Skip to main content

ACCESSE17 Conference Takeaways: Publications a recurring theme

By
The annual CESSE conference (Council of Engineering and Scientific Society Executives) has historically been focused on high-level strategy, so when we headed up to Quebec City for this year’s I wasn’t sure I’d be hearing a lot about publications.

But I was surprised at how many discussions—both in the sessions, and in the hallways—revolved around issues that publications really are central to.  The issues themselves are nothing new…
  • Recruiting, engaging and retaining members
  • Building organizational branding and identity
  • Finding effective value propositions for members and prospects at all points in their careers
  • And of course, adding revenue streams
What’s new is that we’re seeing more and better ways of using publication content to address them.  

For example, associations can recruit, engage and retain members by meeting readers where they are, making it easier to find publication content in Google and social media, and reducing the barriers to sampling, with metered paywalls, rather than strict access denieds.  

If you do it right, some of that traffic converts to publication sales and new memberships.  And more of it converts to awareness that your organization is the place to go for information that is both relevant AND credible.  

Another example: repurposing your publication content in continuing education, courses, leveraging existing materials to create offerings that deliver educational outcomes, and can be adapted to each waypoint in the member’s career journey.

A conversation I had on the flight up neatly captured the challenge.  The woman sitting next to me told me she’d recently started her career as an occupational therapist.  She’d had a student membership in her organization—the AOTA—while in school, but hadn’t renewed when that lapsed.  She clearly felt bad about it, and was aware of the research and other valuable contributions the organization made to her profession, but felt she could get the information she needed to do her job from colleagues, and yes, Google.  

Fortunately, AOTA recently started working with Tizra, and hopefully next time I happen to sit next to an occupational therapist, she’ll be reading one of their digital publications.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Optimizing eContent Sales: 5 Strategies for Monetizing Content

By
Targeted promotions and content bundle upsells are two ideas to test in optimizing sales. This is the third in a series of blog posts based on our webcast,  "10 Factors to Consider when Developing your Digital Publishing Strategy."  You can still watch it in its entirety here: So far we have talked about the importance of understanding your   audience  and whether or not to sell direct . Today, we investigate the various monetization strategies publishers utilize.  The entire publishing industry has been experimenting with pricing and delivery models, from the Netflix-like subscription services offered by Oyster and Scribd, to bundling of ebooks with print editions, to chapter-at-a-time sales and more. Yet no single pricing model has emerged.  What does that tell publishers? It means that you need the flexibility to experiment with your pricing strategy and adapt quickly to market fluctuations and demands. You will need a commerce and delivery...
Post a Comment
Read more

Slater Invests in Tizra

By Abe Dane
This is a big one for us. Rhode Island's Slater Technology Fund is betting $500,000 that Tizra will "really open the floodgates for book-based content from thousands of publishers." Their investment caps a year in which we've gone from four people , two dogs and an idea to a company that someone besides us and our friends and families believe will set online publishing on its ear. We even have our very own Forbes article . Thanks to the folks at Slater for being great advisors as well as investors, and to the many friends and family members who preceded them!
1 comment
Read more

Association of Research Libraries Goes Live with Tizra

By
After extensive internal testing, the Association of Research Libraries has begun offering recent issues of its flagship publication on a public test site hosted by Tizra. The organization announced recently that Research Library Issues is now available in full-text searchable form at… http://publications.arl.org We're thrilled about this, not only because because it's a vote of confidence from a high profile organization, but also because ARL's membership includes some of the most prestigious research institutions in the world (including the libraries of MIT and Indiana University, whose presses are already using Tizra). In addition to greater production efficiency and flexibility, ARL's use of Tizra stems from a desire to provide members with capabilities including… Better full-text search. More targeted references via social software and other links. Better compatibility with web enabled mobile devices like the iPhone. We are proud to count ARL—and RLI reade...
Post a Comment
Read more