This is how the Realview Team made such information accessible on a larger scale:

• The brief from the client was to produce a digital version to expand the distribution of their printed publication of 500 subscribers and ultimately increase advertising revenue.

• The work carried out involved building an online digital edition to incorporate not only the content but all aspects of the client’s brand, look and feel within the publication.

• The client’s current printed subscription totaled 500 subscribers with an annual print and distribution budget of approximately £35,000.

• The client requirement was for a company with the capability to distribute a digital edition of their magazine across multiple digital platforms including PC, MAC, iPad and Android tablets.

• The work undertaken was to build a personalised digital viewer, registration page, help and information page that could be incorporated within the clients website as well distributed through email purpose built to capture specific data and sector information from the reader.

• Taking the clients native print files Realview converted them into an interactive hyperlinked publication, also providing them with a monitored email distribution solution again incorporating the client’s brand, look and feel.

• The result for the client proved to be a huge success with an up-take of over 3,000 subscribers within the first two months. The cost saving to the client was significant with an annual digital spend of only £5,500 to achieve these results. The readership grew to over 80 countries world-wide. The time spent reading the publication averaged 40 minutes with over 350,000 pages being viewed.

“We selected the Realview capability to expand the distribution of our printed publication of 500 subscribers, in order to increase readership and ultimately advertising revenue. This proved to be a huge success with an up-take of over 3,000 subscribers within the first two months.

The tool offered the reader a dynamic online magazine experience while allowing us to then quickly and effectively produce and distribute the publication as well as capture vital statistical analysis.”

Matthew Ashley, Global Head of Marketing, Commodities – Thomson Reuters

Indaily is a specialised platform that delivers crafted news and information to an audience, free of charge. Subscribers receive an email at midday, alerting them that the free newspaper is ready to view at www.indaily.com.au

The move from print to digital is the logical result of the significant growth in Indaily’s audience over the past two years. Indaily already has a subscriber base of 30,000, compared with The Independent Weekly’s recent sales figures of under 8,000.

Indaily and The Independent Weekly are published by Solstice Media, a South Australian-based media company owned by more than 100 South Australian investors who created the company to introduce media diversity for the state.

Solstice Media also publishes a number of specialist newspapers and magazines including The Southern Cross, Sportsbeat, Tempo, The SA Mines and Energy Journal, SA Defence Business and Place Magazine.

The company started publishing The Independent Weekly in 2004, initially as a broadsheet newspaper distributed on a Sunday. It moved to tabloid format and Saturday distribution one year later.
The company has recently hired one of Adelaide’s best-known and most experienced editors Des Ryan, as editor- in-chief.

Earlier this year the company re-launched Indaily as a substantial daily digital newspaper to capitalise on its growing popularity among readers and advertisers.

Solstice Media managing director and publisher, Paul Hamra, said the company’s mission to provide fierce independent local journalism and commentary has not faltered — “we have simply changed the delivery vehicle”.

“For us it seems senseless to crush trees, print on paper overnight and deliver our journalism in trucks to a shrinking print-reading market,” he said.

“All of a sudden, with the proliferation of news on the internet, we are perfectly positioned to deliver our brand of independent journalism and advertising as a unique media product to a market with an appetite for something different, on their desktop at lunchtime,” he said.

Solstice Media engaged digital publishing developers, Realview, to create an exciting platform which took the iPad reading experience and delivered it on PC’s – where 95 of the company’s market source their online news.

“We can get our product to a bigger and growing audience, faster and cheaper. It is a very exciting phase of our company’s evolution,” said Hamra.

The transition has been assisted by the company’s new board member, Eric Beecher, who had a successful media career, more recently in digital publishing through crikey.com.au, businessspectator.com.au and eurekareport.com.au.

Indaily has its own team of local journalists working under the direction of editor, Des Ryan.

Key features from The Independent Weekly will be transitioned into Indaily, including writers such as political journalist, Tom Richardson and wine writer Philip White, as well as syndication from The Age and the Sydney Morning Herald, Domain Real Estate section, arts and cultural information, etc.

Indaily has established a revenue model based on advertising, which ensures Indaily will remain a free publication for its subscribers.

