Learning to pod

Today was the first of four days of training for me this week. It was the turn of the podcast today. We had arranged for JISC Digital Media to deliver a bespoke training course for two days, firstly podcasting then videocasting. Joel from JISC was fantastic. Kept things very straight forward and avoided too much jargon. Also  his enthusiasm for all things sound came over - shared some interesting facts that I had not known before, for instance what the "X-bit" means (he drew charts: it's about the number of times that a sound file gets pin pointed when converting to digital, so determines how accurate it then sounds - higher bit then higher quality).

We had much better mics during the training today than I do at home, and I'm intending to invest in more kit for the office, but nevertheless felt it was as good a time as any to try out my newly acquired skills. So, courtesy of my laptop mic, here's my first podcast... on podcasting... how meta am I.

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/10753745/mithutest.mp3

Kindle for Web

Learn about Kindle for Web here, Amazon's new tool to encourage bloggers and publishers to link back to their store by embedding a chapter or chunk of book content.

This is pretty cool. I can't recollect whether you could already do something similar with Google Book Search (some small dull memory on this makes me think that you could?) but nevertheless Amazon's Kindle portfolio is growing rapidly and there is a lot of content I'd be quite happy to feature a short section of on my own website.

So without further ado, having read all about this I headed over to the Kindle store to try it out. Could I locate a book with the 'read it for free' button? Could I 'eckers like. I tried my most recent purchases, my favourite purchases, then headed for the most popular purchases on the Kindle store. None of them. Not one. Incidentally some of the books in the top of that Kindle chart? Bizarre...

So I'm left wondering, is this launched yet? Is it for US customers only? Am I missing something? Sigh.

Magazines and Newspapers on the iPad

This makes me excited: Mashable posted an article recently about possible talks between Apple and publishers to get magazines and newspapers onto the iPad.

Ok you can already do this to an extent - I've bought an issue of Wired for example just to test out the functionality (watch a demo on YouTube if you haven't seen one). And you can buy single issues of various publications. Exact Editions do this for example.

But it'll be fascinating to see who Apple signs up for this, what the models will be, and how interactive the publications will be for the device.

"If he hurts himself he'll learn not to do it again"??

This wise old mantra is one we often tell ourselves, notably when talking about letting a child do something they will probably regret. So what happens when they just don't learn?

An example on Bad Pitch here - it'll make you smile, but more importantly it'll remind you to pay attention to feedback and learn from your mistakes!

Book rentals: where are we heading?

Catching up on a few weeks' worth of reading this evening. Obviously, working in publishing the business models for selling book content is a fascinating and important topic for me. Particularly academic publishing. So this article from TechCrunch was an interesting one. The growth of book rentals (725% growth for one retailer mentioned in that article) is really interesting. Particularly how much growth there is in the textbook market for this model.

In a way, it shouldn't be surprising that the rental model works for students, since in a way it mirrors the the way students generally engage with their learning. They will use a particular course material for a short period of time: during a particular course or period of their learning. Once they've gained what they need from that resource, they typically don't return to it, except perhaps for revision.

But is that the way we'd actually want our students to engage with scholarly content? Unlike with a fiction title (or actually generally any read-for-pleasure title) I think textbooks are things you dip in and out of over and over again. I guess that depends how many titles, and how relevant. But I know that I still have books I had in college that I turn back to, and the same for several business titles and professional development titles, not to mention light psychology titles!

The traditional models for accessing content over and over again like this were previously: : owning a copy of a book and knowing it's there on your shelf; or having access to a library copy which you can return to over and over again when required.

There are downsides to both options which the book rentals service would suggest it gets around. For the purchase option, the book rental claims it'll save you money. For the library option, there's the risk that 10 other college kids have gone in to find the same book at the same time.

You have to remember at this point in time I'm still talking about TRADITIONAL print publishing.

So how does the rental model hold up in a digital world? When I first started reading the TechCrunch article I immediately assumed that it was digital rentals. I mean, surely in the world of iTunes that is where our rental experiences now lie? I'm amazed that a printed rental model is proving so successful and am happy to admit I have some scepticism, based on the dip-in-briefly-but-often model I set out above.

So in digital? Does Rental overshadow ownership? Digital is immediately more attractive: for one thing providers (e.g. Vitalsource) provide tools so you can annotate and add notes in a way you could never do with a loaned print copy. The model (a la iTunes) is also more familiar here, and much more accessible/immediate compared with the print rentals. But is it better than ownership?

