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L.E.K. Consulting released a study today that shows that e-reader owners outpace other device owners in their increase of new media.
The report, "Hidden Opportunities in New Media Survey", reveals that 44% of e-reader owners increased their new media usage in the last year, as compared to 16% of "iPod Nation" and 19% of "Facebook Fanatics". The report, co-authored by Dan Schechter and Bret Masterson, Vice Presidents within L.E.K.'s Media & Entertainment Practice, also documented that "one of every ten consumers who are online now owns an e-reader."
Thursday, January 21, 2010
e-Readers increase media consumption by 44% according L.E.K. Consulting study
Wednesday, January 20, 2010
Weighing in on the NY Times paywall announcement
Ken Doctor, of Content Bridges, has a piece on the New York Times announcement that their pay wall goes up in 2011. Here is my favorite part:
What does "frictionless experience across multiple platforms," in the Times release this morning, mean?Read the entire piece here.
I think this is one major move, if the Times can pull it off well and quickly. In the age of the smartphone, the coming tablet, and (coming a bit after that) the Internet-mediated livingroom TV monitor, readers are already coming to expect easy, and smart, access to the their content wherever, whenever. They also will come to expect -- we're seeing it in some iPhone apps already -- the stories they save on one device to be known by another; ditto email sharing lists, stock portfolios, favorite sports team preferenes. If the Times can provide such synchronicity, then readers who are asked to pay can understand the charge as, in part, an access charge.
We, Americans, love to pay for access -- think massive cable and wireless bills -- we just have thought digital news content should be free. At a panel I moderated yesterday in New York, Dow Jones consumer chief Todd Larsen, indicated a similar philosophy about universal access. One rub here to watch: who owns the customer relationship with the emerging tablet. Amazon has stubbornly clung to the position that it will "own" the customer (hey, wait a minute, that's me), while news companies -- getting a glimmer of an all-device-access future -- have pushed back, and are negotiating with Amazon's Kindle competitors, to keep their customer touch. [Reformatted for TNM.]
What publishers could learn from Google, Apple, Microsoft, and the growing mobile ad wars
Do a search for Google, Microsoft and Apple -- use your favorite search engine, I bet it's Google -- and you will find hundreds of stories on the rumor that Apple is in negotiations with Microsoft to make its Bing search engine the default search engine on the iPhone.
What does this have to do with my business you might ask? A lot.
Publishers continue to struggle to get the hang of New Media publishing and now the ground is shifting yet again as the major players in technology line up to do battle in markets traditional publishers are not even been in. All these dollars in advertising have to be coming from some place, and that place is your pocket.
First point, for the those in the dark, this is the big news of the day: BusinessWeek is reporting that Apple is in discussions with Microsoft to make its search engine, Bing, the default search engine on the iPhone. There are also rumors that Apple may get into the search game themselves, but these are more sketchy.
The impact of this move can only be seen when one realizes the enormous market shift this may represent. Google makes billions in advertising through its search products (Google is expected to show huge revenue gains for the 4th quarter). Apple signed its iPhone deal with Google a few years ago because 1) Google and Apple were making nice back in 2007, and 2) because Google's search engine is the clear leader in the space. Of course, back in 2007, no one could guess that the iPhone would be a huge success and that the device would bring millions more people into the mobile media market.
Going mobile: inexpensive (or free) solutions to get your content on mobile browsers (part 2)
In part two of this series we look at a couple of companies that offer services similar to MoFuse, but with variations.
Mobify offers a truly custom solution for those who want their sites to be viewed in a mobile format on smart phones. The process process begins with creating the mobile layout from live elements of your web site. And immediately, here is where Mobify would require a little more technical know-how: "it helps to know CSS!". From here one moves on to working on the mobile design, to deployment, to picking your plan.
The example I chose from Mobify's web site was completed by a web design firm -- and it shows. Aztekweb's mobile conversion not only mirrors their own web site, but contains important design elements that still work well on this iPhone version. Others did not migrate as well. You can see other examples on Mobify's gallery pages.