“I’m probably getting a bit old to get excited,” he told Mediaweek wryly, discussing his new role as editor of Indaily. “But it’s intriguing and I guess it is exciting. It’s things I’ve not done before. It’s the future, wherever that future may be going.”

What Ryan is describing is indeed a new path. Publishers Solstice Media have just relaunched Indaily – a news service focusing on the South Australian market – as an iPad-style daily newspaper that offers a dramatic break from the long-established design of online news offerings. Instead of the traditional scrolling design, Indaily brings the tablet-style “slide” experience to a publication that can be accessed on any device, including a standard desktop computer. The platform has been developed by Solstice with digital publishing services provider Realview, and is billed as an Australian first.

Solstice Media managing director Paul Hamra said the motivation behind the concept was that while tablets such as the iPad were changing the way people read online publications, the experience was only available to a very small audience.

“Most Indaily subscribers are professionals and access their news through a desktop PC or laptop or phone during the day,” Hamra said. “What subscribers now receive is  aesthetically akin to the print addition, but with all the immediacy, interactivity and response-provoking mechanisms that make web environments so powerful.” He is adamant the company is on a winner: “I believe this is the future of publishing.”

Hamra and new Solstice board member Eric Beecher were instrumental in convincing Ryan to come on board as editor of the revamped news site.

“I was happily freelancing in Adelaide, doing bits and pieces for various media outlets,” Ryan said. “I got the call from Paul Hamra. He and Eric Beecher came here and we had three or four meetings and they convinced me. Eric was excited and Paul was very excited about these new applications that were suited to iPads and I thought, ‘it’s time to do this’. The debate about the technology has really been had and won. There’s no question this is how we are going to be doing things. The only question is where it’s all leading to.

“There’s a change of attitude across all media. News and information has always been basically a single pipeline from the publisher to the readers but that’s all changed…it’s now being  democratised. It’s about empowering people to look and find the news and information that’s relevant to themselves. The old mass media model has changed completely. It’s the same as the book publishing industry. That old model is well on the way to being transformed to the point where everybody will have e-readers.”

He said another key factor was making the online experience as seamless and enjoyable as possible – avoiding annoying pop-ups and invasive advertising for example. “It’s about being user-friendly. If readers find you irritating they won’t hang around.”

Ryan said Beecher’s involvement was a key element in his accepting the position. Beecher has long been an important figure in Australian journalism – former editor of The Sydney Morning Herald, editor-in-chief of the Herald and Weekly Times newspaper group, founder of the Text Media Group, Business Spectator, Crikey, Smart Company and Eureka Report. Of his board position at Solstice, Beecher said: “I took the board role because I felt it was a fantastic and fascinating opportunity to do something interesting and relevant in online journalism in a city that has a near monopoly ownership situation.”

As Ryan described it: “His position is what attracted me to the company. He’s got such a successful track record.” Editorially, he said the aim was “opening up Adelaide” with a broad, upmarket online publication. “I’ve not seen a concept such as this. And in a sense, I guess it is a test-bed.”

The key question with all new online initiatives, of course, is: will it make money? Paul Hamra said the early signs were positive, with advertisers quick to jump on board. “The brands we work with realise they can develop campaign components that look like print but have the same direct response, click-through functions as web advertising but is far less invasive. So far every edition for the next 12 months is secured with major advertising sponsors so the investment is already producing a return.”

Realview CEO Richard Lindley said the company was thrilled at the way Solstice was using the new platform – particularly as it was focused on a sustainable business model. “It’s not just about taking content online and making it look good,” Lindley said. “There has to be a clear, sustainable commercial strategy attached. Opportunities do not start and end with the advertising sales team. Marketing, circulation, subscriptions, editorial and production are all stakeholders in the success of unified media projects.” Check out the new product at www.indaily.com.au.

“We’ve invested in a complete redesign of our viewer so it now launches touch enabled digital publications directly on the iPad” explains Realview CEO, Mr Richard Lindley. “Readers don’t need to wait for an application to download or wait for updated content because with the latest Realview viewer, access to their favorite magazine, newspaper or catalog is instant. The reader experience is also enhanced as you would expect with a new device like the iPad, with streaming video and interactive advertisements delivered in the new viewer.”

