Evaluate the technical support offered by each book publishing software solution you are considering.
1. Tech Support Hours - Does the vendor offer support during your working hours?
2. How many Tech Support Reps per Client?
3. How much does Tech Support Cost?
4. Do they offer training classes?
5. Do they offer on-line training classes? Online training generally costs less than off-premises or on-site training classes.
6. How good is the vendor's documentation?
7. What do current clients say about the vendor's tech support?
Saturday, November 18, 2006
Tuesday, November 14, 2006
PMA AnyBook Software Review
At the Publishers Marketing Association web site you will find a review of AnyBook, a most affordable book publishing software solution for small publishers.
Monday, November 13, 2006
Rights Tracking Software
Two well known, and very affordable desktop based solutions for tracking sales of intellectual property; such as translation rights and permissions, are;
Rights 2000 with an up-to-date Explorer window interface. Suitable for publishers, packagers and agents. Holds details of interest and submissions, contracts and sub-rights monies. Extensive reports and analyses include chasing overdue submissions, monies due, overdue royalty statements, due contract dates and reversions, projected income and bookfair reports. Invoices can be generated and a Royalty Ledger is maintained. Exports to Mailmerge, Excel and HTML. Available in MS Access or SQL versions. Available from Bradbury Phillips.
Another solution is That's Rights.That's Rights! is a desktop application that helps you manage and drive your rights activities. Designed primarily for publishers, That's Rights! is for anyone who buys OR sells translation or subsidiary rights around the globe. Available from Thats Right's.
Rights 2000 with an up-to-date Explorer window interface. Suitable for publishers, packagers and agents. Holds details of interest and submissions, contracts and sub-rights monies. Extensive reports and analyses include chasing overdue submissions, monies due, overdue royalty statements, due contract dates and reversions, projected income and bookfair reports. Invoices can be generated and a Royalty Ledger is maintained. Exports to Mailmerge, Excel and HTML. Available in MS Access or SQL versions. Available from Bradbury Phillips.
Another solution is That's Rights.That's Rights! is a desktop application that helps you manage and drive your rights activities. Designed primarily for publishers, That's Rights! is for anyone who buys OR sells translation or subsidiary rights around the globe. Available from Thats Right's.
Controlling Expenses via Budgeting
Many managers make the mistake of tracking expenses in a manner that negates any responsbility for managing them.
One example is office supplies. Suppose your annual expenses are $12,000. Would you rather A) Divide the expense among six departments or B) Assign one person responsibility for managing this expense.
The correct answer is B. Why? People are more likely to actively manage large expenses ($12,000) than smaller ones ($2,000).
As a general rule you should not have a General Ledger Account for any expense with a project yearly expense of less than $1000.
One example is office supplies. Suppose your annual expenses are $12,000. Would you rather A) Divide the expense among six departments or B) Assign one person responsibility for managing this expense.
The correct answer is B. Why? People are more likely to actively manage large expenses ($12,000) than smaller ones ($2,000).
As a general rule you should not have a General Ledger Account for any expense with a project yearly expense of less than $1000.
Controlling Freight Costs
Book publishing software that compares the amount charged for shipping to the actual shipping cost can help save you money.
At one client using an outside fulfillment (pick, pack and ship) service we were able to quickly write a report that showed invoices where the actual freight charge was greater than the invoiced amount. By segmenting this list we found that promotional copies were being mailed via UPS for $6 to $8 a book.
By switching the shipping method for promotional copies to media mail; a service of the USPS (United States Post Office) , they cut their cost per shipment by 60% and saved $24,000 a year.
How was this possible? The fulfillment service sent their software a file with the invoice number, shipping date, tracking number and actual freight cost for each days' shipments. If they were processing the fulfillment in house they would have their internal shipping manifest system (UPS Worldship for example) send back similar information to their internal information system.
At one client using an outside fulfillment (pick, pack and ship) service we were able to quickly write a report that showed invoices where the actual freight charge was greater than the invoiced amount. By segmenting this list we found that promotional copies were being mailed via UPS for $6 to $8 a book.
By switching the shipping method for promotional copies to media mail; a service of the USPS (United States Post Office) , they cut their cost per shipment by 60% and saved $24,000 a year.
How was this possible? The fulfillment service sent their software a file with the invoice number, shipping date, tracking number and actual freight cost for each days' shipments. If they were processing the fulfillment in house they would have their internal shipping manifest system (UPS Worldship for example) send back similar information to their internal information system.
Sunday, November 12, 2006
Acumen's Sales Data Mart - Sales Reveal
Acumen Book released its sales data mart product for book publishers; Sales Reveal, in 2005. We have spoken with publishers using it and they are very pleased. Why? It cost less than competitive products; such as Business Objects and Cognos, and is easy to use. They can import data into it from any data source, not just Acumen.
With Sales Reveal, sales data is imported into an SQL data warehouse that automatically builds datacubes. Sales analysis options includes drill downs and drill ups in addition to built in exports to excel and adobe PDF files.
The sales reveal web site utilizes Flash audio and video to highlight the functionality of this software.
We find it interesting to note that Sales Reveal is Cyberwolf's (aka Acumen Books's) second SQL Product, the first one being their SQL driven E-commerce solution for book publishers: PowerWeb.
I wonder if they are planning to offer book publishers using Acumen Book a Microsoft SQL database option in the future?
With Sales Reveal, sales data is imported into an SQL data warehouse that automatically builds datacubes. Sales analysis options includes drill downs and drill ups in addition to built in exports to excel and adobe PDF files.
The sales reveal web site utilizes Flash audio and video to highlight the functionality of this software.
We find it interesting to note that Sales Reveal is Cyberwolf's (aka Acumen Books's) second SQL Product, the first one being their SQL driven E-commerce solution for book publishers: PowerWeb.
I wonder if they are planning to offer book publishers using Acumen Book a Microsoft SQL database option in the future?
Klopotek Purchases Global Turnkey
With the purchase of Global Turnkey Systems by Klopotek in September the book publishing software consolidation that started with IBS's (International Business Systems) purchase of Bookmaster and Media Services Purchase of S3 PubTech (the owners of CisPub) has continued.
On the positive side, Global Turnkey has gained access to the R&D resources of a much larger company. We expect that Global's clients will now have the opportunity to integrate their software with the contract, editorial, production mangement and title information management modules offered bye Klopotoek product - all features that were lacking in the Global Unison product.
Klopotek; a German company, has gained access to the project management staff of Global Turnkey and entre into the large publishers that use Global Software.
Overall, an excellent development for Global clients and Klopotek.
The downside to this purchase is that yet another book publishing software developer; the 3rd in 2 years has been acquired. In the past two years the number software vendors with 50+ clients and sales greater than $2M in the USA has declined from eight to five. Consequently we are seeing a reduction in the incentive for software vendors to negotiate a lower price.
On the positive side, Global Turnkey has gained access to the R&D resources of a much larger company. We expect that Global's clients will now have the opportunity to integrate their software with the contract, editorial, production mangement and title information management modules offered bye Klopotoek product - all features that were lacking in the Global Unison product.
Klopotek; a German company, has gained access to the project management staff of Global Turnkey and entre into the large publishers that use Global Software.
Overall, an excellent development for Global clients and Klopotek.
The downside to this purchase is that yet another book publishing software developer; the 3rd in 2 years has been acquired. In the past two years the number software vendors with 50+ clients and sales greater than $2M in the USA has declined from eight to five. Consequently we are seeing a reduction in the incentive for software vendors to negotiate a lower price.