The digital transformation has also impacted the publishing sector, bringing a series of challenges to overcome in order to benefit from the innovations of current technology, markets, and society. This was the focus of the roundtable in which Ximdex participated during the VII Digital Conferences. Here’s what was discussed.
On June 7 and 8, 2018, the VII Digital Conferences were held, organized by the Union of Spanish University Presses (UNE) and the CSIC publishing house. This year’s edition focused on the digital environment and the challenges it presents.
The first roundtable on the opening day, following the inaugural conference, centered on the “omnichannel efficiency” of the publishing sector. Titled “Do Androids Dream of University Publications? A Commitment to Omnichannel Efficiency,” the discussion featured our CEO, Juan Prieto, offering his perspective on this timely topic.
New technologies, and particularly the advent of the internet, have brought significant changes to every aspect of our lives and across all economic sectors. Juan Prieto illustrated this radical shift by comparing snapshots of the same event taken years apart.
Changes in How We See the World
The first example is the election of Pope Benedict XVI in 2005, where everyone focused on the white smoke without any device obstructing their view. In contrast, the photograph of the next conclave in 2013, when Pope Francis was elected, is illuminated by hundreds of mobile phones and tablets capturing that historic moment. Technology has fundamentally changed how we see and understand the world.
This evolution and progress have given rise to multichannel communication, meaning the use of multiple channels for user interaction and engagement. In the publishing sector, this translates to publishers offering their clients content through various channels and formats, allowing the customer to choose how they want to consume it.
This multichannel and multi-format philosophy must be adapted at every stage, from the author of the work to its distribution. This leads to experiences radically different from traditional ones, such as the use of augmented reality to tell stories in new and more immersive ways.
Adapting the use of channels from the very inception of the work gives rise to omnichannel communication. This concept refers to leveraging all existing channels and integrating them into a unified, coherent vision.
Changing Models
The advent of new technologies has also drastically altered economic models, along with their products and the ways they are understood and distributed. We have transitioned from a scarcity model, characteristic of Mass Media, to a bidirectional model that introduces the new figure of the prosumer (producer and consumer).
During the 1980s and 1990s, the scarcity model was firmly established. Communication was unidirectional, flowing from a few to many. There were only a handful of television channels or radio stations, cultural products (newspapers, books, records) were sold in physical formats, and distribution chains were limited.
The arrival of the new millennium marked a paradigm shift, moving from Mass Media to Prosumer Media. The economy became bidirectional, and consumers transformed into prosumers, capable of both consuming and producing information.
Now, goods are no longer sold exclusively in physical formats; electronic products have emerged and coexist in the same market. There is more space and demand for segmented, niche, and differentiated products. New distribution channels, such as the internet and remote sales, have also emerged.
During the earlier era, the Pareto Principle—also known as the 80/20 rule—prevailed. This general rule is often used to explain a wide range of phenomena, stating that 80% of consequences come from 20% of causes. For instance, in a company, 20% of the customers generate 80% of the profits, or in software development, 80% of the bugs are caused by 20% of the code.
However, things are changing, and this paradigm shift has given rise to an evolution from the Pareto Principle to the Long Tail. That 80% which, according to Pareto, could be discarded because it only generated 20% of the results, is now bearing fruit and currently accounts for over 60%.
The driving force behind this change is technological innovation, which has significantly reduced storage costs (almost negligible in digital formats). Intermediaries are disappearing, e-commerce is flourishing, logistics are becoming more efficient, manufacturing is more flexible, products are more personalized, and globalization allows them to be sold worldwide.
In conclusion, this roundtable highlighted how technological, market, and societal innovations contribute to strengthening the academic publishing sector’s capabilities in publishing and management phases.
See you next week!