Publishers also have a lot to gain from the Realview iPad development, as Mr Lindley explains; “Getting an iPad Magazine or Newspaper ready for market is as simple as sending PDF files of the final content to Realview, meaning publishers can quickly take advantage of the surge in demand for iPad specific content. No waiting for development budgets, no testing, no Apple approval process, just straight to market with your iPad ready magazine within a matter of hours.”

No development expense means no pass-on costs for consumers – providing a competitive edge as well as delivering the fastest route to the online reading market. “Not requiring an application or distribution through the app store means no requirement to pay 30% of subscriptions to Apple,” observes Mr Lindley. “New subscribers are also more likely to find a digital publication online through search engines such as Google, Yahoo or Bing rather than through the Apple App store” although Mr Lindley admits that some publishers will like the distribution channel that the App store offers and hinted that Realview is developing new solutions for those publishers as well.

“Our publishing solution is constantly evolving to meet customers and publishers needs so you can expect to see some pretty innovative and engaging publications in the near future” Lindley concludes.

Realview for iPad is a brand new viewing experience. We didn’t just check our current online publishing solution worked on an iPad, we went back to the drawing board and designed Realview for iPad from the ground up.

Just look at any of our clients’ magazines, newspapers or catalogs on your iPad and you will experience the new Realview for iPad.

Getting you magazine on the iPad is as simple as sending us your PDF files. Readers don’t need to download a magazine app or wait for the content to download, they can read your magazine instantly – this is particularly important looking at back issues of magazines or newspapers.

During the design phase of Realview for iPad we made sure that we kept the same exceptional features as our online product such as:

• Lightweight, quick loading and viewing
• Ability to add or maintain branding easily
• Simple, uncluttered navigation
• Search a single issue or complete archive
• Advertiser options within the viewer
• Complete multi language support including Japanese, Korean and Chinese.
• Tracking of every interaction including new swipe and orientation

Of course it wouldn’t be a new experience if we did not take advantage of the iPad touch interface. We have added brand new features such as an enhanced contents page, orientation specific viewing, search results previewing, full screen video and a landscape reading mode.

Realview is a simple, cost effective solution that can get your magazine on the iPad now. With Realview you do not need any special software, large setup fees or additional user training. Publishing on the iPad is as easy as sending us your PDF files.

Contact us today to get your newspaper, magazine, custom publication or newsletter on the iPad.

Unlike websites, digital editions imitate the experience of reading a newspaper or magazine as faithfully as possible. Titles retain their print layout and design and readers can electronically turn the pages, which feature video pictures and hyperlinks leading to richer content.

Richard Lindley’s Realview Technologies has been executing digital editions in Australia for seven years and has about 1200 local clients, plus 300 or so internationally. “It has taken a while but it’s (now) a massive growth market for us,” Lindley says.

“But publishers still struggle with the business model: how do you make revenue out of it?”

The Audit Bureau of Circulations started quarterly audits of subscriber numbers for replica digital editions last year.

In 2008, Realview scored a coup when it won the contract to provide the digital edition of US weekly The New Yorker..

Its clients in Australia include News Limited’s Cumberland Courier Newspapers, which has digital editions of all its 23 NSW community papers, which include The Manly Daily and The Wentworth Courier. (News also publishes The Australian.)

Digital editions get the paper in front of the eyes of traditionally hard-to-access readers such as apartment dwellers, says Cumberland Courier general manager John Webster.

“We believe there’s also a growing pool of people who will be quite happy just to look at the paper online because they conduct so much of their lives online already,” he says.

The iPad as an on-going magazine interaction device is a tantalising thought… but in-page image and video galleries, social media integration, and additional nav-tools to go with the migrated content, is still just beyond the horizon.

Initially, publishers won’t have much option other than to repurpose PDF’s for viewing on the iPad as well as replicating e-editions, into the new format. However, as time ticks on, if the development of apps for the iPhone and iTouch is anything to go by, purpose designed software will make the whole idea of interacting with a magazine within the iPad environment so much more satisfying for consumers.

