s eBook store. Like .azw, .mobi can be read on a Kindle, but unlike .azw, it can be sold in a number of distribution channels including Symtio and a publisher’s own website.

FPP: What steps a publisher should take to prepare for submitting a title for conversion into an e-book?

VT: Publishers looking at reaching a wide market should first develop a basic idea of planning their marketing and decide on how they would like to take care of the digital rights management. Subsequently, they should identify a reliable technology team that can do a high quality conversion work that can replicate the original book experience into digital format. As they identify the team, the publisher should have their high priority titles organized by the different available format such as hard copy, PDF, Quark Express, InDesign etc. This would allow the conversion team to organize their own conversion steps.

FPP: What occurs during the process of e-book conversion?

VT: Depending on the format, the conversion process involves:

Converting the original source format (such as PDF) into a editable format, such (MS Word or HTML)
Reformatting of the editable format so that it can be seamlessly ported into a conversion tool. Depending on the type of book, this step may involve extensive coding to re-create the formatting from the original book. Aspects such as clickable footnotes, endnotes and images are all taken care of in this phase.
The formatted file is then ported into a conversion tool that can then generate the needed extension required. Aspects such as Table of Contents, book details and Metatags are taken into consideration at this phase. (Metatags are information about information—they help identify and position the digital content in order of relevance. For more information see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metatags).
An eBook conversion team then takes a thorough line-by-line comparison with the original book to make sure that all the needed formats and expressions have been replicated in the converted book. This is a very important step as it ensures a good reading experience for the reader. Depending on the service provider, a conversion team would have multiple quality checks by different members of the team.

FPP: What are the most common problems that occur in e-book conversion?

VT: Formatting errors can come in easily, especially inserting spaces into words. This is why Olive Technology does not rely solely on software for corrections. Olive’s proofreading team pores over every word in the eBooks they convert.

FPP: What is the typical turnaround time for an e-book conversion?

VT: Average turnaround time for a 200 page book is 2 working days. However, it may take additional time if there are lots of footnotes and endnotes that require extensive coding of tags or there are lots of images that need to be edited before including in the eBook.

FPP: How much should a publisher budget for converting a title into the most popular e-book formats?

VT: This depends on how long the book is, how many titles are being converted in the batch, and how complicated it is to convert. Most conversion companies provide a price per page. The more special formatting, pictures, charts, graphs, sidebars, etc. a work has, the more difficult it is to convert.As for a ballpark, conversion of a 200 page novel with a few illustrations from PDF to EPUB and Mobipocket, Olive Technology would charge $160.

FPP: What limitations / differences in appearance should a publisher expect when going from print to e-book?

VT: Because of limitations in the eReaders, it is not possible to enforce the original font types into the eBook formats. However, some eReaders allow the fonts to be changed. Since the reader has options to change the font size to large print or smaller print, there are no set page numbers in an eBook. Also, the style of s Table of Contents is limited to one column. All required images would render as black and white in most eReaders, but in smartphones they can be in color.

FPP: Do you think we will get to a single e-book standard in the near future?

VT: That’s the question of the hour. Members of the IDPF would scream “YES! EPUB!,” and the industry has already seen a great adoption of the EPUB format. However, Forrester has said that of the 3 million eBook readers predicted to be sold in 2009, 60% of them are Kindles. While Bbeb may be a dying breed, I think .azw and Mobipocket will be around with EPUB for years to come—especially if Amazon keeps making mobile apps. Unless, that is, Jeff Bezos decides to become an open format fan. That will probably occur the same day Steve Jobs endorses Windows 7.

FPP: Does having a title in XML format simplify e-book conversion?

VT: Not necessarily. In fact in our experience the reformatting of DocBookXML can be even more challenging and costly. However, the use of XML allows quicker conversion to any future formats that would be made available.

FPP: How important are mobile phones in the e-book market now?

VT: According to research done by Nielsen in 2008, younger people favor the idea of books downloadable to mobile phones or iPods over eReaders or PCs (A third of 16-30 year olds compared to 23% of over 30s). The mobile phone market share is relatively small, but growing. The most popular mobile phone for eBook reading now is the iPhone, which only had 6.5% of the eBook downloads in the first two quarters of 2009. However, in a November 1 report the research firm Flurry predicted that with thousands of eBook apps being produced, the iPhone will be in a serious position to steal market share from the Kindle in reading the way it stole from the Nintendo DS in gaming.F

PP: How do you see the e-book market evolving in the next 3-5 years?

