Later in the course we'll be looking at business models. Here are a few examples of some that have been in the trade news recently...
The first is an all-you-can-read model for children's digital picture books offered by PIBO. For just 315yen per month readers can access as many of the beautifully illustrated picture books as they want (that's roughly equivalent to 2 cans of coca cola). The company is working with illustrators to upload at least one new title per week to grow the list from 128 to 400 titles by the end of 2014.
The second is a start-up called eReatah who are launching an ebook subscription platform that allows you to download and keep a certain number of ebooks from their catalogue of 80,000 titles each month. This business model is quite similar to the good old fashioned mail order book club, in that you pay for the number of books you want per month, regardless of the individual RRP. According to eReatah, you save 15 to 40% compared to other ebook sites. Their pricing looks like this:
- 2 books per month $16.99
- 3 books per month $25.50
- 4 books per month $33.50
The final example is another all-you-can-eat buffet, OysterBooks boasts 100,000 titles in their ebook catalogue which you can access for a mere $9.95 per month. On the face of it this sounds like much better value for money than eReatah... so the question is whether they will be able to compete on content?
Oyster is also a US company and is still currently running on invite only mode so it is difficult to know whether the USPs they are promoting (beautiful typography and social sharing) are as unique as they claim to be.
Oyster is also a US company and is still currently running on invite only mode so it is difficult to know whether the USPs they are promoting (beautiful typography and social sharing) are as unique as they claim to be.