Monday, March 26, 2012

Simon & Schuster Chief Digital Officer Ellie Hirschhorn on Inventing the Future of Publishing

DigitalBookWorld reporting:
Do you have to be a part of book publishing’s past to help invent its future?
Take a look around at the professionals in any major publishing company and you can see the answer for yourself. The infusion of technology into books has given technologists who may have not been veterans of the book business of old a foothold in the book business of the future.
The best example might be Ellie Hirschhorn, executive vice president and chief digital officer at Simon & Schuster. In her position, Hirschhorn oversees a team of digital professionals that managed to help drive Simon & Schuster’s digital revenues up to 17% of overall revenues in 2011 – a number that Hirschhorn expects to double in 2012.
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JG: Can you give me an example of “cross-title, programmatic opportunities”?
EH: One example is database marketing opportunities. We have amassed 750,000 names where we can do highly targeted marketing to consumers. We can do that on a title-by-title basis or a monthly, customized newsletter basis.

JG: We did a survey last year with Forrester among publishers who said they would be spending more resources on developing those kinds of databases. James McQuivey of Forrester made a distinction for us between an email list and a true customer database with rich information that can be used to sell to a consumer. Which is yours?
EH: We have both email lists and customer databases. The easier thing to amass is limited information like your email. But we can also track your on-site behavior, your clicks on discrete pieces and assets in a newsletter. But the less information you ask of people, the higher your subscriber database will be.
Our database is comprised of people who subscribe to 13 different consumer newsletters and one that is based on format – you can choose between 20 different parameters and you get a customized newsletters with books for you...
http://www.digitalbookworld.com/2012/simon-schuster-chief-digital-officer-ellie-hirschhorn/

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