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March 12, 2010#

A More Realistic View of Publishing on the iPad?

We’ve looked at a variety of iPad demos recently and while the potential is exciting, the reality of what publishers produce may be a little more pedestrian.

Ducth paper De Telegraaf released the video above which suggests they plan to repurpose their website for the iPad. This makes some sense and if probably more realistic for many publishers in a time of restricted budgets and staff cuts.

That said, simply bringing video, audio and animated graphics into a magazine/newspaper format could make for an interesting product.

Personally, I think that there’s enormous potential for independent publishers and businesses to put these new tools to use – banishing staid catalogues and boring whitepapers.

What do you think?

January 4, 2010#

The Mobile Future of Digital Magazines?

Mag+ from Bonnier on Vimeo.

So far digital magazine formats have by and large sought to replicate the experience of the printed format, reproducing printed versions complete with ‘flippy’ pages.

A few notable examples have gone further in making impressive use of video, audio and better layouts to maximise the potential of the digital magazine – but even these efforts will likely be seen as stepping stones towards more natively digital and mobile offerings to come.

Indeed, publications like Sports Illustrated [video] and Wired [video] have recently unveiled their respective conceptualisations with a clear focus on new hardware like e-readers, smart mobiles and tablets.

In a similar vein (see video above), design consultancy BERG and media company Bonnier have released what they call ‘a corporate collaborative research project … into the experience of reading magazines on handheld digital devices. It illustrates one possible vision for digital magazines in the near future …’.

Apart from looking very cool indeed BERG/Bonnier’s future retains the concept of magazine issues (as opposed to constantly updated RSS-style feeds) and (thankfully) does away with the flippy pages.

If you’re feeling impatient, skip to minute 3 for an idea of their concepts in action.

August 12, 2009#

Welcome to Own Brand

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Hello there and welcome to the first post on our brand spanking new Own Brand Media blog.

Own Brand is a web editorial company. The business was born out of my own work as a freelance web content writer and, more recently, through Really Practical. But where Really Practical focused on simply supplying content for websites, Own Brand goes a little lot further.

Here’s the pitch – in 3 parts:

1. Web Content Writing

The written word still rules the web, but it’s usually the very last thing that businesses (and web designers) think about when creating a web presence. Our first job is to help plan for, and create, great content for websites.

2. Digital Custom Publishing

The web is dominated by content. To be effective online businesses need to create the kind of content that their prospects really want – useful, informative and ‘non-salesy’. Do that, and you’ll get found in the search engines and via social media, attract and retain quality customers and position yourself as an expert, trusted resource in your industry.

Unfortunately, most businesses are simply not set up to ‘be the media‘. They’re used to buying ad space and pestering journalists – not creating the content themselves.

Which is, of course, where we come in. If you want someone to help you create a printed customer magazine or newsletter, you can hire a custom publishing company. If you want someone to do it online, you need a digital custom publishing company.

Our role is to manage as much or as little of the editorial and production process as our clients would like. From initial concept to writing editorial to finding and managing freelance contributors, we make digital media projects happen.

Things like:

  • Organisational blogs
  • Online magazines
  • Membership sites
  • Content-heavy websites
  • Campaign micro-sites
  • eBooks and whitepapers
  • Resource sections full of SEO-friendly articles

3. Own Brand Digital Media Projects

Last but certainly not least, we’re developing our own digital media projects. Our intention is to launch several digital media projects each year – often in conjuntion with an existing business or subject matter expert. We want to break new ground, experiment with new business models and partner with the smartest people around.

Not only will these projects create value (and profits) but they will also help inform the work we do for clients.

The Own Brand Blog

For its part, this blog will be used to pass on a few tips and ideas about using content within your business as well as discussing changes within theĀ  online publishing industry.

Needless to say, we’ll also keep you up-to-date with the things that we’re working on too.