PDF Industry - How do we help it grow?

[Orcus]

Does anyone know you did that? Did you market that angle? Did you promote that this is pretty much a product that could only have been a PDF? This is interesting to me.

Clark

 

[jmucchiello]

One thing that would help that a lot of publishers don't think about or bother to do (esp if you're going to sell elsewhere) is to put in a little "Thank you RPGNow.com" or something like that into your books content.

Same goes for print books. If you ever do use the money you earned from RPGNow to print your book- why not say thank you by telling your readers where to find more products but in PDF form?

Hey, James, I just want to apologize for not thinking to do this myself. Next time I upload you can be sure such a notice will be included.

Just one thing: The OGL doesn't let me use trademarks without permission, could you put a notice up somewhere that grants that permission.

 

[Arnix]

I was planning on putting a small ad for rpgnow.com into the PoD that I am planning on ordering for "Question of Honor: A Guidebook to Knights". The page count difference for adding any of these type of ads is very minor, and fairly common in print products (i.e., it won't appear out of place enough to anger customers).

Working in the online/media business (software developer for a medium sized international newspaper/radio/magazine/book publishing/online company) has given me a bit of insight into what can be done with various mediums. I agree with Clark that we SHOULD have links to topic headings, named NPCs, statblocks, monsters in the appendix, etc. Our future products will take advantage of that, and an update will probably be done for our current product. Being an e-publisher means that we can do any of these nice features enhancements and it will cost us nothing but time, and we can give an update to all of our customers free.

We also made an agreement with out FLGS to carry CDs of our book for a reasonable percentage of the sales. We printed out the book on a very nice color printer, and set a bound copy right next to the CD cases. We have had nothing but great responses from the in-store people, though sales could be a little better. It seems that the requirement that the gamer print the material is a major drawback.

Also, we did a nice demo CD containing all of our free items and got the FLGS to distribute them with purchases of print products to their customers. The cost on this was very minimal, 100 CDs, labels, and sleeves, costs about $50. Most people can't run a small print ad in the paper for that.

If you want to approach the FLGS, you need to find a way to make it help them. Almost anything that sells, or increases traffic, will be welcomed. Make friends. Often they are gamers just like you.


Cameron Guill
Alea Publishing Group
aleapublishing.com

 

[Orcus]

Oh, sorry, you are saying "Be innovative." Equally good yet useless advice. Innovative how? What can a PDF do that people want them to do besides look like a book?

No, I am saying "answer your core business question."

You guys arent answering that core business question.

You are dodging it by blaming bad PDF sales on lack of marketing. That isnt the problem.

I am encouraging you to actually look to the core of your business decision to use PDF. If you cant exploit the medium why are you using it?

PDFs are universally recognized as:

1. cheaper
2. worse quality layout and design since the budget is smaller
3. poor art and maps for the same reason
4. some few may have great ideas but in general the writing and ideas are inferior to print products again because they dont command professional writers and editors.

If you are trying to make a PDF just be a non-printed book you will lose every time unless it is a situation like Monte where they purchaser knows they are getting a professionally written, edited book with art that is exactly the same as a book.

But PDF publishers are generally not PDF publsihers by choice (except Monte) they are PDF publishers by situation. If you had the money to do a printed work you would. But you went on the cheap (like I did initially) because you had to.

No manner of marketing or advertising is going to ever fix the problem that those products are low rent versions of books that people just dont want to spend their money on.

That is why I gave my advice (which is not build a better mousetrap) it is make a core business decision: "why should someone pay $3 for your PDF when they can pay $12 for a printed book which is their clear preference?" YOU HAVE TO ANSWER THAT QUESTION for your business and your format to succeed.

This is pure business theory.

Just like I cant sell audiotapes of me reading my product (who would buy that?) you shouldnt think that you can just sell a PDF of a print product and have it be accepted.

If your answer is that PDF is nothing more than an electronic book and that it doesnt do more that a print product then maybe that is your answer. But the problem is that fails to address your core business question. If you cant give people a reason to buy your product, all the marketing and banner ads and inserts and demo CDs wont change that.

Because right now it sound like at a game table without computers people would rather have print products and at a game table with computers people would rather have true programs rather than PDFs. If that is true, this is a doomed medium. But I dont believe that.

The brutal truth is that PDFs that are essentially poor man's print products dont sell and wont sell ever unless and until you answer your core business question. You are selling the wrong product. I know many of you dont want to hear this but it seems demonstrably true.

If you had quality and reliability (a la Monte) your PDFs would sell. BUT if you had that, then you would have a budget and wouldnt be PDF publishers.

It isnt enough to just say that "but my ideas in the PDF are GOOD!" That has never sold a product. Because purchasers dont know that.

I'm not trying to be down on PDFs. I love them. I think it is crazy that they aren't more widely accepted. But I think I understand why they arent and I am trying to communicate that here.

Now I could just blow sunshine up your skirts and say "yeah, hey all we need is more 'awareness'" but that isnt true. Look around. People are aware. When there is a free PDF download this is good, it is downloaded thousands of times. But charge $3 and it is downloaded 100 times. If it is less than good, maybe 20 times.

I think the unfortunate reality is that you cant just make a cheap book and try to sell it as a PDF and succeed. That is why I am trying to encourage people to make that core business decision.

"Why should a kid spend $3 on my PDF when he can get a print product for $15 that is professionally written, edited and has quality art?"

If you cant answer that question, you dont have a viable business. Period.

Clark

 

[lmpjr007]

I agree with alot of the stuff you have said BUT...

PDFs are universally recognized as:

1. cheaper
2. worse quality layout and design since the budget is smaller
3. poor art and maps for the same reason
4. some few may have great ideas but in general the writing and ideas are inferior to print products again because they dont command professional writers and editors.

