Digital publishing start-up, Erudition, beta-launches enhanced eBook series

London, United Kingdom – February 25, 2013

Erudition, a new digital publishing start-up, has successfully beta-launched its first series of enhanced publications, Practising The Piano.  The author, Graham Fitch, is one of the UK’s leading piano teachers and the series features the culmination of years of experience teaching pianists of all levels.  The publications fill a gap in the piano literature with a focus on the art of practising, showing the reader exactly what to do in order to get the most out of their practice time.

A digital first approach

The publications are purpose-built for digital consumption using Erudition’s in-house content management system.  The layout of content is optimised for onscreen reading on personal computers and iPads.  Enhancements such as video clips, audio and additional resources are seamlessly integrated with content.  Interactive “sliders” enable important concepts to be broken down and illustrated in a step-by-step format.

Direct sales model

Practising The Piano is marketed, sold and distributed directly to the reader via Erudition’s innovative digital fulfilment platform.  The publications can be purchased and accessed via a dedicated website www.informance.biz or the author’s blog www.practisingthepiano.com.  Readers view and interact with their content via a cloud library integrated with a web-based reading application which renders HTML5 content for online and offline consumption.

This direct model provides statistics and usage feedback not usually available to a publisher via third-party retail channels.  “We’re thrilled with the results achieved so far”, says Ryan Morison, Director at Erudition.  “We’ve received positive feedback from customers across the globe and over 70% of readers accessed the entire first volume within the first week of purchasing it.”  New editions and volumes will be influenced directly by the feedback obtained from the beta launch.

While many publishers are experimenting with enhanced publications, Erudition’s competitive advantage is its ability to successfully monetise such publications.  “We deliberately selected a niche topic in order to demonstrate that we can produce next generation publications that are commercially viable”, says Ryan. “Enhanced publications are often costly, once-off showcases.  Our platform and approach requires minimal upfront investment to launch and achieves significantly higher margins thereafter.  This enables us to break even quickly and refine our offering based on market feedback.”

The publications have been broken up into “bite-size” volumes in order to increase engagement and lower the cost of the initial purchase decision.  The first two volumes of the series are on offer during the beta-phase at a discounted price of £2.50 each or £4.00 for a bundle.  The full retail price of each publication will be £5.00 from the 31st of March and a third volume will be launched during the second quarter of 2013.  Further publications which include enhanced performance editions of popular pieces and a number of new online reading features will be rolled-out throughout the year.

Erudition now intends to leverage its approach and capabilities to launch new publications across a wide range of topics.  Rather than creating its own content, going forward the company seeks to partner with other publishers to create premium digital offerings from their backlist, current or future publications.

 

About the author

Graham Fitch is a pianist and teacher with many years of experience teaching at the college level. For over a decade, he was Head of Keyboard at the University of Cape Town, and has also taught at the Royal Welsh College of Music in Cardiff and the Mannes College of Music in New York.  He is also known as a teacher for specialist young pianists, and has been on the piano staff at The Purcell School and The Centre for Young Musicians in London.  Graham is a regular contributor to Pianist Magazine and an adjudicator for the British International Federation of Festivals.  Currently, Graham teaches privately in London and attracts a steady stream of students from around the world for lessons.

About Erudition

Erudition™ is a specialist digital publishing company partnering with publishers and content owners to create purpose-built digital publications from new or existing content. We enable publishers to generate new revenue streams through creating immersive and engaging reader experiences.