VT: With the fast adoption rate and decrease in price of eReaders, the only certainties I see are growth, increasing involvement of Google, and device convergence. According to Association of American Publishers, eBook sales have grown by more than 300% in last 2 years. While eBooks are still a small portion of book sales, they more than tripled from the second quarter of 2008 to the second quarter of 2009, and the exponential growth is predicted to continue.

Also, I think it’s a matter of time before foldable/flexible mobile devices cause device convergence to occur. The problem now is that eBook readers are too big to be phones, and phones are too small to read on without a whole lot of scrolling. However, when mobile phone manufacturers roll out devices that can be folded or unfolded to the size of a phone or eReader, consumers will probably opt for the convenience of only carrying around one device. Motorola is said to be hard at work on their line of flexible devices.

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October 31, 2009

In Demand! The Espresso Book Machine from On Demand Books

Posted by orionwell under Interviews, open publishing, publishing networks, publishing technology | Tags: book distribution strategy, book printing technology, Dane Neller, espresso book machine, Google, Lightning Source, On Demand Books |
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The Espresso Book Machine, manufactured and distributed by On Demand Books, has created quite a stir since it was launched a few years ago. The book printing system has been compared to a “book ATM.” It can print books, stored in a digital repository, in a matter of minutes. Essentially, the system provides the capability to produce books at the point of purchase.

Version 2.0, a smaller and more efficient version of the Espresso Book Machine is now available and is helping drive sale at On Demand Books. In addition, the company has recently announced deals with Lightning Source and Google which give it access to a greater catalog of books. The video below demonstrates how the Espresso Book Machine produces a book it has retrieved from a digital repository.

Google Books: Classic Books Available via the Espresso Book Machine

Dane Neller is the CEO of On Demand Books LLC, which he co-founded with publishing legend Jason Epstein. He has extensive operating experience in the retail sector as former President and CEO of Dean & Deluca for over 8 years.formerly. Future Perfect Publishing interviewed him a couple of years ago, and he recently updated us on the company’s progress since that time and the outlook for the Espresso Book Machine.

FPP - Originally, mostly libraries were purchasing the EBM. Now it seems that more bookstores are acquiring the EBM. What do you think has caused the shift?

DN – Our primary market continues to be the University Setting both campus bookstores and research libraries. Independent Trade Bookstores also are buying as they recognize the value of localized self publishing programs being able to respond immediately to their customers.

Bookstores benefit as well from an increase in their sales per square foot, increase inventory turnover, derive new customer traffic to the machine, eliminate out-of-stocks and free up shelf space for faster moving, higher-margin inventory. For libraries, the machine enhances the academic experience for students/faculty and makes more books available to more patrons. By allowing the library to acquire a title for its collection on demand when requested by the patron, the EBM helps make the library’s acquisition strategy more efficient. Our technology also enables the library to reproduce rare books in physical form, provides a vehicle for University Press titles, and improves the inter-library loans process.

FPP- Have you begun to see interest from non-bookstore retailers?

DN – Yes, as they see the Espresso Book Machine enables them to add books as a new product line.

FPP - What’s the easiest way for publishers to make their titles available through the EBM?

DN – We are committed to adding content to our network and will accommodate whatever method is preferred by the publisher. There are three methods for publishers to make their titles available to us:

(1) Through our partner Lightning Source. This is our preferred way – publishers add their content to Lightning’s POD repository, and it becomes available through the EBM at the identical pricing offered by Lightning.

(2) By providing us with an API that allows our network to access the publisher’s digital repository – in effect, we “pull” the file from the publisher any time a book is purchased on one of the machines.

(3) By the publisher “pushing” their digital repository to us and allowing our servers to host their files. In this case, we host the publisher’s digital files and perform a regular reconciliation to keep the titles and their associated metadata up to date.

FPP - What does an EBM cost? Are there lease as well as purchase options?

DN - We sell the EBM for $97,500 plus the cost of the text printer (note that the EBM comes equipped with the full-color cover printer). The price of the text printer ranges from a little over $4,000 for the mid-speed printer (35 pages a minute – or a book ever 7-10 minutes) to roughly $28,000 for the high-speed printer (120 pages a minute – or a book every 3-4 minutes).

FPP - How do you anticipate the agreement with Lightning Source and Google will impact sales of the Espresso Book Machine (EBM)?

DN - Both Lightning and Google represent significant sources of high-value books. They’ve made the EBM more attractive to our customers and are helping sales.

FPP - What are the barriers to getting all publishers to sign on with ODB and what is the company’s strategy for growing the number of books available via the EBM?

