Glenn Beck Draws the Crowd, You Reach the Audience

Glenn Beck’s rally at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C. on Friday drew a crowd of tens of thousands of people. Protestors, supporters and gawkers alike came from all over to be a part of the action.

Wouldn’t it be great to have crowds like that become your readers?

Nxtbook Media client Destination DC had just that chance. And they didn’t have to spend a dime to get it.

Destination DC produces an Official Visitor’s Guide to the Washington, D.C. area. (Click here to see the most recent edition.) Having a digital edition meant when rally enthusiasts started planning their trip on internet platforms, they could promote and share the Visitor’s Guide with each other. For example, the guide’s link was posted on the Caldwell Tea Party’s website as a resource for the area (click here to see). Another reader posted the guide’s link to two freepublic chat sites (click here and here).

Going digital meant the Visitor’s Guide could not only be used immediately to respond to current events, but it could also reach an audience Destination DC didn’t even consider targeting. Best of all, Destination DC didn’t have to do a thing for this free advertising; their readers did all the work for them.

That’s a big plus one for the "going digital" category!

This is for You

Attention Nxtbook Media clients: your nxtbooks are solid. Trust me, I know the technology you employ, and the platform is slick. Increased reader engagement times proves a focus on reader experience, and it is compatible with mobile phones, tablets, and e-Readers. (Click here to see how) With it, your content can spread across facebook and twitter to let your readers become your marketers. And, Nxtbook customers, you have account managers standing by to show you how to drive your digital campaign.

So really, it should be a no-brainer to enter for this award: the 2010 Nichee Digital Awards.

The awards have a Best Digital Edition category that any of you could enter. The winner will be announced during the 2010 Niche Digital Conference which Nxtbook Media will be attending.

So go ahead; click here to enter.

How This Decade Does Digital Catalogs

It’s not your ’90s version of an e-catalog.
It’s not even your turn-of-the-century version.
Quite frankly, if this is how the new decade is doing digital catalogs, count me in!

Nxtbook Media client John Wiley & Sons, Inc. is taking advantage of the cutting-edge technology to make their catalog user-friendly and intuitive for shoppers. Check out their Fall 2010 Scholarly & Professional Catalog. Not only do they make use of an optimized layout, they also employ a branded loader, custom toolbar buttons, scrollable cover image, shopping cart, and pop-ups.

This digital catalog easily achieves two major objectives: it informs customers about the product (scholarly publications), and makes it easy to purchase teh product. Readers can click either the books’ titles or the little "i" icon to view a pop-up with more information. They can easily add the item to the shopping cart located in the nxtbook platform by clicking "Add Item" in the pop-up, or by simply clicking the shopping cart icon on the catalog page.

With this technology, shoppers do not have to exit the digital catalog to get additional product information or to purchase the item. Everything is handled directly in the nxtbook, keeping your customers in your catalog.

What is one of the best parts? The shopping cart stores items added from session to session. Shoppers can close the nxtbook and their purchases will remain in their shopping cart for their return. At any time, shoppers can click the "Proceed to Checkout" to fill out an order form and purchase the books.

To get this technology into your digital edition, call your account manager. Like Wiley, take advantage of today’s technology to keep your readers in your catalog.

Last Day to Sign Up!

Today is the last day to sign up for Nxtbook Media’s webinar, Screen Wars: Navigating the e-Reader Marketplace, airing Thursday, June 17, 2:00pm EST.

Publishers have never before been faced with so many e-Reader choices, but last we checked, you only had 24 hours in your day and hardly unlimited budgets.  This webinar will provide an in-depth look into a myriad of devices.  We’ll ponder the iPads, consider the Kindle, and be bemused by BlackBerries – all in less than an hour.  You can reserve your spot now by clicking here

 

 

We Tend to Agree

How do you define success?  If you’re a catalog publisher, you might say it’s good circulation, brand awareness, and sales.  We tend to agree.

One week from today, Nxtbook Media will listen in as two clients talk about how they are cutting costs and reaching more readers with digital catalogs.  Join us on June 16, 2010 at 2:00pm EST for the webinar "Flipping Over Digital Catalogs" featuring the following:

  Wayne Gale – Stoke Seeds – Third generation president Wayne Gale describes his success in using digital media to distribute his catalog internationally and link his products directly to his purchasing site.  (See an example here.)

   John Cortez – Shaklee – Listen and engage as John Cortez describes how his business uses digital catalogs to cut costs, jump revenue, and increase reader interaction. (See an example here.)

Learn from those on the front lines of the industry.  See for yourself what works when it comes to digital catalogs, and start your own success story.  (Register here.)

