June 28, 2000
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*** CONTENTBIZ.COM ***
Practical News & Tips for
Marketing Content Online
June 28, 2000 Volume I, Issue 11
FORWARD THIS EMAIL TO YOUR COLLEAGUES! (And tell
them to get their own free subscriptions at:
http://www.contentbiz.com)
1) News: MediaDNA's eLuminator, Zhivago.com
2) Case Study: A Health Publisher Wins With Free Ezines
3) Exclusive Interview: Andrew Elston of QPass
4) Events: Free Champagne in London - Hurry!
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NEWS & GOSSIP
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* MediaDNA’s eLuminator Helps Publishers Dominate Search
Engines
Normally we at ContentBiz.com don’t get that excited
about yet another (often semi-scam artist) vendor
claiming to get publishers better search engine rankings.
But MediaDNA’s eLuminator program really rocks. Their
software goes deep into your site (even, if you want,
into password protected areas and PDF files) collecting
headlines and keywords from content that would otherwise
remain hidden from search engines. Then it feeds those
tantalizing bits to the search engines where some of your
best prospects (up to 85% of your total potential
traffic) will find them. You decide (using your own in-
house tech) what you’d like to do with the click through,
offer free content access, sell articles “by the drink”,
or collect leads for site license/site subscription
sales. AviationNow and ZDNet are two currently satisfied
customers. ZDNet used the eLuminator to raise traffic
to 25,000 old product reviews deep in their site.
Much as we like eLuminator, we think the performance-
based pricing is a bit high for smaller publishers.
After an initial $2,000 set-up fee you’ll pay 5-45 cents
per click through. A test of 5,000-10,000 clicks would be
25 cents each. Set-up takes a couple of weeks.
http://www.mediadna.com/solutions/promote/
Jeff.Gibbs@MediaDNA.com 847-458-2464
* Best Publisher Privacy Policy: Zhivago.com
Sadly, it doesn’t occur to most publishers, used to
asking for addressing information from new subscribers
offline, that they should post a privacy policy when
soliciting subscribers online. Kristin Zhivago,
publisher of Marketing Technology, is one of the few who
stands alone from the pack. ContentBiz.com applauds her
privacy policy that certainly must increase her online
subscription-offer response rates by stating, “FYI-we
NEVER share e-mail addresses with ANYONE. Never have,
never will. We'll only use your e-mail address to tell
you about new articles that we post here. I promise.”
http://www.zhivago.com
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CASE STUDY: Atlantic Information Services (AIS)
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* How a Traditional For-Fee Health News Publisher is
Profiting With Free Email Newsletters: Atlantic
Information Services (AIS)
COMPANY: Atlantic Information Services (AIS) has been
publishing traditional, high priced ($300 and up) print
newsletters and other publications focusing on business
news for health care-related organizations for more than
a decade. This winter they hired Internet marketer Jon
Lowder and launched their first free email newsletter for
the same marketplace in late February.
CAMPAIGN
Lowder, a long-time newsletter marketing
expert, pulled out all the in-house stops to promote the
free newsletter, “We put inserts with print pubs; put the
URL on EVERYTHING we send out; we promote to everyone we
cover in the newsletters (Here's a copy of PUBNAME that
has an article about your company….)” Lowder also
encouraged readers to redistribute the newsletter under
their own name, “we started a liberal, free custom
publishing program where we ask people to re-send the
newsletter to their own list and report to us how many
they are sending it to, with an agreement to not change
content other than adding a line that says "PUBNAME is
being provided courtesy of COMPANY NAME" at the beginning
and their own unsubscribe info at the end.”
RESULTS
“First email newsletter is up to 4,800 subs.
Second is up to 2,800 and we just launched third. Sold
first sponsorship (big $$$) and our site traffic is up
over 300%. What a kick!" Lowder feels this success is
in part due to, “killer content. I've worked for several
publishers and I've never seen content this rich before.”
THE FUTURE: Lowder says, “Our initial goal was to drive
traffic to the site. It's worked so now we are
concentrating on revenue. Sponsorships are priced
completely on what the market will bear, and honestly
we're still figuring it out on a pub-by-pub basis. We're
also looking at syndication, sponsor swaps, etc.”
NOTES: Lowder has two recommendations for other
publishers, “Develop products of very high quality,
probably even more so than your print pubs. Why?
Because competition is even more fierce. There is no
barrier to entry for anyone with a good idea, great
writing skills and a knack for marketing. In other words
don't worry about your traditional competitors, worry
about the star reporter on your staff who can buy a
domain name, set up a free web site and start cranking
out killer content from her own email client. And
remember that your audience is time-starved and swamped
with information. That means your stuff has to be the
best out there or you’re history.