DN - Distributed printing clearly is attractive to publishers who see the advantages of a greener distribution and sales channel. There may be some technical barriers on the publishers’ side to aggregate their printable files but most are creating or outsourcing Digital Asset Management repositories. Our strategy is to make our customers successful by going after content that will sell well through their setting. Academic content for the University Bookstore, for example.

FPP - Do you see a potential market for magazines, journals or newspapers using the EBM?

DN – Absolutely. The Espresso Book Machine will print, bind, and trim absolutely anything that a laser printer can print. In addition, customers have used the machine to print journals with personalized covers and lined pages, technical manuals, custom anthologies, professor-created textbooks, lab journals, study guides, coloring books, conference documents, corporate reports, recipe books, collections of (digitized) letters, and the list goes on . . .

FPP - E-books have been steadily growing in popularity. Do you see this as competition for the EBM?

DN - No. The growth in e-books has helped us in several ways. First, to the extent that growing e-book sales help publishers and booksellers, then we are helped, since these represent our partners and customers. More concretely, the digitization of backlist books for e-readers has made more titles available to our machines. Also, with the growth in e-books, publishers and retailers have grown more comfortable with nontraditional methods of book distribution, including our own.

FPP - What new features would you like to see in the next version of the EBM?

DN - We have no major upcoming changes to the EBM. In summer 2009 we began our full commercial rollout of the new EBM, version 2.0 (previously we had installed earlier-generation machines to test the market and the technology). At 3.8′ x 2.7′, the new 2.0 machine is half the size of the previous model. Interest in the machine has been fantastic, and we expect our installations to accelerate significantly in 2010, with an early emphasis on trade bookstores and the university bookstore and library market.

FPP – What do you see as the biggest challenges ahead for On Demand Books?

DN – Managing rapid growth is the biggest challenge. Other challenges relate to selling internationally. It is an exciting time for On Demand Books and our customers and we are very confident about our ability to meet challenges as they arise.

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October 11, 2009

How m-books Could Change Reading

Posted by orionwell under open publishing, publishing strategy, publishing technology, readership strategies | Tags: Amazon, ebook, iPhone app, LexCycle, Stanza |
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The day of the m-book (e-books on mobile phones) is rapidly approaching. Recently one of the founders of LexCycle, the company that makes the Stanza e-book reader for iPhone, recently spoke at a Book Publishers Northwest meeting. Stanaza’s numbers are impressive. In a very short time, over 100,000 titles have been converted into Stanza books. And there are now more than 1.3 million readers using Stanza on iPhones. And Stanza has added some distribution muscle by teaming up with two major retail partners, Fictionwise and Smashwords (both of which also provide e-books in other formats as well).

Stanza iPhone App Review – AppVee.com

LexCycle was purchased by Amazon in April. Unlike the Kindle, it uses the open standard epub format for its e-books. With the purchase of Stanza, Amazon may be hedging two bets – the popularity of reading books on a large form factor, single use device in a proprietary format versus a multi-function, small form factor, standard format mobile phone. Single function mobile devices have an annoying habit of becoming obsolete.

The success of Stanza has me wondering – how will the spread of m-books change the way we regard books and the manner in which we read?

Size won’t matter. As books go digital, the notion of personal library becomes something you carry in your pocket. It’s no big deal to have thousands of songs in your iPod; why not thousands of books on your iPhone (memory permitting).

We’ll need reading management apps. Gigantic personal libraries means we’ll need apps to help sort it all out and find what we need when we need it.

Read me a story. When its difficult to read, we can switch to an audio mode. Every book will come with two modes - text and audio. For example while commuting on a crowded bus or train,or in your car (there is already a controversy starting to brew about people reading books on their mobile phones while driving).

Books will become more social. Finding and texting interesting book snippets to friends will be easy.

Books will be processed, as well as read. Processing book content with other apps. For example, clicking on a location mentioned in a title and using Google maps to view the locale. Or mark inspiring passages and have them shown to us periodically.

Perhaps none of this will happen. It may be that the biggest change m-books will have is simply to make us read more, if in a different manner. With libraries and educational institutions leading the way, books are being reconceptualized as downloads and reading as an app.

A Reading Revolution – CBS News

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September 25, 2009

Village Books and the Espresso Book Machine – 4 million Books to Go

Posted by orionwell under Interviews, open publishing, publishing technology | Tags: book ATM, Chuck Robinson, espresso book machine, Lindsey McGuirk, publishing innovation, Village Books |
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Future Perfect Publishing has been following the Espresso Book Machine for the last several years. The Espresso Book Machine, sometimes called the “book ATM” is developed and marketed by On Demand Books. The system, about the size of a photocopier, allows a book to be selected from a digital catalog, then printed and bound in just a few minutes.