I think I need some more time to think about this one.

Loyalty?

I was catching up on my blog feeds this morning and came across this post by Seth Godin. It's all about loyalty from customers. He makes the point that if you always delivered the best product on the market, that wouldn't necessarily engender a loyal following from your customers ("If your offering is always better, you don't have loyal customers, you have smart ones."). To have loyal customers, they have to be making a choice to buy your product service rather than look elsewhere. I won't summarise the post further than that - you can read it yourself.


What this started me thinking about was the routes various businesses take to build that loyalty, and what role marketing plays in that process. It's got to be the very values that underpin a business that dictate why a customer chooses them over another. In publishing for example, this may be in part down to the ethics of what kinds of books we'd be publishing: the topics and disciplines; the choices we make about authors' rights; the decisions we took on corporate social responsibility;  etc. 


I just got through reading a book (which I'll be writing a separate post about) called The E-Myth Revisited, which in one section discusses what it is that the founder of a particular company envisions for her business (a pie shop). She realises that she set up her shop as an ethically responsible, highly 'caring' company, without having done so purposefully. But having realised this, she identifies that this is what makes the shop special as a brand and has that to build on. In the publishing world again, a great example of this would be Alastair Sawday. Not only is the product he creates instantly recognizable for its personable charm, but the company itself has been set up as a highly ethical business, right through to having a small farm on site for its employees. With businesses like these two, there's a massively tangible brand value that has wide appeal to potential customers. And with such strong brand I think you are bound to garner strong loyalty.


Going back to Seth Godin's post, loyalty isn't something that is guaranteed to last. So this is the part where PR and Marketing have a key role to play. He talks about the relationships you have with loyal customers. What is your interaction? How do you reward them for being loyal?


I had someone tell me at a conference the other day that they'd spent a certain amount of money with an online retailer, and as a thank you had been given vouchers with which they could spend yet more money on that retailer's site. With offers like that, you get the double whammy of making that customer feel special, and at the same time giving them a reason to come back and shop again with you. Easier for some retailers than others? Perhaps, but it's food for thought...

In the chair: how to handle a panel discussion

I chaired my first conference session this week. The panel were, frankly, amazing. I was very lucky to have had acceptances from a truly great group of people, that not only offered a broad range of views, but were willing to be open and honest about their point of view.

Having not done this before, I set out to get some advice from others who have done this well. Some suggested reading follows below:

• http://www.sparkmediasolutions.com/conference.html
  http://paul.kedrosky.com/archives/2006/06/04/10_rules_for_be.html
• http://blog.guykawasaki.com/2006/03/how_to_be_a_gre.html#axzz0yevjiPXZ
• http://powazek.com/posts/497
• http://www.ehow.com/how_2099947_moderate-panel.html
• http://www.socialsignal.com/blog/rob-cottingham/13-keys-to-a-good-panel

So what would I add to these words of wisdom? Well, having now faced the challenge head on, I'll agree with all those pieces that chairing a panel is not easy! At all! Some of the hardest things were dealing with questions or answers that took the issue off topic, and handling the same small vocal minority to ensure they didn't monopolize the conversation.What I also found difficult was keeping the questions very short and to the point. In hindsight I'd practice that aspect more. I'd prepared lots of questions and had lots of views myself (which I managed, for the most part, to keep to myself), but there were a few occasions where I felt I should have worked the room better. So my advice is as follows:

• Preparation really is everything. My biggest benefit was having looked carefully at who was on the panel, and what their strengths were, what they could respond to, and where to turn a particular question over to them.
• Keep intros snappy, and set out how you want audience participation to be. If they know what your expectations are, it's easier to control. So if you want questions throughout, say so. If you want them just at the end, be clear. It's just like facilitating any meeting.
• Keep questions short and clear. Take time to clarify if there is any confusion, so your speakers don't veer off topic.
• Make sure you do look to the whole room, not just the small vocal minority, for input. They do have questions, they're just shy. Find ways to get them involved.
• Do leave time to cover what you want. I set a timer to count down at the start of the session, which enabled me to monitor how long we were spending on each area, and to say clearly how much time we had left.
• Final point: be flexible. It won't go exactly how you plan - you can't predict what people will want to talk about, either on the panel or in the audience. You just need to keep the flow moving, and ensure the audience get lots of time to engage.

I think my first chair experience was far from a disaster, but I've got lots of room for improvement. It was great to hear from lots of different people how much they enjoyed the session over the course of the conference. Looking forward to the next opportunity to try it again!