The New York Times is leading the way forward for newspapers right now, and the potential to incorporate more user-driven functionality like still and video galleries, active social media links and other interactivity is almost unlimited.

With a base price around the same as the black and white screen Kindle, iPad offers publishers the promise of being able to provide a far more powerful viewing experience for their readers than has been possible up until now.

As Steve Jobs pointed out on January 27, over 75 million people already know how to use the iPad, because of its similarity to the iPhone and iPod family. So publishers will be able to explore the opportunity to sell access to their iPad content through the existing AppStore channel, which is a proven method for content charging.

Due to the iPad’s lineage, it stands a better chance than it possibly deserves of succeeding, and creating a sustainable third category in between laptops and mobile phones.

Another new contender into this middle ground will be Microsoft’s ‘Courier’ booklet device (rumoured to be using a new purpose-designed operating system) that is tentatively being launched within the next few months.

Prototypes feature dual 7″ displays and its folding design not only provides protection but gives the Courier the look and feel of a standard paperback book. This booklet device is a larger version of a smartphone and will be ideal for those who want a smartly-designed dayplanner that can run videos as well as other entertainment applications. Unlike the launch iPad, it is said to incorporate 3G and feature a built-in camera.

But back to the iPad and the here and now. Publishers around the world are announcing iPad apps in ever increasing numbers and one of the most recent is the Imagine Publishing group, based in Bournemouth in the UK. Even though iPad won’t be available for sale there, here, or anywhere, until March this year, that company announced a few days ago they had released iPhone and iPad editions for all of their twenty titles.

Imagine Publishing are actually releasing slightly modified iPhone apps which will run on the new tablet computer, although the new interface won’t be taking advantage of the iPad’s bigger screen and instead will be running at the original iPhone resolution.

Imagine’s business model is centred around charging for the magazine app and bundling in the current issue at no additional cost to the consumer. Imagine charges extra within the app for back-issues or for a subscription, and many more companies are fine-tuning their own pricing structures to get on board.

Apple only released its latest software developers kit a week ago, which will allow publishers to write apps with list and content views on iPad’s larger single display, rather than across multiple iPhone page flick.

Sydney based digital publishing services provider, Realview Technologies, is already in the game. “The iPad supports the same apps as the iPhone so everything already developed for that will run on the iPad without changes,” says Richard Lindley, Realview’s CEO. “It’s just the iPad’s much bigger screen means application tweaking will need to occur to best utilise that.”

“We are currently looking at several approaches when it comes to the iPad, and by the time it’s in stores we’ll ensure our online viewing platform works properly on the new device,” Richard told me. “This will include changing the user interface to take advantage of the big multi touch screen and detecting when the device is in portrait or landscape mode. All of our current clients will immediately benefit from this.”

Realview’s second approach is designing an iPad application for publishers. “The advantage of writing an application rather than a web version is that we can get better control over the device and take advantage of options such as using iTunes for payment,” says Lindley. “At this early stage we are not at liberty to give too many details away, however we welcome any publishers to engage us in dialogue about what they would like to see.”

Richard Lindley and his team are convinced that the iPad really is a game-changer. “We believe that the iPad will revolutionise the way that readers consume digital media and we are here to help publishers get their content onto the new device.”

And Realview won’t be the only locally-based players with the know-how to best migrate titles to the iPad, which offers far more scope for tactile user interplay, a higher degree of portability, and the ability to charge for the experience, too. Indeed, just like Apple changed music, they may just change publishing forever as well.

Sports illustrated iPad demo outlining the type of magazine functionality that is possible.

Actually using a tablet on the same electronic issue – utilising an HP touchsmart TX2.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZxXlqtg2rik&feature=related

click here to view the AMA awards supplement.

A who’s who of Australia’s magazine publishing fraternity assembled for the AMA presentation breakfast at Centennial Parklands Restaurant to witness Better Homes and Gardens triumph.

The popular Pacific Magazines title was a clear choice for the top AMA prize having made substantial gains in subscription, readership and advertising volume despite coming off a high base amid challenging market conditions.

The magazine posted a 10.4% year-on-year increase in circulation in the June 2009 Audit Bureau of Circulations report representing the biggest circulation increase of any magazine. Sales hit 370,000, making it the third best-selling magazine in Australia.