With so many current and ex-WOTC Empolyees and random "professional" RPG designers out there who have started to do PDFs, it seems logical that these ideas and beliefs will change.

 

[jgbrowning]

No, I am saying "answer your core business question."

{edited out stuff}

I think the unfortunate reality is that you cant just make a cheap book and try to sell it as a PDF and succeed. That is why I am trying to encourage people to make that core business decision.

"Why should a kid spend $3 on my PDF when he can get a print product for $15 that is professionally written, edited and has quality art?"

If you cant answer that question, you dont have a viable business. Period.

Clark

Very good points. When we decided to publish, we only had one goal:

Put out an awesome product.

We didn't have a lot of money, so fancy art, layout, and production were out of the question. We couldn't afford an editor, so we edited ourselves. We were't going to sell our idea and let someone make money off of it when we could do it ourselves. Not that the idea was gold or anything, but it had value.

I don't think PDFs can compete with standard books unless the content of the PDF is as good, or better than the standard book. I've put out a PDF using cool PDF stuff, Internet Arcana. Over 3000 hyperlinks so one can browse around like mad. I put too much time into it. I should have known better. It didn't sell.

Because in the end, the people want "A better mousetrap." It's crappy advice to tell someone that, but it's the truth, and none of us would argue it.

That's why my only goal is to "Put out an awesome product." I'm aiming for the better mousetrap.

You're dead on when you tell people to addresss their core bussiness. The core business is gamers. Make a good game/supplement, and they'll be happy, regardless of the medium.

joe b.

 

[Orcus]

OK, this has been a fun discussion.

All of this has made me decide to put my money where my mouth is.

Inspired by this discussion, I decided to answer the core question I asked above.

A PDF can:
1. Be focused on a smaller slice of information than a book can. You can have a PDF on different types of swords, for example. It would be hard to do a 64 page book on it.
2. You can be smaller. Print publishers have pretty much given up on anything under 64 pages.
3. Provide support materials that a purchaser of a print product would not want to pay for, but that could be a key part of a PDF.
4. A PDF can repeat content because it doesnt cause a larger print run, where a print product usually has to consolidate stuff and put it in an appendix, which can be unusable.

Plus I thought more about what kind of product would be successful as a PDF as opposed to a print product. Something that is actually MORE appropriate as a PDF.

I came up with something (several things, in fact).

So I am going to test out my theory.

I am going to do a few PDF products and we will see how they sell. God knows I am not Monte Cook so things wont sell on my name. I might even try the first few weeks of release to not place our name on it, just to simulate that situation.

This should be a fun experiment. I just had a three way conference call with the other two guys who are doing it with me.

Clark

 

[jgbrowning]

OK, this has been a fun discussion.

All of this has made me decide to put my money where my mouth is.

Inspired by this discussion, I decided to answer the core question I asked above.

So I am going to test out my theory.

I am going to do a few PDF products and we will see how they sell. God knows I am not Monte Cook so things wont sell on my name. I might even try the first few weeks of release to not place our name on it, just to simulate that situation.

This should be a fun experiment. I just had a three way conference call with the other two guys who are doing it with me.
Clark

Awesome! Glad you're willing to try it out. I like PDF because it makes me feel closer to the gamers, than print often does.

I like knowing that *boom!* that sale just happened. Somewhere a gamer is opening my file for the first time. It makes me excited about a product and excited about the future products.

Welcome aboard!

joe b.

 

[Cergorach]

@Orcus:
I think that the name Necromancer Games has almost as much name recognition as Malhavoc Press, i think you would sell very well using that name.

The "problem" with pdf is that the format is actually meant to print (it was developed as a better alternative to postscript). So i think it's important that it's always kept in mind that the customer will print it.

The last couple of years pdf has been profilated as an ebook format, and it does work well on anything that has an 800*600 resolution or higher, but on palmtops the resolution is just to low to read and as the formating of the pdfs is often set to book size it doesn't fit the screen. The pdf can be changed to fit the screen on such small devices, but that inflates the size of the file enormously (memory for handheld devices is getting cheaper, but a doubling of the file size is still bad).

PDFs can only be viewed with pdf readers, the most common reader is of course acrobat's own reader. That's great for most common desktop operating systems, but again palmtops are again restricted to a single file reader (acrobat ebook reader) which isn't that good.

So the PDF format has it's own inherit problems. I would say that the technology that would make PDFs widely accepted is just not as readily available as we would want. That will change in the next five years, but it would be wise for publishers to keep in mind that very few people read more than a couple of pages on a computer screen (desktop or laptop) and that palmtops (where some people do read thousands of pages on) have totally different requirements than the standard pdf.

Sure electronic documents can do a couple of things that normal books can do very difficult. One of my ideas is to make adventures/sourcebooks where the user can make choices and the document will reconfigure itself to those choices. This can be as simple as changinging the statbloks of the encounter, to changing whole plots. This way the user has maximum flexibility but he will only see what he wants to see. I just don't think it's a good idea to do it with every product (because it will be expensive to do)...

 

[jmucchiello]

Sure electronic documents can do a couple of things that normal books can do very difficult. One of my ideas is to make adventures/sourcebooks where the user can make choices and the document will reconfigure itself to those choices. This can be as simple as changinging the statbloks of the encounter, to changing whole plots. This way the user has maximum flexibility but he will only see what he wants to see. I just don't think it's a good idea to do it with every product (because it will be expensive to do)...

Wouldn't stat block changes on the fly run afoul of the difficulties in including OGC in normal programs? You need to make anything derived from open content (including the javascript that alters your statblocks) must be open content. How is that accomplished in a PDF?

Multiple plots sounds like a lot of work and the user will not see the extra work, they'll only see the path taken.

Notice none of Clark's conclusions involve programming.