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I’m excited to begin using my year-long free subscription to Britannica’s Online Encyclopedia. They’ve recently launched a digital presence aimed at drawing people into their content. By using their blog, widgets, free subscriptions, updates via Twitter, & soliciting contributor feedback, they are seeking out people who are actively engaged in reading & publishing online content.
Britannica is giving you many options for choosing, aggregating, displaying, & consuming their content. This flexibility allows them to display their brand to a wide audience. Online publishers looking to add valuable & trusted content to their site will benefit from the instant recognition of Britannica.
It has been a long time since I have used actual books to do research (not counting the standard text books in high school & college). I can vividly picture slaving over World Book & Britannica during the mid 80s to early 90s; this was one of the few ways to get accurate information in bulk about a great many things. From my late college years until now, though, I have relied almost exclusively on getting the information I seek online. Unfortunately for libraries & encyclopedias, so does just about everyone else in the world.
Companies like Britannica & Sports Illustrated are starting to understand that simply pushing their content to people the same way they did 20 years ago doesn’t cut it. They have both been somewhat irrelevant in terms of perceived worth. I haven’t subscribed to SI in over 10 years; I get ESPN the Magazine instead. Those who have read both will know why. Similarly, I visit ESPN.com more frequently & for longer periods of time than SI.com. I even pay for an ESPN Insider subscription; for $4 a month I get the magazine & access to content I find interesting or insightful.
Recently, SI has literally opened up its vault. You can now access any article, story, etc. from any issue, ever. Do you know how many sports blogs there are? Lots of opinion, but coming up with something truly unique on a regular basis is difficult. Sports fans love nostalgia; smart publishers will take advantage of this. SI.com will benefit from an increasingly engaging web presence.
One brand, Britannica, I had completely forgotten about. The other, Sports Illustrated, had become a commodity. I will now incorporate them into my regular media production & consumption routines. Once antiquated brands have now given themselves a chance to re-engage a lost audience while, more importantly, appealing to new ones.