“My second recommendation is to ask your readers what
they want. This is really important because we've found
that our online readers are very different from our print
readers. The best part is that our online readers are
also very responsive to our queries. We did a survey
that garnered a response rate of over 20% in just one
day. And we didn't offer them anything other than an
explanation as to why we were doing the survey. In print
we'd be lucky to get a 5% response, and that with a
premium offer. So by all means ask them what they want
and give it to them.”
http://www.aispub.com
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EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW: Andrew Elston, QPass
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Over the past year QPass has emerged as one of the
leading players enabling major publishers, such as the
New York Times, to raise “pay by the drink” article sale
profits. Part of this success is due to the fact that
unlike other tech companies, QPass hired a true industry
expert, former Newsnet President Andrew Elston, as their
Director Publisher Alliances.
Elston immediately charmed us by saying he was a charter
ContentBiz.com subscriber -- so we had to be extra tough
with our questions just to remove any stain of
complicity.
Q: How is QPass different from all the other software
programs that enable publishers to sell content?
Elston: Our mission is to be Web-wide infrastructure, a
total transactive network across the Web -- rather than
to be something you can buy pieces of and deploy at your
site and yours alone. It’s shared, it leverages the
natural assets of the Web.
Q: Ok what does that mean in English? Can you give us an
example of how it works?
Elston: First of all we make the first content sale a
whole lot less friction laden. Unlike other ecommerce
systems, with QPass first-time customers only have to
give up seven items of information: your first name, last
name, zip code, credit card number and password. No
phone, no fax, no address. All you need is a zip code to
authenticate a purchase so why ask for what you don’t
need?
Q: And risk shopping cart abandonment?
Elston: Exactly.
Then when somebody makes their first content purchase
from a QPass client such as The New York Times, they get
a QPass membership at the same time. We’ll send them an
email with an ID and password and a link to their ‘My
QPass’ space where their billing and purchasing
information resides. From that moment on, they can
purchase content with just one click at the New York
Times again or anywhere else in the QPass network,
including Forbes, Factiva, WSJ Interactive, Aviation
Today … etc.
Q: Why would a publisher want to make it easier for their
clients to buy content at other publishers’ sites?
A: QPass is a shared success network. ecommerce systems
that are just point solutions don’t help the customer
solve the problem which is ubiquity or portability.
Consumers want low friction purchase events!
Q: Once customers purchase content from a QPass-networked
site, how long do they have access to it?
A: Each partner has the ability to designate duration
during which access is good, for example you can view New
York Times purchases for seven days while MorningStar
Reports are good for 90 days during which time some of
the content might be updated. Customers’ personalized
MyQPass sites contain hyperlinks to all the stores they
ever bought at and when they click, if the access period
is still good it will take them to the article.
Otherwise it will take you to the story but ask you to
pay for it again before you can view it.
Q: So how much does this cost the publisher?
A: The typical one-time implementation fee is $20,000 --
that’s by publisher not by number of titles. The way we
make our money is from transaction fees. If your price
is under $12 an item, we typically get 20-40%. If it’s
above $12, our fee is $3 per transaction plus 5% of
transactive value.
Q: Can you project up-front how much a publisher can make
by joining your network? That’s everybody’s #1 question,
“How much will I make?”
A: I do have a tool I use to project revenues. It’s
mainly based on what your site’s current visitor numbers
are for the month. The one thing I want to make clear
is, a lot of people say you can’t charge for content on
the Web -- we’re proving them wrong!
http://www.qpass.com
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EVENTS
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* Free Champagne in London: Hurry!!!
ContentBiz.com’s sister newsletter, MarketingSherpa.co.uk
is throwing a party for London’s top Internet advertisers
and marketers July 26. Free champagne and tasty tapas
for all -- but we only have space for 125 attendees and
90+ RSVPs already! Grab your invite now at:
http://www.ersvp.com/reply/londoncocktails
BTW: Thanks to the following sponsors for making this
event possible --
* Kaltons Solicitors, http://www.kaltons.co.uk
* @d:tech.Europe,
http://www.ad-tech.com/europe2000/europe.html
* eRSVP.com, http://www.ersvp.com
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CONTENTBIZ.COM INFO
----------
Subscription Contact:
Aimee Kessler Evans
Aimee@marketingsherpa.com
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Advertising Contact:
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margyg@marketingsherpa.com
703.845.1141
Publisher:
Anne Holland
anneh@marketingsherpa.com
202.232.6830
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