Revenue

O’Reilly Media Inc., a technology publisher, with corporate offices in the heart of the Silicon Valley, utilizes pen and ink woodcut-style drawings of different animals on many of its books. It has been doing so for years, which has helped create greater worldwide recognition for its products. The company, a driving force behind the commercial Internet, Web 2.0, blogging and online book selling, has also perfected the use of brand identity. “Like so many things in life, the O’Reilly animal branding was a combination of luck, generosity and unexpected genius,” says Tim O’Reilly, founder and CEO of O’Reilly Media. “When we first began

Official government documents may not have topped most holiday wish lists in the past, but several such reports found their ways under Christmas trees with increasing frequency the last several years. “The Iraq Study Group Report: The Way Forward—A New Approach” hit bookshelves in early December 2006 and, like a couple of its recent predecessors, has earned overwhelming success. Already in its third printing at the time of this story, the book’s release was made all the more remarkable by the circumstances surrounding its publication: a 24-day turnaround time. Government reports have, on occasion, sounded blips on literary radar screens in the past—perhaps most

Several recently published studies have found that kids are becoming “teens” at a younger age than ever before. Children’s book publishers must face the challenge of reaching a changing audience demographic of more independent and mature readers. Lisa Holton, executive vice president of Scholastic and president of the company’s book fairs and trade books, talks with Book Business about the task. ● How are children’s book publishers responding to the trend of children becoming “teenagers” at a much earlier age? Lisa Holton: It’s very interesting to see what kids are actually reading, in terms of understanding whether that trend is true. At

Book Business magazine has announced Google’s Jim Gerber as keynote speaker for the 2007 Book Business Conference and Expo, March 5-7, at the New York Marriott Marquis, Times Square. Gerber, director of content partnerships at Google, will present the Keynote Address on Tuesday, March 6 at 9:15 a.m. The Keynote Address is open to all registered attendees. “We are thrilled to have Jim give the keynote address at the Book Business Conference and Expo. There are few companies that have as profound an influence on publishing today as Google, so it’s a major boon for our audience of publishing executives to be able to

On Oct. 19, Book Business held its first webcast for book publishing executives. The webcast was on—what else—but webcasts. Titled, “Expand Your Brand: Webinars for Publishers,” it featured the following speakers: • Twila Bennett, director of marketing, Revell/Baker Publishing Group • Suzie Cross, assistant marketing manager, Revell Books • Sharon Linsenbach, director of e-learning, North American Publishing Co. • Noelle Skodzinski, editor in chief, Book Business • Jeffrey Yamaguchi, online marketing manager, HarperCollins. Book Business compiled the following tips, tactics and considerations for using webcasts as effective marketing and sales tools, based on its recent webcast. If you missed the live event, you can view it at <a

Don’t be afraid of electronic distribution—make your content available online, because it’s the best way to appear on radar screens these days. For smaller marketing departments, it’s the best way to market your books. So says the National Academies Press’ (NAP) Michael Jensen. “You have to give material to search engines to munch,” he says. “Content is its own best advertising. That’s only going to increase in significance. Most people feel like once the PDF gets out there, suddenly the market will dry up, [but] it’s demonstratively not true. I don’t know of an instance where somebody made the material available for free

Following typical protocol, Ayun Halliday went on tour to promote her latest title, “Dirty Sugar Cookies.” Only, it wasn’t a 30-city tour, it was a 30-blog tour. These days, blog tours are all the rage thanks to the high-speed, seemingly infinite cyberspace connections they create. After interviewing with bloggers who either posted Halliday’s comments online or recorded her on a downloadable audio podcast file, the author’s “appearance” was suddenly linked to other blogs, which linked to more blogs, ad infinitum. Buzz like this is priceless and, interestingly, Halliday’s publisher, Seal Press—an imprint of Avalon Publishing, New York—didn’t have to make too many adjustments

Laura Waldron’s life is publishing. An author, a publisher and the marketing director of the University of Pennsylvania’s Penn Press, Waldron offers a perspective on academic publishing that is uniquely well rounded. After an internship at Carnegie Mellon Press piqued her interest in publishing, she cut her teeth in sales and marketing for Princeton University Press and eventually represented 15 different university presses in the Mid-Atlantic territory as a trade sales representative. Today, she is closing in on her 10th anniversary with Penn Press and is the author of “Museums of Philadelphia: A Guide for Residents and Visitors,” which was published in 2004

Evan-Moor Educational Publishers Inc. hasn’t always been a major player in the education market. In fact, the company got its modest start more than 25 years ago in a garage, with a staff consisting of three people and an entrepreneurial spirit. Today, Evan-Moor is home to 65 employees and is housed in a 20,000-square-foot facility churning out 60 titles a year in 35 countries. The company provides a compelling example of a publisher who has succeeded in areas other publishers have failed—generating online revenue, profiting from e-books and building an effective search engine strategy. Turning on a Dime It’s funny how a

We’ve printed books locally, in Canada, and overseas. We’ve dealt with printing companies who couldn’t get much beyond the pre-press process and others that couldn’t manage shipping the final product. We’ve had companies use our projects to train their staff without our knowledge. We’ve had finished books held up in customs for months, sitting tantalizingly at a dock less than a day’s drive away. How, as a publisher, can you know what to expect from your printer? I’ve learned the hard way that, at least in the book printing business, size doesn’t matter. We’ve been burned by one of the 10 largest printers in the