Mobify offers pricing that ranges from free to their enterprise level which requires a custom quote. Their "Publisher" level costs $99 per month ad server integration, but no SSL security. Mobify's free option does offer you a custom domain, but they list "custom branding" as not included. This could be a deal breaker for many.
Instant Mobilizer offers a format that is similar to that of MoFuse but has some advantages. The whole process works like launching a web site. The user uses one of the company's registrar partners to register a .mobi domain. Then the mobile provider let's you preview your site to see how it would look using Instant Mobilizer.
Sadly, this is where things fall apart pretty quickly. Using the preview this is what saw (see right). Not encouraging. I then tested a WordPress site and received the same warning screen. OK, I thought, let's test another of my sites that is plain ol' html. It rendered the site without a problem, but . . . no way I would consider the newly rendered mobile site acceptable.
Instant Mobilizer's advantage is that pricing is simply the cost of registering a new site and paying for hosting. The downside of this approach, however, is that most publishers are not looking for a new URL, but want a subdomain approach. That is, what I would want for www.CitizenPublishing.net would be a mobile domain that reads m.CitizenPublishing.net.
For those who insist on absolutely free, publishers can migrate their content using Mippin. Mippin allows content providers to get their news content seen on the Mippin service while maintaining your branding.
There are several things to like about Mippin: 1) it's your brand and your site the readers sees; and 2) using Admob you can monetize your site (if you recall, we used Admob on the MoFuse example).
I will create new editions of this post as I discover more companies in this space. Feel free to contact me if you would like to publicize your company and its services, or if you know of more good choices for small and individual publishers.
Next, however, we look at the world of apps -- stay tuned.
Tuesday, January 19, 2010
After the invitation the deluge
Talk on some of the journalism blogs today is about newspaper bankruptcies (guess what? magazine companies are going bankrupt, too), but meanwhile the talk elsewhere is about pay walls, tablets, and rumors, rumors, rumors.
PC World has a couple of articles up today about the Apple tablet including one so poorly thought through that the writer seems to think the new rumored device will be a giant iPod. Sorry, I refuse to link to that one.
In the meantime, work continues behind the scenes to bring content to the mysterious device. The WSJ has reported that "HarperCollins Publishers is negotiating with Apple Inc. to make electronic books available for the introduction of a new tablet device from Apple, according to people familiar with the situation, posing a challenge to Amazon.com Inc."
The article states that they could not discover whether the publisher would sell books through a new iTune media store, or through the existing iTunes store. Another option might be through an app -- though there is nothing to stop HarperCollins from doing this now.
The issue of pay walls continues to be hotly debated (pro and con and con) as the New York Times prepares their own Great Wall.
Going mobile: inexpensive (or free) solutions to get your content on mobile browsers (part 1)
We may be two weeks away from what we may look back at as the real beginning of the mobile media revolution -- assuming Apple really does blow people away with their tablet introduction. But media people can't just wait around, or at least they shouldn't.
Here is a short guide to assist small business publishers, as well as individuals and organizations, get their content on mobile devices -- concentrating on cell phones for now.
Let's break this up into two categories: 1) the go-it-alone type who is doing to do all the work themselves; and 2) the site that will call on the work of their designated web genius (we hope).
Our first company probably crosses into both categories. MoFuse has been a leader in the mobile area for a while now.
Their new free service for bloggers is very handy indeed. While their design template is rudimentary, and does not offer much in the way of customization, nonetheless, the conversion process from start to finish is fast and easy. You can also redirect your mofuse.mobi site to a custom domain through changes to your dns records.
Most importantly, at least to me, you can quickly monetize your site by adding Google AdSense or Admob ads to your site. In this case, I added Admob ads because, more often than not, their ads resemble web banner ads as opposed to text based ads (though they sell both). The down side of this is that MoFuse will get a cut.
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