HarperStudio Summer 2009

Editor's Notes

1. Harper Studio5 people plus an internWe are just about a year oldJust pub’d our first 4 books – start 2 a month in Sept. – Most publishing houses do many more booksBob came from HyperionI was the second one to join – we were both on a path seeking. Frustrated. Julia, Katie and Sarah started after that, then Kathryn. SkelitalMISSION STATEMENT:HarperStudio is committed to partnering with authors to publish books in a way that is effective, creative, and sustainable. We believe books are a vital part of our culture. We believe traditional publishing models are broken and are experimenting with new ones. We believe in embracing technology. We believe the future is now.
2. BOB CAME WITH 4 THINGS WE WANTED TO CHANGESkyrocketing advances – we pay no more than $100,000 but she profit share 50/50 (true profit share) Returns (average of 40%)Bundling and direct selling (Supersize like the music industry is starting to do Digital marketingAnd I like to add, there’s no “this is how it’s done.” I hate that. Everything is questioned. No rules.
3. Ok, so how’s it going?We’ve acquired ???? Books – all for less than Back to press 4 timesTotal of 25,000 in print – non returnable for the most partMix of traditional (Harper’s mag, New Yorker, New York Times, NPR) and new media (BoingBoing, New yorker.com gave away the audio read by Lithgow for a week)Tried the supersize bundle – which I”ll get to later.
4. 10 books by EmerilFreshening him up – trying to make him less BAM more authenticPaperbacks w/flaps $24.99 Up to over 105,000 copies Hit bestsellerlist. One ever six monthsRisk isn’t as big when we’re paying $10,000
5. Toni Morrison, Salmon Rushdie, Oran Pamuk, -- got great coverage, just came out
6. 50 Cent & Robert Green partnering on The 50th lawThe came together over the 48 Laws of PowerWorking with Violotar who does his music and will be a real mix of traditional and newAnd new spin on doing stuff – the lecture tour is being booked like a concert tour with different price tickets.Explore marketing in the P to P world the way we haven’t before.Book as an object – gold leaf. Bible format
7. A few blogs to booksI am neurotic and This is Why you’re fatStarted as a tumblr blog and went viral really fast
8. Green Porno which started out as Online videos of Isabella dressing up and acting out bug sexExclusive DVDAgain, book as object.
9. Memoir by a 23 year old guy who was born without legsAnd he traveled around the world on a skateboard and took pix of people staring at him and how they’d make up their own storiesAnd he took 30,000 photos that are part of a rolling exhibitionAnd we’re trying to incorporate some of those intothe electronic version of the book and even see if we can have narration. Think Jeanette Wall’s Glass Castle 3.0
10. 10 books by Gary VeeEpitomizes an author who wants to profit shareHe’d been offered more money for one book.Skin in the game makes it partnershipBuilt his own platform. Comes to the party with this huge platform of his own.
11. RETURNSWe made a big dent in the non-returnable for our first list – but still HUGE way to go. People are really resistent. Major acts went with us though. We’ll see for next list.
12. THE BUNDLE – Hard. NO ONE does the shopping cart.We had to build our own and it was shockingly complicatedIt never worked the way we did it, so we went out slowly. DRM free – code on the back of the book (and Burn this book) without activation – just a noteNot many people did it – but that’s not to say they won’t as people start to read on more devices. Also, only available on our site. When others do it it’ll be more. Top Spin does it for music companies More experimenting needs to be done here.
13. DIGITAL MARKETINGI feel like we’ve been successful with this. Our books have had a great mix of traditional and new media. We started out w/a blog 8 months b/f our first book came out to sort of recipe test all of the stuffLearned how to work a lot of the toolsGet good SEO – how to build a community and go out into the community and connectWe were getting quotes for $200,000-$600,000 for web sites – Bob said “Parts or Labor”Ultimately we did it on Word Press ourselves and paid a designer minimal $$ to help.
14. TEACH THE AUTHORSUltimately what I think I learned is that the value I bring in marketing is to teach the authors how to do this. We spend a lot of our time “marketing” by educating the authors because I feel like that’s the best use of our time. We’ve had workshops and Web Ex’sIt’s not either or – and it might be hard for you – but it’s an opportunity, and it’s free and easy and no one can do it better than youWe’ve gone to Lithgow’s Apartment to teach him how to twitter
15. WHAT’S NEXT?These are my kids. I look at them when I get home and I see people reading even if it’s not traditional paper books and I want to reach them and excite them.
16. Definitely see it going mobileWe experimented with Daily Lit – Publishers are afraid of it – it’s DRM free; they don’t know if its to be sold or serializedWe used as a marketing tool and I think it worked and will be part of the future.More mobile stuff to happen
17. Want to try Ustreaming authors and selling books direct. That’s next. I’m excited about ustream. I see the music industry starting with that. EmerilI want to try hosting our own conferences and selling books. We have a bunch of business authors, Gary Vee, Michael Eisner, Tom Peters, HEADLINERS and have a breakfast or something. Try the Vook