SIPA UK Blog

How's trading?

As we plan our series of SIPA events for the second half of the year I'd be really interested to hear how trading is going across our member companies. Have any areas of your business been particularly badly hit by recession? Which parts are growing strongly? Are there any new initiatives that you feel are working well & that other SIPA member companies could learn from?

If you've got something to share - it can be anonymously if you wish - please leave a message in the comments section below.

Alternatively you can contact me directly at rory (dot) brown {at} incisivemedia [dot] com

Rory Brown, Incisive Media

Chairman, SIPA UK

What we can learn from wine marketers

From the Undercover Marketer

Secrets of the wine trade

I see that France is moving to ‘relax’ its rules on wine. According to the London Times leader:

Rivalry from New World winemakers has provoked France .. to allow wines from different areas to be combined to create fruiter blends .. designed to appeal more readily to the palates and pockets of foreign wine drinkers

Well, excusez-moi! The clever French have been doing that for years. Whoever wrote that Times leader knows nothing about:

(a) The French

(b) Wine

(c) Direct marketing.

But that ignorance, as we will see, is pretty universal. The French are the only people it is perfectly acceptable to be racist about, so our newspapers take regular pot-shots. (I won’t repeat the insulting joke about Paris contained in the Times leader.)

Here is what we publishers can learn from French wine marketing:

Off the record, on the QT & very hush hush..

Having spent some time in close discussions with a director of a French wine cooperative, I can tell you that French wine makers are expert at marketing. There are lessons here for all publishers who’d like to re-purpose editorial for different markets.

I will use what my wine making friend told me about wine marketing to make this demonstration. Brits reading this who are particularly sensitive, please click away now …

What do French know about marketing?

I ask my French vineyard owner “Why does your wine taste different in the UK?”

His answer: “We add things to change the taste for the British palate. If you buy a French Roquefort cheese in Sweden – it will taste different to yours. It’s the same with wine. Each country likes a different taste.”

He shrugs. His cooperative, which produces red wine, adds sweeteners and chemicals. “But not the anti-freeze that other producers add.” Too much and the result is headache and nausea.

What about the other point in the Times leader?

‘Allowing wines from different areas to be combined’?

The French have always done this. For example: Bordeaux is the most popular French wine. But it is a tiny region and cannot possibly supply the huge demand. So they mix it with wine from the huge Languedoc-Rousillon region in the south, which coincidentally is where my friend’s vineyard is.

Go here for the full story and learn why we should follow the wine producers ..

Wine marketing

Or cut and paste this:

http://www.subscriptionsstrategy.co.uk/confidential/the-undercover-marketer

 

In an online world is 'content still king'?

The final panel of the day at the SIPA Congress last week debated whether content was still king. I am running an open question on LinkedIn at the moment - feel free to contribute or leave a comment here with your thoughts.

Rory.

So, what did you think?

Thanks to everyone who came along to the SIPA UK Congress yesterday. I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did. Please leave any comments below on things you particularly liked or thought we could improve on.

Remember - the best testimonials will make next year's brochure... there's fame for you.

Rory.

Top 5 reasons why you should be at the SIPA UK Congress next week

The clock is ticking...

If you haven't already booked your place at the SIPA UK Congress next week you had better get moving. It takes place next Wednesday (9th July) in London. Full details can be found here.

Still need convincing? Here are my top 5 reasons to clear your diary and join us at the Tower Hotel next week:

1. Hear from some of the leading speakers in the specialist publishing industry - representatives from Incisive Media, E-Consultancy, DMG World Media, Euromoney, Informa, Business Monitor... and many more will be on hand to share real life experiences of how their companies make money.
2. Get a perspective on the way our media landscape is changing. What is the future of paid content in the revenue mix? How important is search engine optimisation for publishers? Is it possible to build vibrant social networks around your brand (and monetise them...)?
3. Discover how a few minor changes to your e-mail marketing operations can transform your results. One of our speakers generated over £1m in 7 days from an e-mail campaign for his new company. Would you like to know his secrets? - Nic Laight reveals all exclusively for delegates at the event..
4. Build your network. It's not what you know but who you know. All around the publishing industry there are people like you working on projects similar to yours. You're never going to meet them by sitting behind your desk - get out there and make some great connections!
5. See Jonathan Feroze in action at the SIPA UK Awards presentation! Well, who knows quite what to expect...

We still have limited places available. Please contact Karen Hindle of 020 8288 7415 or e-mail uksipa@btconnect.com

I look forward to seeing you on the day.

Rory.

SIPA UK Congress next week

155 places confirmed so far for next week & some great companies.