Now it is beginning to make serious inroads into the bookstore community. Two of the latest installations are going to be right here in the Pacific Northwest. One is at Third Place Books in Bothell, Washington, just outside of Seattle. The other is at Village Books. It is a community-based, independent bookstore located in the historic Fairhaven district of Bellingham, Washington, and was honored as the 2008 Outstanding Philanthropic Small Business in Washington State.

Village Books, Outstanding Philanthropic Small Business

Chuck Robinson has been co-owner, with his wife Dee, of Village Book in Bellingham, WA, since June of 1980. Chuck has pioneered many causes in his community so it seems only natural that his bookstore would be one of the first to make this innovative new way of producing books available. He’s a former board member and president of the Pacific Northwest Booksellers Association and the American Booksellers Association and currently serves as a board member of the Community Food Coop and as a trustee of Whatcom Community College. He is currently writing a book about the history of Village Books to be published–on the Espresso Book Machine–during the store’s thirtieth anniversary next June.

Helping him with the installation is Lindsey McGuirk, Digital Marketing & Publishing Manager. Lindsey has been in the book industry for over 5 years, beginning as a bookseller at Village Books where she eventually became the Events Coordinator. After a short stint on the publishing end of things with Algonquin Books, she returned to her true love as an independent bookseller at Village Books. She now does the online marketing for the bookstore and will be the go-to person for Village Books’ Espresso Book Machine.

Chuck and Lindsey recently took the time to share their plans for the bookshop’s new Espresso Book Machine.

FPP: How did you first learn about the Espresso Book Machine (EBM)?

CR & LM: Though we had read about the machine in trade publications we first saw an early model of the EBM at Book Expo America a couple of years ago.

FPP: What convinced you to put it into Village Books and how do you plan to use it?

CR & LM: We’re convinced that “the times they are a’changing” and that we need to be on board or we’ll be left behind.

FPP: What type of books do you expect to use the EBM to produce?

CR & LM: Although we’ll have access to books through LightningSource and now Google’s public domain books, the bulk of the books we will be printing–at least in the short term–will likely be self-published. We have already been receiving inquiries from authors interested in having their books printed on the Espresso Book Machine and have a few projects lined up to print when the machine is installed.

FPP: How many titles are available in the EBM catalog overall?

CR & LM: Between LightningSource and Google Books, there are nearly 4 million books available to print through the EBM. There are also nearly 600,000 backlist titles that are in-copyright that we can print thanks to publisher’s permissions.

FPP: Could you describe what happens when a customer places an order that requires the EBM?

CR & LM: This could be an elaborate answer, but I’ll try to simplify it as much as possible. Assuming that an author brings us print-ready PDFs (those that will not need any additional layout changes or adjustments) of both the book block and the book jacket, we will simply upload those files to the EBM and let it do its work. It prints the book block, glues it, prints the book jacket, and binds it all together. It will then take the book and trim it to its specified trim size. It’s an amazing process!

FPP: How does the cost of producing a book on the EBM compare with ordering it from a wholesaler or distributor?

CR & LM: Pricing in print-on-demand, like that of e-books, is still shaking out. However, we expect the retail price for books printed in-store to be comparable to those ordered from distributors.

FPP: Will having an EBM change how many titles you carry in your physical inventory?

CR & LM: We believe the EBM will allow us to enhance our inventory by being able to offer books that would otherwise be unavailable. There will be some books that we may carry in smaller numbers because we can instantaneously print a replenishment copy and there will be other books that we won’t have on the shelf–just as there always have been–but, unlike the past, will be able to provide very quickly.

FPP: What is the purchase model for the EBM? Is it an outright purchase? Lease? Per book fee?

CR & LM: There are a couple of ways one may obtain a machine. We have chosen to lease ours.

FPP: Will Village Books use the EBM to support self-published authors or small presses without distribution?

CR & LM: We absolutely will be supporting self-publishing authors! We’ve been highly supportive of self-published authors for year—we have a strong consignment program and carry dozens of books by local, self-published authors. We haven’t considered printing books for small presses without distribution, but you have just added another element to our growing list of possibilities. Thank you!

FPP: Are there any special logistical considerations for operating the EBM? For example, space, power, supplies, etc?

CR & LM: We did have to provide 220V wiring to the site and we will be moving shelves around to accommodate the machine. And, we will, of course, need to stock paper, glue, etc.

FPP: If you could design the next version of the EBM, what features would be on your wish list?

