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PressReader Brings the Replica Edition of The New York Times to the iPad
A big announcement was just made on our PressDisplay Blog that for the FIRST TIME EVER, The New York Times Replica Edition is now available on the iPad brought to you by PressReader.
Yup, you heard it right!
The New York Times Replica Edition subscribers can now download PressReader for free to their iPad, and authorize it with their Replica Edition subscription. Once authorized, readers can set up automated delivery of each new issue to their device and read it online or off at their leisure.
The New York Times Replica Edition provides access to an online replica of the print edition of the day, from cover to cover, including The Sunday New York Times, The New York Times Magazine and The New York Times Sunday Book Review. Similarly to the web experience, The Replica Edition for the iPad is enhanced with the following functionality:
- Auto-delivery of the title when it is released
- Zooming to the graphical view of the page, or text view of each article
- Printing full pages or articles
- Listening to articles using on-demand audio
- Adjusting font size and type
- Automatically aligning with the beginning of an article using the optional SmartZoom feature
- Full Retina display optimization for the new iPad
The New York Times is one of over 1,000 publishers who have chosen NewspaperDirect as their digital (replica) edition partner, and PressReader as the app to deliver their digital replicas to their subscribers on the iPad. Some other notable publications that can be authorized through PressReader include The Washington Post, The Globe and Mail, National Post, The Australian, The Irish Times, Irish Independent, The Guardian, El País, ABC, La Nación and China Daily, to name just a few.
The Replica Edition of The New York Times for the iPad is free for existing Replica Edition and home delivery print subscribers, $19.99 for a 4-week recurring subscription and $259.87 for an annual recurring subscription.
You can read more about this exciting release on our PressDisplay Blog.
The Toronto Star’s new digital product bundling strategy
The Toronto Star just announced a new product bundling offer to promote their newly launched SmartEdition. As stated in the article below, the Philadelphia Media Network also successfully implemented a similar product bundling offer when launching their SmartEdition just over a year.
You can read the complete article published on the INMA website and here’s an excerpt:
Product bundling is a common marketing strategy that involves offering several items for sale as one combined product offering.
This strategy is often utilised by cable television companies, who tell subscribers that, if they want channels A, B, and C, then they need to also subscribe to channels D, E, and F. Then there’s the fast-food industry, which is a master of the combo-buy — in effect, product bundling.
In the last two years, the Toronto Star has become skilled at bundling a variety of products to our print subscribers. The result has been a nice lift in consumer revenues.
Recently we launched a new product bundle offer that includes a Star ePaper subscription and Kobo Vox™ eReader. The Star ePaper, powered by NewspaperDirect, is a replica of the print edition.
Many newspapers market their e-papers (a.k.a. digital replicas) on their Web sites as a bundle subscription with print. In some cases, consumers can subscribe to the digital-edition only. The Star does not currently promote a Star digital replica subscription on our Web site.
We partnered with Kobo, an e-reading service provider, and chose to bundle the Star ePaper with their Kobo Vox™ eReader, which is akin to Amazon’s Kindle Fire or the Barnes & Noble Nook Tablet™ in terms of price and tablet-like features.
This device is a low-cost alternative to a full-service tablet and retails for about US$200. The Kobo brand is well-known in the Canadian market, and we thought it was important to bundle with a brand that consumers would recognise.
The Toronto Star is not the first newspaper to test a digital subscription with a tablet device.
In the fall of 2011, Philadelphia Media Network bundled a tablet along with a digital subscription. They chose the Arnova 10 G2 tablet and marketed a one-year and two-year digital subscription to Philadelphia Inquirer and Philadelphia Daily News.
The New York Times and Barnes & Noble also ran a promotion, which included a subscription to The New York Times and a free Nook Simple Touch eReader.
We had internal and external research on tablet usage and buying trends, thus we knew there were many people who intended to purchase an e-reader or tablet in the near future.
