Monday, April 12, 2010

Penguin India in digital mode

Penguin is getting ready to launch digital content business in India. With 500 digital titles and counting, John Makinson, CEO of Penguin, is convinced that the publishing house will have a good run delivering books over mobile phones and e-readers.

“India remains a tough market to do business as book prices are low. Besides, pirated editions are already selling at traffic signals before we place our copies at the book stores,” Makinson says. Lack of physical distribution in Tier 2 and 3 cities has also hit business – reasons that are strong enough for Makinson to turn books into applications with “online communities” for fans, live chat between readers and other multimedia effects.

The publishing house is also getting ready to tweak its marketing strategy in India. “Penguin book launches will now have an aggressive digital marketing team,” says Makinson. Penguin aims to use social networking sites extensively.

“We will put out video interviews with authors on video streaming sites or release teasers of book on the web. For some book titles, we may create a website or have a Facebook page to promote the content,” says the CEO.

Full report here Business Standard

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