CR & LM: It’s a little hard to say prior to our working with the machine for a while. We’ve spent some time with an earlier model and feel that the company has addressed many of the issues we would have had with that machine. I’m sure that this is a question we may have a better answer for in a few months.

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July 24, 2009

After the Page

Posted by orionwell under publishing strategy, publishing technology, readership strategies | Tags: e-book, electronic reading devices |
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Since the development of written language, mankind has experimented with different reading “devices” and formats.

Inscription on the walls of dwelling spaces or public buildings
Engravings on clay tablets
Scrolls
Bound books with pages

Over the last two thousand years or so the bound book reading experience has become so ubiquitous it is difficult to imagine any other way to read. The structure that surrounds our reading experience has slipped beneath the level of our consciousness. The only thing that surprises us is when a book comes with an odd trim size, similar to the micro jolt we get when someone hands us an odd sized business card.

Every readng device has its opportunities and tyrannies. The page in the bound book of today provides a simple unit of reading; the total number of pages lets us know in advance how much information a book contains or how much effort will be needed to read it. Page numbers and headers provide useful reference points. But the price of paper and ink limits the information that can be conveyed. This has always been the problem with all previous reading devices: the cost of the physical medium used to convey the information scaled with the amount of information.

But electronic reading devices offer an escape from that hard rule. E-reading or reading with the aid of software offers us new opportunities (and doubtless many tyrannies as well).

Extension - Linking to related material
Search – Finding without the need for page numbers or indexes
Filtering - Hiding irrelevant or uninteresting parts of the book; especially useful for second readings
Layering - Accessing additional information (e.g. pictures and / or background material) via layers that can be turned on or off under reader control
Annotation – Adding / editing your personal annotations (actually part of layering)
Sharing – Connecting to your favorite reading groups and sharing your comments and quotes from the book
Apps - Simple applications that make the reading more enjoyable – e.g. embedded dictionaries, automatic translation to another language and summarization of key information. For fiction this might include summaries of the story to the point where you last left off to refresh your memory between reading sessions. Innovative developers will find ways to extend the capabilities of our reading devices similar to what has been done for the iPhone.
Multiple modalities – Switch between reading and listening
Metrics – Tracking personal stats on everything you’ve read

Like it or not, over time our books will become more like computers and we will expect them to the things that computers do. Our long standing reading model will change as the physical nature of our primary reading device changes. The big limitation may become, not physical cost, but reader attention.

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July 14, 2009

My Numbers, Myself – Personal Reading Metrics

Posted by orionwell under publishing analytics, publishing technology, readership strategies | Tags: personal metrics, reading metrics |
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Personal metrics – information that we collect about ourselves – have a natural appeal. We want to be better – if we can measure something about ourselves and optimize it, we will. Today that process is becoming easier with the help of sensors to collect personal data and web sites that help us make sense of it. Individuals are keeping track of all kinds of personal data – including caloric intake, how much we’ve exercised (e.g. Nike + iPod video below), the state of our finances. This is what Gary Wolf in a recent Wired article referred to as “self knowledge through numbers.”

Nike+iPod in action

So why not personal reading metrics? We capture general statistics about reading levelsof the population. And with a little bit of mathematical dexterity it is possible to calculate our per capita consumption of books. But this doesn’t tell us anything interesting about our individual reading habits. e-Book readers offer a platform that could help us collect and track information about what and how we read.

For starters we could track:

Total books read over a given time period; also categorized into genre or type
Books never completed (similarly categorized)
Average number of pages and words per session
Average length of each reading session (which could yield average reading speed) and time between reading sessions
Amount of reading by time of day

Data could be uploaded to websites with the appropriate algorithms and graphing capability to take care of the analysis and trending for us. By providing just a little of additional personal data, we could even benchmark ourselves against other readers with similar demographics. Anonymized aggregates of such data could provide publishers with valuable information about their titles and readership.

Such metrics might be viewed as self indulgent. But, given the natural inclination to improve our stats, they could spur us to read more.

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June 8, 2009

Contemplating the Google-book

Posted by orionwell under book marketing, open publishing, publishing strategy, publishing technology | Tags: e-book, Google |
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According to a report in the NY Times, Google is preparing to enter the e-book market and take on Amazon. The delivery platform is unclear, but it does not appear that Google is favoring any particular e-book device at this time. Details are also lacking about whether Google would support open standards or take a proprietary approach. The e-book pricing hasn’t been finalized, but Google has hinted it would probably be more open than say with the Amazon Kindle.

So let’s say that Google jumps into the e-book market in a major way. How might this change the market? Here are some speculations.