My target is 200 - please point your friends, colleagues, suppliers etc. this way.

http://www.sipaonline.com/Chapters/SIPA08_final.pdf

See you next week.

Rory.

Companies confirmed so far include: Abacus E-Media * Accolade Publishing * Adestra * Agora Business Publications * AI Digital * Ant Marketing * Aroq * BNA International * BSI * Business Monitor International * Canonbury Publishing * CDS Global * Cecile Park Publishing * Chemical Watch Research & Publishing * Complinet * Datamatics Financial Services * DMG World Media * Economist Intelligence Unit * E-Consultancy * Electric Word * Elsevier * Euromoney Institutional Investor * Global Water Intelligence * Incisive Media * Informa Healthcare * Informa Insurance * Informa Law * Informa Telecoms * Inside Mortgage Finance Publications * Institute of Physics Publishing * Journal of Applied Science & Technology * Kluwer Law International * Laurence Kay Solicitors * Lawrence Ragan Communications * Melcrum Publishing * Metal Bulletin * Morton Gregory * Nature Publishing Group * News on the Block * Outsell * PPA * Premier Print Group * Property Secrets * Publishing House Research * PureLabs * Rapport Learning * Report Buyer * Research Research * Response Consulting * Rightscom * Sunfish * Verlag fur die Deutsche Wirtschaft * Steven Voss * William Reed Business Media * Wordtracker * WorksSitebuilder

[Still waiting on registrations from some regular attendees - where are you Steel Business Briefing, CRU, Janes, Fleet St Publications, Campden Publishing, van Tulleken & Newseye?]

Advice for all speakers at SIPA UK Congress next week

Life After Death by PowerPoint

SIPA UK Annual Congress - 8 days to go

There are now just 8 days to go until SIPA's Annual Congress in London. For those of you who have yet to register please make sure you do so today. Nearly 150 people have confirmed their attendance so far and I am still competing with Julian to beat his record from last year.

A full brochure and booking form can be found here.

I had to write my Chairman's introduction for the conference this morning. I thought I would also share it here to see what you think. Comments welcome and I look forward to seeing you all next Wednesday (9th July) at the Tower Hotel in London.
__________________________________________________________________________________________

“If you don’t like change, you’re going to like irrelevance even less”

Gen. Eric Shinseki, US Army.

 

Welcome to the SIPA UK Annual Congress 2008. I’m delighted to see the range and scope of companies on our delegate list and speaker roster for today & would like to welcome you all.

 

When we started working on the structure for this event at the tail end of last year your committee hit upon the novel idea of asking SIPA members what were the biggest issues that they faced in their business and then trying to put a programme together which answered some of those concerns. Of the nearly 100 detailed responses we received, some high level themes emerged – the state of the economy; the general shift from print to online & the impact of Web 2.0 technologies on our members’ businesses. It was clear that there was a full mix of emotions behind these responses. For some it was outright fear. “Where do I even begin to deal with all this new stuff?” For others there was an overt sense of excitement about all of the new business and revenue models that were opening up.

 

From my early days as a direct marketer I was taught to appeal to the key emotions of fear and greed in my promotional pieces, so here goes – a packed one day conference for both the fearful and the greedy out there in the audience. You probably know which side of the fence you sit on!

 

We start with embracing the fear. I know that there are several traditional publishers in the audience who are seeing their worlds transformed. The revenue mix is shifting from print to online but the concern is that concepts from the newspaper world like the “Rushbridger Cross” (where growing online ad revenues one day overtake declining print ones) will never happen. What do we do? Put on more events? Launch new forms of subscription products? Move away from news into the development of workflow tools? In our programme today you will hear lots of case studies from other publishers in exactly the same boat as you talking about how they deal with these issues. What’s working and what isn’t.

 

On the other side of the coin SIPA is the association which embraces a lot of the newer, less traditional publishers. These are probably companies which won’t have thought of themselves as part of the old media community & you won’t see them at mainstream publishing events. Often they are web based businesses with no print heritage and work under entirely different business models. Our brave new world of online publishing is great for these organizations – technology costs are falling rapidly, barriers to entry are coming down and, in Google, there is a ready made marketing machine out there to help you reach the ‘long tail’ of customers across the globe. I’m really looking forward to hearing from some of them today.

 

In summing up I think my main message for you lucky SIPA delegates is that our world is changing at a faster rate than ever before. Welcome and embrace that change. Experiment with new business ideas and whether you’re in the fear or greed camp, it is clear that it is vital to get out there to share war stories; pick up tips and build your network of contacts. That’s what SIPA the association, and today’s conference is all about. Enjoy the day.

 

Rory Brown, Incisive Media & SIPA UK Chairman.