Showtime

Next week marks two of our biggest shows of the year as FOLIO and Internet Retailer kick off in NYC and Chicago. First up, here’s what to expect for the magazine crowd in New York:

Presenting: SCREEN WARS! Tuesday: 3-4 PM
Come in to get an in-depth view of the e-Readers battling for your readers’ attention. Leave confident about which devices are winning the war.

• Eye the iPads
• Analyze Androids
• Consider Kindles
• Behold Blackberries
• And more

Plus, the best looking digital publishing team, yet, will be at booth 100

• See the newest features.
• Learn why our publishers are the most successful!

ATTENTION RUNNERS: Join us at 7am Wednesday as City Running Tours takes you on a free tour of the city! All distances & paces welcome. 

If that’s not enough for you, be sure to check out our special exhibit in the Cyber-Cafe…. too exciting to reveal, here, but be sure to stop by and see the REAL future of digital publishing!

If you’re a catalog publisher, no worries! Our catalog specialists will be on hand at Internet Retailer, ready to demo our newest e-catalog features for you!

Hope to see you anywhere!

Calling All FOLIO Fans!

Calling all Folio fans!  Thought you missed your chance for registration?  Well fear not: Nxtbook Media would like to officially invite you to attend the 2010 Folio Show as our VIP guests.  With our promotional code, you can save $125 off a full conference pass OR register for an exhibit hall pass absolutely free.  Come check out our booth (#100) and the e-Reader lab (by the cyber cafe) and see what the Nxtbook Syndicator is cooking up for your digital content.  (Meet the Syndicator here.)

To register: go to www.folioshow.com

Promotional code: SEVIP10

 

 

One Gorgeous Nxtbook

Here’s one of the sexier interactive covers I’ve seen in some time. It’s for a catalog project and does a great way of pulling you into the content. The client – Wiley – also made good use of an integrated shopping cart so people can shop directly inside the Nxtbook. Well done!

 

But Seriously…

Last week, one of our competitors sent an e-mail to a lot of you. (This is bound to happen when you’re not afraid to promote your customers’ content.) The e-mail said (in part):

 

 

So Long Nxtbook. I’m Getting Serious With (insert classy competitor name here)

Sometimes you just grow out of a relationship because you may not be getting everything you need. We understand.

The Benefits of (working with said competitor) are endless:

Double audience readership (Compared to what??? Half audience readership???)
Track advertising and reader behavior (How very 2003)
Integrate keywords for better Google search (Cute… we had this four years ago. )
Enrich and keep sticky with multimedia content (Is it me, or does this just sound gross?)
Reduce costs of print and mailing by up to 95% (Insert baldness cure claims here)

First up, whoever is in charge of marketing for these guys should be fired. Or worse. Consider the strategy:

1. Even though the ocean of digital edition prospects is a million miles deep and a million miles wide, let’s poach them from a competitor’s website.
2. After we poach them, let’s make it obvious that we poached them in our e-mail. They’ll think we’re cool! (Judging by what we heard, most of them thought you were creepy.)
3. In the e-mail, let’s mention a bunch of features that they have and pepper it with unprovable statistics.

Are you kidding me? The only thing that was missing was a free order of steak knives if you act now.

When shared with a top ranking industry insider, he wrote, "No classiness in this type of advertising. On the other hand, you guys exemplify class… so it positions you well in an odd way." So there’s that.

All of that being said, aside from the intrusion to our customers, the only thing that stung was the idea that you and we aren’t serious about this industry.

We’ve written of the many publishers who carefully have mapped out a strategy to grow international readership through their digital magazines. We’ve promoted webinars for those publishers who’ve found six figure revenue streams. And we’ve helped others launch their first forays into the mobile space with Nxtbook Liberty. You’ve gotten serious results, and we’ve provided serious support.

Along the way, we’ve built an entire layer within our organization of Account Managers, whose only mission is to help you be more successful. We added Flash animators and video experts – specialists who exist for the sole purpose of pushing the technology as far as it will go. And along the way, we’ve added a small army of developers, whose job it is to push the boundaries of the product even further. In fact, as a full-service provider, our entire survival is based on delivering serious results.

At the end of the day, we share many traits with our customers. Our mutual dedication to pushing the digital edition envelope further is just one of them.

We Got Game

Here’s a post discussing our involvement with the Cardiff City Football Club (you know – that kind of football), which caused us to think about how much sports work we’ve done at Nxtbook. We’ve done digital editions of American football, marathons, golf and even hunting & trapping. 

It turns out if you can kick it, carry it, run it, hit it or shoot it, we’ve done it!

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