Evolving Business Models for Content Producers

This is the sixth and likely final post in a continuing series from a technology seminar by Creative Strategies at Thomas Nelson on October 23, 2009.

The connected world is driving new business models. Here’s a few we publishers need to consider:

Free/Freemium
The consumer tests a chapter or two of our product. If they like it, they buy the whole thing. Amazon has pioneered this through its Look-Inside-The-Book feature.

Ala Carte Micro Transactions
This involves taking our content, breaking it into smaller bits and selling to the consumer just what they want. Apple pioneered this with iTunes; just buy the song you want for $0.99 instead of the whole album at $13.99 for a bunch songs you are never going to listen to anyway.

Many have argued against this as unhealthy for the music industry, but it will continue to be successful because it is a better solution for the consumer. Yes, it is convenient for the very small percentage of the US population that’s employed by the music industry, but many more benefit from this new model and thus it can’t be stopped.

We need to pioneer this in publishing. It is especially relevant to our reference and self-help books. Could we piece meal fiction with cliff hangers so the consumer can’t wait to buy the next scene?

Subscription
This business model has been talked about so much, and has been around for so long, I think some don’t give it enough credit as a viable model in the connected world. Subscriptions are most likely for the “Tribe” that is really passionate about your content and just wants to keep the facet flowing.

The beauty of the model is that it’s an annuity. It is the opposite of the Ala Carte Micro Transactions model where you only pay for exactly what you want. This is for the person who can’t get enough of our content and this is a better deal. We will take that annuity all day, but we have to keep offering enough new interesting content that they want to keep paying us that subscription.

I can see this working for nearly all of our clearly defined specific genres, including Bible, Reference, Self-Help and Fiction.

These models will take on more relevance as our online communities grow. What do you think?

3 Billion People – From Listeners to Readers to Writers

This is the fifth post in a continuing series from a technology seminar by Creative Strategies at Thomas Nelson on October 23, 2009.

The printing press turned listeners to readers. Will the Internet turn readers to writers and/or participants? (Creative Strategies Technology Seminar - October 23, 2009)

As I posted earlier, we will have 3 billion consumers connected through smart phones, computers and web-enabled TV in 2010. This creates an unprecedented opportunity in history for people to quickly and inexpensively communicate. If you doubt this will happen, consider the numbers of bloggers today:

• Over 100,000,000 blogs
• 85% of 18-35 year-olds are active posters, commentators and uploaders

The critics will cite the Despair.com wall poster:

BLOGGING: Never before have so many people with so little to say said so much to so few.

This blog may indeed fit that description. But still, never before has it been so easy for so many to say what’s on their mind and quickly send it around the world. We can’t ignore the power of the people, because they will be heard more than ever before; no way around it. It’s now a two-way relationship; not just publishers pushing out content.

The opportunity is to harness that powerful network. My next blog will discuss how we as content producers can harness that network.

Scary Book Facts - We Must Reinvent

This is the second post in a continuing series from a technology seminar by Creative Strategies at Thomas Nelson on October 23, 2009.

Consider these facts presented by Creative Strategies:

• 80% of US households did not buy or read a book last year


• 70% of US households did not enter a bookstore last year


• 42% of college graduates never read a book after college


• 33% of high school graduates never read a book again


• 52% of books are not read to completion
  

The last point I get. I probably finish a book about 70% of the time, because I usually get it about halfway through. In fact, I am more likely to read a full book with Seth Godin’s formatting in Tribes than I am to read a whole traditional chapter format book.

For us book publishers, those facts if indeed true, are downright scary. The solution, as regular readers of my blog know, is for book publishers to become content producers to provide product in any format a consumer wants to consume our education, message and entertainment.

This is why our DigiReady efforts at Thomas Nelson are so important. Our company is embracing DigiReady. DigiReady is one of many things we will need to do differently in the coming years to stay relevant. I am certain we will make the transition, despite the unavoidable pain that will come with it.

We have great content. We must reinvent it; not just repurpose content.

Nelson Leadership Seminar - Post 1

This blog will start a series of posts highlighting key take-a-ways from Thomas Nelson's Leadership Technology Seminar Series. We had the first seminar last Friday. The presenters were Tim Bajarin and Ben Bajarin, the principals at Creative Strategies.

Let's start with these two intersting facts presented at the technology seminar:

1. Processing power is continuing to increase at an amazing pace, while the processors driving that power continue to get smaller
2. The Internet is allowing anyone to connect on anything to any digital content any where in the world

These two converging facts are making our cell phones into what is called smart phones, or basically functional computers that fit easily in our pockets and purses. The iPhone is the most popular smart phone today.


Consider these facts:

• In the United States, 80% of the population has PCs; 77% have mobile phone
• Globally, only 13% of the world's population has computers, but 42% have cell phones
• About 23% of all cell phone purchases today are smart phones

It is estimated by 2012, 50-60% of the world will have smart phones. This raises a series of threats and opportunities to our business. Imagine if half the world's 6.8 billion population can now have access to our content with a device the size of a cell phone. How does that change our publishing strategy from how we acquire rights to print runs on books we sell in a traditional print format?

This is likley a threat to our print volume in the future, but huge opportunity for digital delivery of our content. Read what Michael Shatzkin has to say of the future of e-books in his post Sunday. It will definitely make you think. It might even scare you.

Stay tuned. There is a whole lot of interetsing stuff to come from our first Leadership Technology Seminar.