Roy Morgan figures revealed the magazines readership increased by 2.3% in the same period, to 1.74 million – its seventh consecutive reporting of year-on-year growth.

However, its most impressive result was in advertising volume, with a 19% increase in the year to June 2009, according to Nielsen AdEx.

The panel of judges, led by Fusion Strategy’s Steve Allen, said the strength in numbers overwhelmingly stated Better Homes and Garden’s case for Magazine of the Year, The magazine beat finalists Shop Til You Drop (ACP Magazines) and Delicious (News Magazines) for the top gong, contested from among the 15 AMA category winners.

Better Homes & Gardens had earlier won the Home & Garden category, while Shop Til You Drop and Delicious were judged the best Womens Lifestyle and Food & Entertainment titles respectively.

The AMA program, an initiative of AdNews, did not solicit entries, rather the titles were appraised on set criteria circulation and readership growth, advertising volume, editorial content and design and front cover.

A total of 67 finalists were shortlisted across the categories.

Guest speaker Estee Lauder Australia MD Terry Little, spoke of the continued vitality of magazines as an advertising medium for brands that need to engage with consumers in a meaningful way.

In the welcoming speech AdNews editor Matt Porter said it was crucial the AMAs were as inclusive, transparent and robust as possible.

In devising the AMA, AdNews recognized the need for Australia’s robust magazine industry to have a highly credible and sought-after awards program, particularly since the demise, after 11 years, of the annual MPA awards this year.

The AMA is open to all magazines including non-Magazines Publishers of Australia members, but titles must be ABC audited and have a Roy Morgan readership figure. The program will not solicit entries; rather the titles will be appraised on a set criteria by a team of independent judges, chaired by Steve Allen, industry pundit and MD of Fusion Strategy.

The judging criteria includes circulation and readership growth, advertising volume, front cover, editorial content, layout and design.

Awards will be handed out across 17 categories that cover all the magazine genres in addition to Launch of the Year and U-Turn of the Year. The AMA Magazine of the Year will be chosen from the category winners. The AMA Hall of Fame will recognize outstanding individual contributions to Australia’s magazine publishing industry.
Paul Carroll, group strategy manager at News Limited’s Newspaper Magazines, said the AMA would provide an “excellent opportunity for the industry to recognize the power of magazines as a medium”.

An objective, independent judging process based on the rigour of third party auditing were the take-out points of the AMA program for Simon Davies, head of print at OMD.

“These awards are going to be quite different to the MPA Awards in terms of having less subjectivity in some of the judging criteria,” Davies said. “It is important we encourage third-party auditing of titles, and where possible we try and support titles that do have that support.”
Gordon Towell, chief executive of the Audit Bureau of Circulation, agreed with Davies. “The Key to the AMA is the independent, open, transparent process that will produce winners judged on their merits.”

Online publisher Realview is the inaugural major sponsor for the AMA. Chief executive Richard Lindley said it is important to recognize the outstanding efforts put in by the magazines sector despite it “struggling in the current economic climate”. The fact the awards are being staged independently means they cannot be “swayed by any of the big players”, Lindley said.

AMA judging will take place on 1 October, with the winners announced in a special supplement published with the 6 November issue of AdNews.

The new multilanguage viewer means that not only can readers search within the publication in its native language, but the text of the publications is also indexed by search engines such as Google in the native language. “We are very excited to be launching the new viewer at this forum, as Asia is close to home and we are committed to helping publishers in this region monetize their assets through digital publications or flip books.” said Lindley.

Realview was exhibiting at the convention with Asian partners SeriousTec who are the Gold Certified Solution Partner for WoodWing publishing software. “Realview is an ideal partner for us as their product completes an end to end solution with the WoodWing pre-press and workflow solution.” SeriousTec CEO John Fong commented.

Ashok Nath, co-chair of the Asian Publishing Convention, said: “It seems the definition of publishing now is multimedia. In the old days, when we say publishing, it just means newspapers and magazines.”

The convention finished on Friday with the 2009 Asian Multimedia Publishing Awards presented at a Gala dinner in the evening.