We decided to test this new offer to a small segment of existing weekend service subscribers who pay by credit card. This group was selected for several reasons:
- As existing subscribers, they already have an affinity for the Star.
- For whatever reason, they only subscribe to print on the weekend, so perhaps this new way of accessing the weekday edition would appeal to them.
- They already pay for their subscription by credit card, which is a requirement for the bundle offer we were introducing.
To date, the response rate from this target audience is in line with the average direct mail response rates to a non-subscriber file promoting traditional print. That’s not too bad.
The response is even more impressive when you consider that, as part of this offer, these subscribers also maintained their existing print subscription. In effect, they have opted to spend incremental revenue with our brand, not simply switch from print to digital.
Malaysia’s Largest Tabloid Newspaper, The Star, Launches ePaper, Powered by NewspaperDirect SmartEdition Technology
We have partnered with The Star Malaysia to launch an enhanced digital replica version of The Star, Malaysia’s largest-circulation daily tabloid. The Star ePaper, which went live on April 1, 2012, offers the paper’s subscribers new tablet and online editions, both powered by NewspaperDirect’s advanced SmartEdition and PressReader technologies
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“Expanding the distribution of Malaysia’s favorite English newspaper to reach readers across a complete range of channels and devices is the surest way to engage with tomorrow’s readers and provide today’s subscribers with a wide range of options,” said Alex Kroogman, CEO of NewspaperDirect. “The Star is setting a benchmark to which other publishers should aspire.”
The new, digital replica editions deliver 100 percent of the content from the printed publication, including the Main Paper, StarBiz, Star2, and Star Metro. The Star ePaper gives subscribers two new ways to read the paper: online via the Web or downloaded to a PC, smartphone (iPhone and Android), or tablet (iPad and Samsung Galaxy Tab). Advanced digital features of the Star ePaper include:
- Instant switching between Replica/Page View and Article View
- Engaging, cover-to-cover reading by simply swiping from page to page
- Share stories on Facebook and Twitter or via e-mail
- A “Listen” option to hear articles read aloud
- Convenient zooming of text and enlargement of articles and photos
“Smartphones and tablets provide a fantastic growth opportunity for The Star by enabling us to give our readers the content they want, the way they want it, where they want it,” said Wong Siah Ping, chief operating officer, digital business. “We chose NewspaperDirect as our partner as they have the technology and worldwide distribution channels to reach our existing and new mobile subscribers, wherever they are.”
Boston Globe Introduces New Digital Replica Edition
The Boston Globe today launched “The Boston Globe ePaper,” a new digital replica edition of the Globe newspaper featuring new interactive functionality, enabling subscribers to enjoy the experience of reading the Globe print edition, but on a desktop, laptop, tablet or mobile device. The Boston Globe ePaper is available on BostonGlobe.com, as well as in the iTunes store as a standalone iPad and iPhone app.
“The Boston Globe ePaper allows us to put the actual newspaper into the hands of readers who prefer the print version of the Globe, but may be traveling, or live outside of our delivery area, or perhaps just prefer to read their newspaper on a tablet,” said Christopher M. Mayer, publisher of The Boston Globe. “It further broadens the Globe’s digital portfolio and complements our other digital content offerings, including the web site BostonGlobe.com, the GlobeReader, Boston.com and our mobile apps.”
The Boston Globe ePaper is formatted like the print version of the Globe, including the same sections, articles, photos and page numbers, so navigating the ePaper is similar to reading the print one, but with digital features. The new digital replica edition is powered by NewspaperDirect’s SmartEdition technology and replaces the first generation Boston Globe Replica Edition.
“With the Boston Globe ePaper, we are extending our digital content on all available platforms, in as many formats as possible,” said Jeff Moriarty, vice president of digital products for The Boston Globe. “BostonGlobe.com is already optimized for the iPad, but this app gives users another choice – to download and navigate the entire daily newspaper in an application designed for that purpose.”