Google links e-books with Book Search. While Google has said it has no plans to do this, it certainly is a strong possibility. Books scanned today as PDFs can be scanned into e-book formats just as easily. Search – view – purchase – download. Seems logical.

Google becomes the Book Scan of e-books. With its own reader or in partnership with reader manufacturers, Google tracks not only what e-books readers browse and purchase, but how they read them after purchase (think Google Analytics with a “phone home” capability). Publishers use the anonym-ized information to better understand what readers really want.

Google redefines the e-book experience. Again, with its own reader or in partnership with reader manufacturers, Google provides a more connected reading experience where book lovers can share what they’re reading with others online.

Google embeds advertising in books. Print books today often have a page or two in the back showcasing similar books of interest. It wouldn’t be a stretch to include a Book Search type of capability in an e-book. A connected reader could view the preview and make the purchase / download immediately.

Google becomes a publisher. Google could provide tools to make it easy for authors to publish and market their works directly as e-books. Absurd you say. A short while ago you might have said it was absurd to think Google would be a bookseller.

2009_ebook_revenues_projected_runrate

Growth in e-book revenues (data from IDPF, AAP)

Books in aggregate represent one of the largest storehouses of information on the planet. Yet most of the information in books is not accessible to us online. Google has the resources to tap into and monetize this infotopia. Whether it willor not remains to be seen. According to a recent Forrester report, the e-book market is ready to go mainstream and break out of its current niche status. My only hope is that if Google is igoing to take the plunge, they do so boldly

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April 3, 2009

Books by Number – Super Crunching to Find Profitable Titles

Posted by orionwell under book marketing, open publishing, publishing analytics, publishing technology | Tags: analytics, Ian Ayres, Super Cruncher |
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In his book Super Crunchers: Why Thinking by Numbers is the New Way to be Smart, Ian Ayres outlined how statistical methodologies are challenging expertise and intuition in a multitude of fields including seemingly unlikely areas such as film making. In the book, he discussed the approach used by a company called Epagogix to selecting movie scripts which would most likely produce a profit at the box office. The firm developed a neural networkto based on the analysis of numerous successful and unsuccessful scripts. The neural network tuned the weights of the various input factors to a point where, according to Epagogix executives, it could pick winners eight out of ten times. By Hollywood standards – or any other entertainment industry for that matter – that is a phenomenal success rate.

Interview of Ian Ayres, author of Super Crunchers

The claims were both lauded and challenged in the popoular press, but venture capitalsts were sufficiently impressed to invest in the company and start using its methods in movie production. Given the length of time it takes to produce films, it will be awhile before the methodology is able to show us the money – or not.

But the story raises an interesting question for publishers. Could this approach be used to select books for publication – especially in the fiction arena? The first reaction to such a proposition might be a dismissive, defiant NO – such a thing is impossible. How could an algorithm, a mindless piece of software make a judgment about the merits of art and the reaction of its human consumers? Actually, if we stop and think about it, this may not be such a stretch.

Track record – Publishers have a poor history of selecting books that will be profitable. Estimates of profitability range from about 1 in 10 to 3 in 10. This by itself is a clear indication that the human powered title selection process is deeply flawed (at least from a business perspective). Perhaps an algorithm could do better or at least no worse.
Distractions, distractions – Much of human intuition is geared toward protecting ourselves from danger and figuring out the behavior of our fellow humans. These serve us well as a species, but not so well when it comes to analyzing in a brutally objective manner those elements that make titles successful. The reason a publisher takes on a title may have more to do with relationships than business considerations.
Short memories- Any kind of statistical analysis starts with a meaningful collection of data. The human memory is an amazing, but in many respects fallible tool. It is hard to keep in mind thousands of samples of successful and unsuccessful books – we usually just remember the outliers on either end of the spectrum. So we develop rules of thumb that may be biased to the outliers and perform poorly for the bulk of books published.
Useful judgments- What we’re really good at is figuring what are the right factors to take into consideration in the first place; not sifting through mounds of data to assign the weights to these factors. Book publishers can build predictive models based on factors they judge to be the most important. Then back test the models and see which factors really are significant. Once the key success factors are identified, sample data sets can be fed into models like that developed by Epagogix to tune the weights for each factor and start making predictions.

Katherine Hepburn confronts the computer in Desk Set

Will publishers adopt such analytical methods in selecting their titles? Maybe – but probably not. As Ayres pointed out in his book, when Epagogix approached one major Hollywood studio about their algorithm and presented their evidence for its effectiveness, the firm was turned down cold. When Dick Copaken, CEO of Epagogix, asked the studio executives why they wouldn’t use the tool even it picked 8 out of 10 winners, they replied that it would interfere with their long standing relationships with agents, agencies, actors, producers and directors. “We wouldn’t be invited to the right parties. Our wives would hate us.”

