Keynote given by Peter Collingridge at the BiC (Books in Classification) conference in London, December 2010. BIC Script I’m Peter Collingridge, co-founder of Enhanced Editions. I have a 13 year background in digital publishing, starting off at Canongate in 1997, where I set up their first website, which was described by the Guardian as “A cool club stocked with well-read friends rather than a lazy corporate exercise”. The connection I made with readers directly through this website has been a big influence on my outlook towards the opportunities of digital, and part of what I will talk to you about today. I left Canongate 4 years later to set up my own consultancy, Apt, which has produced over 25 digital projects for publishers, from HarperCollins and 4th Estate, to Random House, Granta Magazine, Picador, Mills and Boon, Hachette, Walker Books, Laurence King, Little Brown, Portobello, Frances Lincoln and many more. In 2009 I co-founded Enhanced Editions with two of my smartest friends. Enhanced Editions was set in the belief that we could make the ebooks that the 21st century deserved, and our first project was Nick Cave’s The Death of Bunny Munro. Here’s a short video about that: [Show video] Bunny came out in September last year, and was lucky enough to receive some pretty amazing feedback from users, the media, and the industry. We’ve produced more than 20 apps in the last year, as well as helping Andrew Wylie “destroy publishing” with his Odyssey Editions launch. From all these projects, and more, we have learned a huge amount, all of which comes under the banner of today’s topic - the realities of digital change. I don’t want to stand here and give you the sales pitch. In fact, we are basically closing our doors for the next few months to all but the most exciting of projects, because we feel that it’s time we went back “to the lab” to work on the next generation of products. What I would like to do is share with you our current thinking about what the future of publishing looks like, and how we think publishers should be set up to benefit from such a future. So, this afternoon I am going to talk briefly about where we think publishing is headed (clue: it’s all about your consumers), and how the most effective publishers will orient themselves to this direction. //// By 2015, publishing industry executives estimate that between 20-50% of books sold in the US will be digital. Other countries, including the UK, will not be far behind. Industry analyst Mike Shatzkin reckons that “If by the end of 2012, 25% of sales for a new book are digital, then about half of new book sales will be made through online purchases” In other words, as well as a shift to digital in terms of ebook sales, don’t forget about the continued chunk of the print business also going through online retailers. The consequence of both is obvious: physical sales, and the shops that make them, will be cannibalized. And some of those shops will close, probably concentrating power in the hands of fewer, larger players. Scott Lubeck of BISG recently told me that he is interested in the “cataclysmic tipping point” in eBook publishing; that moment when the existing supply chain, geared around physical products, begins to disintegrate. His estimate is that it is around 15-20%, and that as well as bookshops closing, other things will happen. Economies of scale, such as the price of paper, printing, ink, and distribution, will go away. And the result of that is that physical books will become more expensive, or even less profitable, thereby driving cost-conscious consumers even further towards ebooks, and publishers to the wall. Tim Spalding, founder of social reading website LibraryThing, takes this further when he talked recently of other “positive feedback loops” in eBooks. One such effect is “the highlander principle” - this is that in ecommerce, success tend

1. The realities of digital
change all the time.
Enhanced Editions
BIC
November 30, 2010

2. Canongate.net 1.0 (1997–2002)

3. “ At last… a publisher’s site that
feels like a cool club stocked
with well-read friends
rather than a
lazy corporate exercise.”
The Guardian

4. Definition of apt
1 : unusually fitted or qualified
2 a : having a tendency
b : ordinarily disposed
3 : suited to a purpose;
especially: being to the point
4: keenly intelligent and
responsive

6. Jim Rhys
Strategy Product
EE
Peter
Publishing

7. The evolution of the book
www.enhanced-editions.com

8. Users Awards Media
“Sets the gold MediaGuardian “The moment
standard for future Innovation award digital publishing
literary apps.” came of age”
iTunes & Observer The Bookseller
apps of the year
“Worth every cent. “Sprinkling a little
No actually worth eConsultancy rock’n’roll glamour
a lot more!” Innovation Award over publishing”
Guardian
Wolff Olins
“Future” award

13. Planning
Metadata / ONIX
DocBook, ePub, Mobi
Web design
SEO
Identity & book design
User experience
Project management
Odyssey

15. Innovation Customer
focus
Future
of publishing

16. 1
The forecasters

17. “If, by the end of
2012, 25% of sales
for a new book are
digital, then about
half of new book
sales will be made
through online
purchases”
Shatzkin

18. “What % of sales
as digital is a
cataclysmic
tipping point for
the physical supply
chain?”
Lubeck

19. “Positive feedback
loops in ebooks:
success accrues to
a small number of
companies”
Spalding

21. “It’s time to stop
looking for readers
for your writers,
and to start finding
writers for your
readers”
Godin

22. “[Random House
will…] change from
being a b2b
company to b2c
company.”
Dohle

23. Publishing 2010 2015
% Digital 5% ±50%
Model B2B B2C
Needs to Read Choose Purchase Read Discuss Share
influence

24. 2
Romance is not dead

26. 1. Find 2. Launch 3. Connect
writers rebrand with readers

27. 1. Long term 2. Insight 3. Extended
relationships footprint

28. Target 8,000 users 15 pp / visit
entries: 250
10,000 20,000 uniques
Actual: 823 comments
3x Facebook
1m views fans
20m visits 2x Twitter

29. Print Targets
& PR
Win
Digital

30. 3
The goal

31. Products Customer
focus
Enhanced
Editions

33. “When it comes to
the really important
decisions, data
trumps intuition
every time. ”
Jeff Bezos

35. Next-level Next-level Innovation &
apps communities customer
focus
Informed by Clear value
user proposition
feedback

36. “Among 45,000
respondents we
saw a breathtaking
velocity for the
growth of weekly or
daily e-reading:
doubled from
7-14% in six
months.”
BISG

37. Philip Pullman on publishing in 2010

38. “Ever tried. Ever failed.
No matter. Try again.
Fail again. Fail better.”
Samuel Beckett
@gunzalis
peter@enhanced-editions.com