Simon & Schuster Digital Launches New Websites With Samplings of Book Content

Simon & Schuster Digital announced this week two initiatives as part of its ongoing efforts to offer readers new ways to find and sample its book content.

TipsonHealthyLiving.com, TipsonLifeandLove.com and TipsonHomeandStyle.com are three recently launched, category-specific websites that feature short, 500- to 1,000-word articles culled from the publisher's list of nonfiction titles. The sites are an outgrowth of the company's recent partner marketing efforts that have resulted in content syndication partnerships with websites such as MSN and Yahoo.

According to Simon & Schuster, each of the new sites is search-optimized to attract an audience interested in these subjects and entice them to sample material from the books in the form of helpful articles. "The sites are only lightly branded, with the feel of a magazine or independently operated, subject-specific site, serving to keep the focus on the content itself, and ultimately, the book from which it is derived," the publisher stated in a press release announcing the websites. New articles are added to the sites on a regular basis, and readers are encouraged to comment, e-mail or share stories with friends on social networks.

The three sites supplement and aggregate articles that have been syndicated through Simon & Schuster's network of content partners. Through its syndication efforts, the publisher says it has garnered millions of page views, generated high click-through rates and helped to increase sales levels of select titles. Simon & Schuster expects to enter into more partnerships and syndication arrangements in the near future.

"At Simon & Schuster, we have a deep library of first-rate books by world-class authors on a plethora of evergreen subjects. Both our syndication partnerships and content verticals are cost-effective ways to capitalize on this content by using it to market our books and authors, drawing attention to categories that might not be actively promoted at retail, in ways that reflect how today's consumers think about, search for and discover information," says Ellie Hirschhorn, executive vice president and chief digital officer of Simon & Schuster.