Unique features of the Boston Globe ePaper include:
- Availability as a standalone iPhone and iPad app in the iTunes store and on Newsstand
- Offline reading capabilities
- A digital page turning feature
- Page and article printing capabilities
- Bookmarking
- Ability to access back issues
- A navigation bar to scroll through sections, as well as a search option to find specific stories
- A text-to-speech feature to hear articles, or the entire paper, read aloud
- Advertisements in the same layout as the newspaper, with clickable phone numbers and URLs
- Available at 5 a.m.
The Boston Globe ePaper is available for free to all Boston Globe print and digital subscribers. Readers can download it at BostonGlobe.com. Single copy purchase of the app is available on iTunes for 99 cents per issue or $14.99 a month. Globe subscribers can access the iPad and iPhone app for free.
Readers who subscribed to the previous e-version of the paper, the Libre Replica edition, have full access to BostonGlobe.com and the new Boston Globe ePaper.
About The Boston Globe:
The Boston Globe is wholly owned by the New York Times Company (NYSE: NYT), a leading, global multimedia news and information company with 2011 revenues of $2.3 billion, that includes The New York Times, the International Herald Tribune, The Boston Globe, NYTimes.com, BostonGlobe.com, Boston.com, About.com and related properties. The Company’s core purpose is to enhance society by creating, collecting and distributing high-quality news, information and entertainment.
NewspaperDirect Extends its 10-Year Collaboration with The New York Times Company to Deliver New Replica Editions for Consumer and Education Markets
We are excited to announce that we have just launched three new Replica Editions for The New York Times, The Boston Globe and International Herald Tribune.
The New York Times Company was one of the first publishing collaborators of NewspaperDirect when it joined the company’s global Print-on-Demand network. For the past 10 years The New York Times has been one of the most-requested publications of the more than 2,000 titles delivered by the 1,200 print stations NewspaperDirect operates in more than 100 countries.
The two companies have now expanded their relationship to include the design, development, hosting, technical/customer support and payment processing for the Replica Editions of The New York Times Company’s flagship publications. The new Replica Editions will be available to existing print and digital subscribers and will be included in The New York Times and The Boston Globe Newspaper in Education (NIE) Classroom Subscription Programs for K-12 teachers and students.
Powered by NewspaperDirect’s SmartEdition technology, the replica editions deliver 100 percent of the content from their printed publications, with advanced digital features such as:
- Offline reading so subscribers can access the news even when they’re not connected to the internet
- A new “Listen” option to hear articles read aloud
- New and convenient ways to browse and search
- News alerts via email on topics important to subscribers
- Ability to easily adjust pane and font sizes, or view pages side-by-side
- Bookmarking
- Page and article printing
- Back issue access and unlimited access to NYTimes.com
The New York Times, The Boston Globe, and the International Herald Tribune join a growing list of over 1,000 publishers who have chosen NewspaperDirect as their digital (replica) edition partner, including The Washington Post, The Globe and Mail, National Post, The Australian, The Times, The Daily Telegraph, The Guardian, El País, Le Figaro, The Wall Street Journal Europe and South China Morning Post, to name a few.
Having one of the world’s most-honored newspaper publishers select NewspaperDirect to power the replica editions of its elite portfolio of titles is testimony to our technology leadership and operational excellence,” said Alexander Kroogman, NewspaperDirect’s CEO. “Being awarded their digital replica business through a highly competitive bidding process reaffirms NewspaperDirect as the industry leader in ePublishing solutions.
The Replica Edition of The New York Times is free for print subscribers, $19.99 for a 4-week recurring subscription and $259.87 for an annual recurring subscription. The Replica Edition of The Boston Globe is part of its subscription package, which includes BostonGlobe.com, and is offered at $3.99 per week. The Replica Edition of the International Herald Tribune is offered at $14.99 for a 4-week recurring subscription and $194.87 for an annual recurring subscription.