Opportunity could be knocking for publishers who are weary of the pursuit of elusive best sellers, and need new thinking to survive in this dreary economy. Perhaps the most counter intuitive idea we would have to swallow is that to find better art, we may to have sublimate part of our humanity.

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March 27, 2009

ebooks – Toward a Tipping Point?

Posted by orionwell under book marketing, open publishing, publishing strategy, publishing technology, readership strategies | Tags: e-book, e-book readers, ebook, Indigo, Read an e-book Week, Shortcovers, Smashwords, Stanza |
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The ebook continues on a roll. March 8-14 was national Read an e-Book week and by all accounts was well received. As if to underscore the continued success of the electronic reading format, the American Association of Publishers announced that e-books sales were up 68.4 percent for 2008. This amid a mostly gloomy assessment of down publisher sales. Smashwords, a blog focused on ebooks, characterizedd the growing popularity of the ebook format thus:

For the five years between 2002 and 2007 (Click herefor data, opens a PDF), overall trade book sales averaged an annual increase of 2.5% (lower than inflation, which means unit sales probably decreased), while ebooks for the same period turned in a 55.7% average annualized increase.

As any numbers guy or gal will tell you, it’s easy to show great sales growth when you’re growing off of a small base. But when sales show sequential acceleration off of sequentially increasing bases (meaning, you grow faster as you grow larger), then something really interesting is taking place.

If you extrapolate the 70% growth for five more years (and I would argue 70% is a relatively conservative number), then ebooks rise to $1.6 billion, and assuming a 2% growth rate of the overall trade book sales to $26.7 billion (generous), ebooks would then represent a respectable 6% of sales.

Not quite a tipping yet, but approaching one. Other news on the ebook front underscored the continuing interest by authors and publishers in exploring the ebook domain.

Novelist Danielle Steel released 71 of her works, including the new One Day at a Time, as ebookson Amazon.com and The eBook Store by Sony. This is the first time Steel’s books, which are published by the Random House division of Bantam Dell, have been made available in digital format.
In November, Random House announced it would be making 8,000 to 15,000 additional books from its list available in digital form.
Apple’s popular iPhone, now in use by nearly 20 million people, is also creating a a new market for e-books with free applications like Stanza, an e-book reader for the iPhone, making it easier to read books on the go. Users download the app for free directly from their phones. The popularity of the application is told by the nearly one million downloads so far.
The Canadian bookselling chain Indigo has launched a service called Shortcoversto market e-books to smartphones and computers. The firm will initially offer about 50,000 titles, priced from $4.99 to $19.99 (US$4.02 to US$16.11), and chapters will be available for 99 cents (80 US cents) each. Some 200,000 sample chapters will be available for free. Shortcovers will offer recommendations to users based on their reading habits and is creating a forum where self-published and unpublished writers can submit a chapter from a novel, a short story or an article, and list them for free, with ads or for 99 cents without ads.

The ebook continues to march steadily toward mainstream acceptance despite ebook reader war, pricing confusinos and a still modest inventory of titles. While it’s still difficult to predict exactly what an ebook world will look like, it does seem more certain that we are heading toward one.

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March 16, 2009

Richer Reading with Social Media – An Interview with Vidar Brekke of Social Intent

Posted by orionwell under Interviews, open publishing, publishing strategy, publishing technology, readership strategies
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Recently, Broadway Books, (part of the Crown Group, a division of Random House), launched an innovative marketing strategy to promote David Bach’s new book Fight for Your Money which uses Facebook and Twitter as an integral part of its campaign. The Facebook page created around the title offers a hybrid of standard Facebook functionality – e.g. discussion forums, video and picture albums - but also custom applications for free chapter previews, pre-ordering the book, as well as applications that integrate with the book content. For example, there is a ’savings calculator’ that tracks users’ savings based on tips from the book and generates viral messages throughout the reader’s network of friends whenever money is saved.

Vidar Brekke

The strategy was engineered b Vidar Brekke , the CEO of Social Intent, and his team at Social Intent. The company is a social software studio serving marketers with social networking strategy and application development. Previously, Mr. Brekke served as a VP Marketing at JPMorgan, Strategist with Ogilvy and VP Marketing at Linkstorm. We talked with him about the Random House project and his views about social media marketing for book publishers.

FPP: You mention that your company, Social Intent, is a “social software studio.” Can you give us an example of that?

