As I perused many different publishers websites I though about the various audiences they are trying to reach: readers, booksellers, authors, journalist, teachers, librarians, and those looking for publishing jobs. I looked at many different types and sizes of publishing houses: from small to large and from literary to religious. In the end, there were two sites that stuck out to me for different reasons. Let's start with the good one first.
I came to the Macmillan site via one of their imprints TOR books. I found this site because I wanted to look into the publisher of one of my favorite author's Charles de Lint. As I looked over the TOR site I discovered that they were an imprint of Macmillan and so I quikly moved over to their site. The thing that I liked right away were the drop down categories at the top of the page: books, authors, publishers, services. Right away there is easy access to the different books catagories, all of the author's that they publish in any of their imprints, all of the different imprints, and information for teachers, booksellers, and librarians. On the page itself is informatipn about a featured books, news and press releases, a book trailer, author tours and events, information for book clubs, and much more. Then if you just link to one of their imprints, such as TOR/Forge books, you find even more specific genre focused information: more book trailers, podcast, reading group guides, and links to their Facebook, Myspace and Twitter pages.
All in all I would have to say that they are doing a pretty good job covering most all of their bases over at Macmillan.
On the other hand, the Random House website left a lot to be desired. Though they try to appeal to many of the same audiences the organization of the site is just not as accessible. The top of the page does have drop down categories for books, authors, features, and newsletters and alerts, but the majority of links to specific information is found scattered throughout the sidebars and at the very bottom of the page. Additionally, there are no links to any imprints, only one book trailer, and too much moving around to see the things that were interesting to me. Fianlly, this may be a little nit-picky, but when I went to the book categories and look under gay and lesbian titles there were none listed. I found a drop down which allowed me to look through past months, and did find some titles, but honestly I found it to me a little silly to have a category without having a single title listed. Overall, I think that Random House needs to reorganize their website to make it more user friendly.
Friday, January 16, 2009
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2 comments:
I never guessed you for a fan of de Lint. Okay, I didn't know who that was before following the link. Still, I find it fascinating what people like to read. Is that kind of thing you write, too? How's the writing group going, by the way?
I do have a story that i am working on right now that has a de Lintesque quality to it. The writing group hasn't taken off quite yet, we have a meeting a week from this Sunday.
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