Zimana Blog

Explaining how a digital magazine could work

With so much discussion about the iPad and the impact on e-books (see the New York Times article regarding the potential price premium of an e-book because of the iPad), there has not been much discussion on digital magazines. Until now.

Gregg Hano, Group Publisher of Bonnier Technology Group, spoke at a recent gathering sponsored by Digital Flash NYC (which sponsors some great business panels with solid Q&A — see the Digital Flash NYC site here for more on the group and their event schedule!) . Hano presented an explanatory video of the digital version of Popular Science magazine, currently researched with Bonnier design partner BERG, and spoke about the challenges and opportunity potential. Hano graciously listened to many questions from the audience, with excellent queries ranging from analytics to owner’s rights to the purchased content. Highlighted queries include:

A digital magazine creates the potential for publishers to control content, though like book publishers, magazine publishers fret about how this can be done.

There is potential for selling individual articles as well as selling e-reader subscriptions as a premium (at least initially).

Advertisers can create ads rich in content that can true engage readers.

There can be a distinct market for readers of a print magazine.

For web analytics, this along with iPad are further example of content consumption away from a given tagged website. The new challenge for blogs, e-magazines, newspapers, and other content providers is to capture the path that leads to traditional web metrics such as increased time on site and conversion.

You can view the Bonnier/BERG video on the development of a digital magazine here.

It’s not everyday one gets to share a book on which a client help create, so I am figuring a healthy shout-out is in order here.

Stuart Scott created a coffeetable book called We Shall Overcome: A Song That Changed The World.   The book tells the story of how the famous song played a galvanizing role in the civil rights movement, as well as other social events during the period. There is  a CD recording of the song included with the book.

Terrance Cummings, a former Zimana client, created the illustrations for the book.  Cummings is an award winning illustrator, an art director, and a former teacher at Parsons School of Design.  He has illustrated several books in his past, along with managing catalog layout design and graphic design projects for corporate clients.  He has a studio in New Jersey, just outside of New York City.

Stuart Scott’s appearance will be at Politics and Prose in Washington DC on February 11th (click here to learn more) .  You can purchase the book via Amazon (click here for purchase).  The Amazon site also has a cool video to accompany the post.

I wish the very best to Stuart and Terrance.

And I wish the very best to all during Black History Month.

Pierre

RT @nickjayres @smulpuru @CNNMoney: How The Wiggles became an empire http://bit.ly/6umS77 // fun stuff RT by Georgia Tech classmate

RT @GoogleRetail: New Google Place Pages Help Local Businesses Reach Existing and New Customers http://ow.ly/WFtZ

RT @eMarketer: Study: Shopping with Smartphones | Android users willing to spend more than iPhone users – http://bit.ly/74v05G

Fox Business News talks about how businesses can link local search listing to mobile devices & increase sales. http://ow.ly/WOtt

An eMarketer report on online coupons provides various stats that indicate growing usage among retailers and marketers as a marketing strategy to drive website traffic and sales. The usage, which became more mainstream with consumers beginning with the 2008 holiday season, is expected to increase in the coming years.

The surging usage should also be a boon to analytics practitioners.

Why? With capability to track campaigns in an analytics solution, practitioners now have a new medium to convince managers the value that analytics can play in investigating the response to an online buzz. With the explosive growth in social media, along with consumer interest in value, coupon campaigns are becoming a great value for marketers. Furthermore, smartphones have made sharing online coupons a benefit for potentially engaging customers with new offers and events. While analytics still has a long way to go for covering the entire tagging activity from a coupon to a site, analytics solutions can still help to correlate site interest to coupon campaigns.

The online coupon growth may also be a benefit for small businesses. Many business owners are leery of PPC, having been burned by overspending on keywords that lead to little actual conversion. Yet these businesses need another driver to their e-commerce site. Coupon creation sites such as twtQpon can help ensure that small businesses can announce tantalizing offers as tempting as those from large corporations.

And a li’l web analytics can help ensure the best results.

from Autoblog — MyFord touch shows 2nd generation connectivity in #Ford cars. Read it here — http://ow.ly/Ty9q #measure

Hootsuite announced a new feature, the ability to post to WordPress blogs. This post, in fact, is a HS post. Read more… http://ow.ly/TxUr

The number of flights to offer WiFi service will increase over the next year. Jaunted, a hip travel site, offers a list of US airline carriers which will offer WiFi (or should I say Gogo, since it is supplying most of the airlines). Soon your web analytics data, along with any other online business, can be reviewed alongside your coffee, tea, or milk.

Not every airline has WiFi — AirTran is currently at 100% while Southwest has to tweet which flights will offer the service. Check for your favorite carrier at the Jaunted post here.