VB: Web 2.0 was not just a seismic shift in technology (video, mobile, blogs, micro-messaging, etc.) and user engagement models (social networking, viral, peer-to-peer, etc.) but it brought a new cast of customer characters onto the stage – the networked user, the user-broadcaster, the activist, the tastemaker, the activist, the stalker, the crowd, and so on.

Catering to this new audience has also created a new cast of service providers; technologists reinventing themselves as marketers, and marketers turning technologist, PR specialists becoming social relations specialists. It was, and still is, a big social science project where the sheer number of factors in flux makes it hard to understand cause and effect – and neither traditional marketers, PR pros nor technologists (no matter how much they desired to reinvent themselves) could completely grasp what was going on. At Social Intent, traditional marketers, strategists, technologists and user experience professionals have shed their labels and looked at this new world with fresh eyes and found ourselves back to basics. It’s about people and their relationships to others, and it’s about using technology to create new experiences that cater to basic human needs for recognition, self-actualization, being included & staying informed. That’s what makes software social.

FPP: How did your team hook up with Broadway Books?

David Bach

VB: David (who already had a passionate and loyal following) had been looking for the right social media tools for his Finish Rich community for some time. He introduced us to Broadway, and together we worked up a plan to make Facebook a key part of the release strategy for the book.

FPP: Can you describe the Facebook application you created for Broadway Books?

VB: As social media specialists, it was our task to take our customer’s ‘social intent’ and craft a strategy that aligns their marketing goals with social networking best practices. A key differentiator for us as an agency is that we truly believe that social networking is the new customer relationship management (CRM). Thus we set out to develop a Facebook presence for David Bach that, while serving the short-term goal of promoting his new book Fight For Your Money, also created a sense of community among his fans that would thrive between book releases.

We tell our clients to also look at their social media investment as a product extension. Customers should get additional value from engaging with the brand via social media; prospects should get to sample what the brand is all about, be it utility, fun or anything in between. When marketers help people achieve their goals, people will return the favor through both evangelism and purchase.

So in the case of Fight For Your Money, which is a book full of advice on how to make smarter purchase decisions and ‘fight back’ against companies that are overcharging you, we extracted dozens of tips and embedded them into a custom ‘savings calculator’ that allowed users to read a tip, act on it and then the calculator would show them their annual savings – and send a message to the user’s friends newsfeed announcing how much money was saved and encouraging them to do the same. We would also show how much money all Americans have saved by acting on these tips – creating a sense of a ‘larger mission’. We built several other applications that would function as a trigger for further viral messaging and engagement, such as reading a free sample chapter, downloading bonus content, RSVP’ing to tuning into a TV or radio appearance, etc. All measurable in its effectiveness to the marketer, of course.

Our strategy for David Bach was to bring his book and the whole “Finish Rich” franchise to life in a way that allowed fans to take ownership of the brand and make the benefits of the David Bach “experience” tangible to both fans and (through viral channels) friends of fans.

Also key to growing his fan base is to give the evangelists a voice and a medium – and when done right, these voices convert their peers in a way that a marketer couldn’t. Truth is, people trust each other, not brands and marketers. At the same time, social media makes the brand and its representatives more approachable and peer-like, a strategy that David Bach has fully embraced by engaging his fans both via Facebook and Twitter.

FPP: What other applications does Broadway Books have planned to support the content of the book once it gets into customers’ hands?

VB: We recently upgraded David Bach’s page to the new Pages for Brands product that Facebook offers, which we’re “tricking out” to the fullest to create even more engagement and virality. There are more custom applications for David Bach in the works that will further enable fans to share their story about how they are ‘fighting for their money’ using the David Bach brand as a symbol and reference point.

FPP: In general, how can social marketing help book publishers better connect with readers?

VB: First and foremost, book marketers need to understand and define their brand promise and readership. Then they need to quantify what marketing and business success means to them. This will help us narrow down the list of platforms and types of engagements that are appropriate.

Secondly, publishers need to figure out if their role in social media is to engage directly with their readers or are they seeking to provide tools for reader-to-reader engagement? Social media isn’t a set-and-forget tactic, it’s a commitment, and publishers need to be realistic about what it takes to remain engaged over time.

There is no one-size-fits-all approach to social media for publishers or other marketers. Creating a social marketing program is not necessarily as inexpensive as many have come to believe.

A successful social marketing program requires expertise that spans design, usability, branding, advertising, technology and PR. It’s not something an intern offering to set up a blog is likely to pull off successfully.

And finally, if you build it, they won’t come until you put some marketing dollars behind it.

Future Perfect Publishing