Wiley Merges Old and New
Christine Dunn, director of marketing, John Wiley & Sons’ professional and trade division, talks about how the 200-year-old company’s marketing efforts blend new and traditional media.
June 2008 By Matt Steinmetz
Having recently celebrated its 200th year, John Wiley & Sons Inc. is among the oldest independent publishers in the world. You don’t survive two centuries without an ability to change with the times. That, says Christine Dunn—the focus of this month’s Marketing Interview—is a core strength of Wiley’s.
“Wiley hasn’t been around 200 years by not trying new things every now and then,” says Dunn, director of marketing for Wiley’s professional and trade division, home to such popular brands as “For Dummies,” “Frommers,” “CliffsNotes” and “Betty Crocker.” “… When you have the luxury of [working for] an organization that runs smoothly doing things it [has] always done and doing them well, it’s much easier to go out and experiment a bit, because you feel like you have a solid base from which to jump.”
Dunn’s career began in nonprofit publishing with MIT Press in Cambridge. From there, she spent time as a sales and marketing director for Washington, D.C.-based Island Press. Today, she is nearing the completion of her third year leading Wiley’s marketing efforts in the United Kingdom, and throughout Europe, the Middle East and Asia. These efforts, she says, are centered around experimentation—finding new, innovative and, whenever possible, cheap ways to leverage emerging and new media in marketing Wiley’s books.
What are your current responsibilities at Wiley?
Christine Dunn: … I’m responsible for [Wiley’s professional and trade] content in … Europe, the Middle East and Asia. …
Wiley is kind of a big basket of brands. We have everything from “Dummies” to “Frommers” to “Sybex.” But we also have some of our own indigenous brands here in the U.K., one of which is Capstone, which has been a fantastic place for us to do online marketing. We have an author base there that loves to be online and loves to use all mediums available. We also have Wiley Nautical. We’ve set up a community page there—we call them Collective Knowledge Portals. This [one] is for the sailing community, and was a way to launch the Wiley Nautical brand and also really focus on sort of a niche market.
How has the emergence of the online space and all of its potential affected the 200-year-old company?
Dunn: … The way we’re organized here, I’ve really tried to empower the teams to be entrepreneurial in how they look at the lists, how they market and promote, and really think more about having conversations with customers rather than just marketing to them in the traditional sense. And everyone interprets that in different ways, but the size of Wiley makes it a place where there are lots of resources available, if you know where to look, … and you get a lot of support to try new things as well.
“Wiley hasn’t been around 200 years by not trying new things every now and then,” says Dunn, director of marketing for Wiley’s professional and trade division, home to such popular brands as “For Dummies,” “Frommers,” “CliffsNotes” and “Betty Crocker.” “… When you have the luxury of [working for] an organization that runs smoothly doing things it [has] always done and doing them well, it’s much easier to go out and experiment a bit, because you feel like you have a solid base from which to jump.”
Dunn’s career began in nonprofit publishing with MIT Press in Cambridge. From there, she spent time as a sales and marketing director for Washington, D.C.-based Island Press. Today, she is nearing the completion of her third year leading Wiley’s marketing efforts in the United Kingdom, and throughout Europe, the Middle East and Asia. These efforts, she says, are centered around experimentation—finding new, innovative and, whenever possible, cheap ways to leverage emerging and new media in marketing Wiley’s books.
What are your current responsibilities at Wiley?
Christine Dunn: … I’m responsible for [Wiley’s professional and trade] content in … Europe, the Middle East and Asia. …
Wiley is kind of a big basket of brands. We have everything from “Dummies” to “Frommers” to “Sybex.” But we also have some of our own indigenous brands here in the U.K., one of which is Capstone, which has been a fantastic place for us to do online marketing. We have an author base there that loves to be online and loves to use all mediums available. We also have Wiley Nautical. We’ve set up a community page there—we call them Collective Knowledge Portals. This [one] is for the sailing community, and was a way to launch the Wiley Nautical brand and also really focus on sort of a niche market.
How has the emergence of the online space and all of its potential affected the 200-year-old company?
Dunn: … The way we’re organized here, I’ve really tried to empower the teams to be entrepreneurial in how they look at the lists, how they market and promote, and really think more about having conversations with customers rather than just marketing to them in the traditional sense. And everyone interprets that in different ways, but the size of Wiley makes it a place where there are lots of resources available, if you know where to look, … and you get a lot of support to try new things as well.
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