10/01/08
Reaching Readers Online - 2008
Update: All of my files from the presentation are available for download here
I’ve been asked back to The Bookseller’s Reaching Readers Online seminar, which takes place at the end of this Month.
There’s some really interesting people looking like taking part, including those within the publishing industry (from Penguin, Little Brown and Headline) and within the wider digital media landscape. The chair this year is Cameron Saunders, who does Channel 4’s digital marketing. (I hope it’s the same guy who was behind the great stuff they’ve done for the equally brilliant Skins)
I’ve got a fairly open brief this year, and am giving a 30 minute presentation on (apparently!):
“how publishers can build communities, authors and series brands online”
which could be pretty much anything. Before I go off on one, I’d like to (1) see if there are any readers who will be thinking about going and (2) to see if there is anything anyone thinks I should cover in particular. I’ll be putting the presentation up on slideshare (as I did for a talk I gave to some students about what a “producer” does) so you won’t have to go to get the gist of it. I’ll also encourage the Bookseller to podcast it, which they didn’t get round to last year but should be possible this year.
Either email me (via the site, or peter [at] aptstudio.com) or comment below if you have anything you’d like to hear. I’ll maybe post some thoughts in the next week or so if there is interest in seeing where it’s all going.
Peter
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# Comment by Alastair Mucklow @ 3:21 pm, January 10, 2008:
If I was attending the seminar, I’d be interested to learn how successful Apt have been with their different digital campaigns for publishers over the last year or so. In particular, which campaign attracted more web traffic: the Mitch Albom / One More Day / Create a Star campaign - or the Flickr / Crowdsourcing campaign (although this one has just begun)?
I guess the interesting thing is the creative decisions you make to use different web technologies based on the nature of the content and the market involved - whether that is creating bespoke Flash animation or using APIs to pull in data from existing networks / resources…
# Comment by George @ 10:43 pm, January 10, 2008:
I’d be interested in discussion of building communities from scratch versus leveraging existing communities and networks - quite different challenges in my experience.
# Comment by anon @ 1:40 pm, January 12, 2008:
Depends what you want to do; Reassure people and be safe and don’t give too much away and try and get some design work? Or really try and be provocative and paint a future of what the world might look like if we don’t engage now?
How quantifiable can you make it ? How many comparisons to other companies / cultures that might tell us what the future looks like? How nobody is yet investing enough in UK publishing to really understand what the potential upside could be. How differentiation continues to be all and yet we insist on aping and homogenising. And by the time someone is really making money out of a community or brand, it might be too late to catch up.
I’d be as apocalyptic as possible. I think even the publishers who have bought into the idea of this are unsure how brave or committed to be.
Anything you can do to move the debate on beyond one where we’re all paralysed by the speed of our own irrelevance and just prefer to keep our head down til the Tsunami hits. Please do anything that really get them talking / thinking at least…
# Comment by Lindsey @ 3:47 pm, January 12, 2008:
Let’s face it - last year’s seminar was atrocious and showed how far behind a lot of the industry are. Most publishers won’t fully embrace digital until they are completely convinced it’s worthwhile and risk-free. And you’re never going to have a brilliant campaign/community/or content unless you take a few risks. Perhaps you can persuade us to experiment and take some chances. And even if things don’t go to plan and aren’t successful it’s not the end of the world, you’ll have learned something that will benefit you in the future. Persuade publishers to stop playing it safe and get involved.
# Comment by neil @ 7:33 pm, January 18, 2008:
Coming from a web2.0 and new media background I would suggest the audience needs to understand how to use the social web2.0 world through talking to those who are living and breathing it. The danger with most corporate entities suddenly discovering there are potential audiences out there on various social networks, is to try and bulldoze their way in as they might have done in the “shout loudest and be heard good old days”. These communities must be nurtured and have room to grow organically - there’s nothing more damaging than a community turning against an entity as a result of feeling manipulated.
Anon uses the word ‘apocalyptic’ and I have to agree. Having been smack bang in the middle of how new media technologies - such as podcasting - have chipped sizable chunks of audience from TV and Radio, and helped to shake the music industry into fearing its future, it looks like publishing is next in line.
# Pingback by Speaking gig @ 12:03 pm, January 29, 2008:
[...] that one of my fellow speakers, the extremely innovative Peter Collingridge of Apt Studio, has posted a piece on his blog soliciting ideas and questions – so I thought I’d follow his lead. If there are any issues which readers or seminar [...]
# Pingback by Times Emit: Reaching Readers Online Reminder - Tomorrow! @ 4:09 pm, January 30, 2008:
[...] presentation is done, and will be posted on here and on SlideShare as soon as I can after tomorrow. (I’ll [...]
# Comment by Jonathan Bean @ 2:55 pm, February 4, 2008:
Hi, I was unfortunately unable to make it to the seminar, so was pleased to find your slideshow available - thanks for that. My concern had been to look at how to engage and hold an audience in literature by local/regional writers published digitally (online pdf’s) across a wider base than the region alone. Hopefully there will be further seminars to attend in the coming year?