How to create a new revenue stream by developing content for interactive whiteboards

SMART Technologies, the inventor of the SMART Board and industry leader with over 64 percent market share in North America, has posted an on-demand webinar to show publishers different ways to create new revenue streams using interactive whiteboards. Here are some highlights from the presentation.

Publishers are facing many challenges in the current education climate, including a decline in print product demand as educators’ needs shift from paper-based to electronic content. Other challenges include:

1. Free content proliferation
2. Changing distribution channels
3. Shorter product cycle times
4. Need for new revenue streams

How can my company succeed in the instructional materials business when so many adoption states are cutting back on spending?

In this new blog series from AEP, “What’s Keeping You Up At Night?, experts offer their advice on the most pressing issues facing the educational publishing industry. AEP members may sign up for a free half-hour consultation with the experts for 30 days after their entry is posted.

The following question was posed to our current featured expert, Mark Grayson of Six Red Marbles.

Q. How can my company succeed in the instructional materials business when so many adoption states are cutting back on spending?

A. California opts for open-source texts! Texas scales back science spending by 50%! To survive these days, you’ll have to throw out decades of conventional wisdom about adoptions. Consider these points:

Look where the money IS, not where it used to be.

There are new opportunities on the tech side, the instructional supplies side, and in other booming markets, from after-school to charters to home-school. Are your offerings integrated with an accountability system so schools can make a case for federal Race to the Top funds? Are there other grants that you can help your customers tap?

FCC Works on National Broadband Plan for Education as More Schools Move Toward Open Digital Texts

On August 20 the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) held a National Broadband Plan Workshop on education to receive ideas for the plan, which is due 181 days from the date of the hearing. National broadband development focuses on ways that technology and telecommunications infrastructure can further the national priorities of education, job training, energy, environment, health, the economy and public safety. The FCC seeks collaboration on developing the plan, and hopes to obtain exemplars, best theories, data, research and evidence.

Do micro-payments motivate people to make more purchases?

In this new blog series from AEP, “What’s Keeping You Up At Night?, experts offer their advice on the most pressing issues facing the educational publishing industry. AEP members may sign up for a free half-hour consultation with the experts for 30 days after their entry is posted.

The following question was posed to our current featured expert, Sameer Shariff of Impelsys Inc.

Q. Do micro-payments motivate people to make more purchases?

A. We are in global recession, budgets are in free-fall, and readers are becoming increasingly price sensitive. In times like these, publishers must experiment with different business models to discover what works best for them. One model that invites further exploration and experimentation is micro-payments.

To start exploring this model, publishers should first identify untapped market segments that are willing to pay a small price for a limited time access to content.

Learning Platforms for the 21st Century and Beyond

The 2009 AEP Summit session “Learning Platforms for the 21st Century and Beyond,” presented three different cutting-edge technologies that could be used to deliver content to students. Jeff Keltner from Google, Laura Porco from Amazon.com, and Michael Riordan from the Open Publishing Lab at Rochester Institute of Technology discussed why classroom technology is 10 years behind the consumer world and how their products could be used in the education market.

All speakers agreed that the students are the biggest driving force behind advancing the technology in the classroom. Keltner said that for every generation, technology is what is invented after the students were born. Reflecting the advancements of iPhones, laptops, and social media sites, students expect their education to be mobile, use multimedia, and have the ability to involve the community. Riordan concurred that students are asking their teachers to use educational technology that lets them learn together; they want teachers to abandon podium-style lectures for a dialogue.