Disintermediation and Déjà Vu; Publisher Needs in Developing Markets

In this weeks Perspectives post, Martin Marlow offers a valuable counter-point to last weeks blog on the future of subscription agents. Martin points out that the role of local sales agents is more important than ever in this increasingly global market.

Founder and President of Maverick Publishing Specialists, Martin Marlow’s previous positions in publishing include Senior Vice President of Publisher Business Development & Marketing for Ingram Digital, Vice President for Sales and Marketing for Atypon Systems Inc., Director of Strategic Marketing for ProQuest International and Director of E-Commerce for Blackwell Ltd.

Back in 2010 I gave a talk to the ALPSP on using third party aggregators and intermediaries to reach the market. It’s a topic that still has a lot of currency, particularly when it comes to global sales.

Modern communications and IT systems mean that it appears to be easier than ever for even small publishers to sell into regions across the world. Meanwhile there are real hotspots of emerging scholarship where publishers can find new authors as well as new readers. But dealing globally can be a complex business. Indeed, one could say that the emergence of said systems and services has clouded the issue still further, and actually created more issues than many were designed to resolve.

Despite the growth of the larger “Global Publisher”, with a lot more direct routes to markets, customers and end users (not least via these increasingly adept online support services and marketing and sales channels), I still believe that there is a valid place for agents, distributors and intermediaries to support the small to medium sized and/or specialist Publisher. The demise of SWETS was indeed a terrible occurrence for all involved, and was one of the key topics at last weeks Association of Subscription Agents Conference in London, UK. But here in other online blogs and comment sites, it has been argued that their demise was not purely the fault of falling margins or loss of publisher clients. Sales agents and intermediaries can still offer vital assistance in approaching markets where a publisher has no experience and where the business culture is markedly different

Publishers and users – a closer relationship

In both developed and emerging markets, we’re moving to more user and author driven publishing, not least characterised by new business models such as open access. And it’s important to note that this changes the revenue stream for publishers, who are now marketing at authors as the source of article processing charges. These authors are, of course, also readers, and a lot of the publishers are looking to get more exposure to this group.

Over the last three – five years, amongst larger publishers, there’s also been a big drive to to set up regional offices. Publishers are looking to expand, especially into Asia-Pacific and they want to get closer to the client.

Establishing a new, close relationship with users can be tricky with local agents in place, because the relationship is one more step removed. Publishers looking for a closer relationship with their end users can utilise social media, and digital marketing channels and techniques, but it’s still hard for a centrally based team to deliver for all territories across the world. Language barriers, and the desire for a real-time response, make it challenging at an operational level, as well as not particularly desirable at a strategic one. This tension means that most publishers should still need a mix of local knowledge and central expertise to successfully move into these new areas of market demand. Or indeed, to make the most of an underdeveloped one.

Stepping back from disintermediation

At Maverick, we’re still having conversations which include requests such as:

• can you do market research for this set of territories
• can you help us with marketing tactics within these emerging countries
• can you tell us how we can best identify, manage and work with local agents and distributors

And that includes marketing to authors and end users as well as libraries.

What that says to me, although there has been a drive towards disintermediation, is that even the larger publishers are starting to realize that total disintermediation isn’t desirable or beneficial. A lot of the work Maverick was involved with in the early days involved worked with clients on identifying, managing and working with local distributors, and understanding the value they deliver. We’re doing that again with the emergence of next generation end user (online) access tools and also developing business models such as Open Access. Different sets of criteria admittedly, but still the same core issues at base level.

Publishers are also starting to look again at some of their previous distributor and intermediary relationships, ones that they had curtailed in the quest for more direct end user access. They’re revisiting how they can get a closer relationship between their regional and central offices, between regional offices and agents, and between central offices and distributor networks.

Publishers want to explore new and different ways of developing these relationships in order to understand user behaviour and needs in the increasingly complex online service world. And they want to identify the value added services that customers need and will really use, rather than the services they think they will use but cannot verify that without good local data and feedback. If publishers get this wrong, and introduce services to market that users don’t actually value or use, it can be an expensive miss-step. Poorly chosen services can result in higher maintenance costs with little benefit in terms of keeping customers and developing sales relationships. Local support and “on the ground / from the ground” feedback is crucial therefore – and perhaps an area where local distributors, agents and aggregators might look to develop in the future as a core value added service. After all, there’s no value, on either side, of providing bells and whistles that customers don’t really care about.

With the advent of open access and digital vs print marketing the need for a local presence is equally (arguably) even more essential. That’s because doing business is even more complex and potentially expensive for publishers trying to maintain and grow their revenues and customer relationships.

It’s also important that publishers try to understand changing customer behaviours regarding their own particular specialist content. An emerging market isn’t a whole, niches and subject areas will be very different in those markets, at both country and regional level.

Understanding the information flow

To understand new markets in this new paradigm of open access, social media, and direct to customer / author / user marketing, it’s vital to create a flow of information that moves in both directions. If you’ve got good relationships with people on the ground, it’s easier to get market intelligence back to the centre, which is vital to understanding the value added services that can give publishers real traction in new markets.

I’m not saying it’s not easier to get in touch with emerging markets than it was previously. Social media strategies and email marketing obviously means that it is. The challenge is to get back, or more accurately, assimilate, quality information about end users’ behaviours and needs.

At an operational level, ease and growth of online communication creates more volume of course. So with the expansion of digital marketing and global sales channels, the ability to be able to effectively sift through, evaluate and draw relevant conclusions from all this increased feedback is even more complex, without good specialist or local knowledge.

It gives me Déjà Vu. We used to call ourselves information rich and time poor; we are still. Publishers looking for exposure to their end users are utilising social media, and digital marketing channels and techniques, but it’s hard for a centrally based team to deliver for all territories across the world.

Conclusion

Working with new business models, new markets, new technology and new audiences might cause us to ask how we approach publishing, but the answer may not be as new as we think. “Going direct to market” may still be preferable for some – and indeed it is a vital part of any international development strategy. But just because online makes it seemingly easier to get “local” quickly, a local partner may well be even more vital than some might think.

*”It s a small world-3″ by Leowang1995 – Own work. Licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0 via Wikimedia Commons.