Know-How Exchange : Strategy

Have you been able to place any of your books in overseas schools? If so, what did the students & teachers think of them? Were they "effective"? How do you know?

When pitching something new, it'll help to be able to say something like, "In the New Congo School, our books have been an instant favorite. Reading scores have increased and student attention as well."

My parents were antiquarian bookdealers. They refused to have a TV in the house! So I sadly note that "selling reading" to young people, Harry Potter notwithstanding, is indeed a "tough sale." Here are some suggestions:

1) Consider language schools as a target market. The teaching of English as a foreign language (TOEFL) is a big, booming business -- and very much profit oriented. Some of these illustrated classics should lend themselves well to introductory and intermediate English courses for adults.

Incidentally one of China´s better known Internet entrepreneurs started out as an English teacher. Jack Ma founded www.alibaba.com in 1998 with $60,000 in order to help foreign companies find Chinese manufacturers. According to Forbes he is now worth $1.6 billion. So do not underestimate the potential of an entrepreneurially minded language school owner!

2) Expanding on the Internet option: I assume these books will be available as E.books on Amazon.com. It has two tier pricing for E-books, and the cheaper tier is the obvious way to go. But obvious may not be best! Consider offering the book on Amazon.com at premium pricing, sky high in fact. You don´t expect to sell many there. Rather you are establishing value. If necessary, you negotiate with Amazon.com its receiving an exclusive RETAIL license, but you retain the rights to grant WHOLESALE licenses.

You then offer "master licenses" for the extremely expensive E.Books at reasonable terms to both the public and private sectors. Specifically, license them to language schools. Some of the language schools are large chains, such as Berlitz www.berlitz.com with 550 schools in 70 countries and Inlingua, www. inlingua.com with 300 schools in 30 countries. However these giants are difficult to deal with. They are a "step two," maybe even a "step ten." Begin with smaller, hungrier, faster on their feet local language schools.

The E.books are not just for use in class. Instead the language school goes to corporations to market the E.books. They are made available to a corporation which wants its employees to improve their English. The E.books are paid for by the company, and the employees can download them for free.

The language school receives a fee based on the number of times the e-book is downloaded. And with each downloaded E-book comes a marketing message, a special offer, from the language school for its courses. The language school is now marketing to corporate employees on the basis of "First, provide value!"

3) Attend selected major Asian educational and book trade fairs. You don´t need an expensive booth, or even to piggyback with another firm. You just need to go there with high quality business cards (the back printed in the relevant Asian language) directing them to your high quality website. Consider attending with a bright, attractive, enthusiatic student intern who has the needed language skills, ideally someone truly bilingual.

4) If you are really serious, you will get websites up in the target Asian languages. Let us say a target is China. Deal the website project out to a student, or student team, in China. Use a Chinese student intern where you are located as a control. Your Chinese (Mandarin language) site doesn´t need to be a full blown site. A good 5 page site linking to your major English language site will still make you "user friendly" and show that you are serious about doing business there.

5) My experience with the commercial attaches at U.S. embassies and the staff at the Dept. of Commerce was not promising. I just routinely made the contact, checking it off on my "to do" list, expecting nothing. However one exception was amazing. He was a "fan" of my product line, and had set up half-a-dozen key appointments for me when I arrived in that country.

Your unusual project here might get lucky and attract another such over-achieving "fan" response, so do not ignore this route.

6) I understand from friends in Bombay (Mumbai) India, one of the three or four largest cities in the world, that public libraries there are expensive -- and in India generally. In contrast Internet access is becoming more reasonable and is rapidly growing there, although not spreading as fast as the mobile phone wildfire. Going after the entire huge country seems a bit ambitious. Focusing on a key city (a point also applicable to China) seems to make more sense.

Which city? Easy -- the one where you have the best personal contact. After having sales in "ordinary city, any city" you can then, with the proven business model, go to the city which makes the most economic sense (e.g. perhaps Bombay/Mumbai for India).

7) Consider cross-marketing with one of the "promoting reading" organizations I list below. You allocate a (small) portion of your revenues to that organization. In return, it mentions you favorably on its website, and the owners make from their own contacts some business referrals for you.

Regards, J. Hamilton

www.americanaexchange.com

www.bookins.com/index.php

www.bookmans.com/

www.bookmooch.com/

www.booksthatbuild.org

www.buyselloldbooks.com/

www.paperbackswap.com/index.php

Lastly, but certainly not least, I add my personal favorite, Book-Crossing. The concept, in which over 800,000 people in 130 countries participate, is explained at www.bookcrossing.com.