Publishers Launch - Alfredo Santana - Wiley

These are my continuing notes from the Publishers Launch conference held on 7/26.

Permissions are the original micro-transaction.

Challenges with old permission systems:

mystery of ownership

time consuming process

small per-transaction profit

lots of freebies offered 

The last two above make you question if it is worth it.

Repurposing of content has driven permissions demands from ad-hoc to systematic, from low accountability to high accountability, from low profit to high profit. 

There was a dedicated and trained staff with an internal system connected to subsidiary rights, but they were detached from the customer. 

Goals for RightsLink:

improve customer service

be trusted (which the CCC (Copyright Clearance Center) offers automatically)

integrate seamlessly with existing DB and eCommerce site

tailored to Wiley's business rules and licensing terms

customizable messages, redirect, STM rules

retains publisher/publication branding throughout 

They set priority for journals as first product because of the volume of the requests; next was online books, and finally print books. Different product lines had different sets of rules. 

The entire process was 10 months, largely because of the number of products, rules and guidelines. 

Worked closely with editorial and marketing to choose which titles were included. IT provided metadata feeds and cover images. Legal group drafter terms and conditions documents for the site. Coordinated world wide.

Offered customer self service. RightsLink had the following benefits:

• immediate clearance (within a few minutes)
• directly from point of content or title
• quick and intuitive made it very easy to use
• available 24/7
• secure online payment (no worries for Wiley about someone having bad credit -- that is handled by RightsLink)
• user can purchase across multiple publishers in one transaction (more appealing for a customer to have wide selection rather than just Wiley)
• the site is transparent to the user -- looks just like it is part of the Wiley site
• a transaction used to take 4 to 6 weeks, now it is instant

CCC handles:

• technical issues
• invoicing
• payment
• debt chasing
• visually impaired access (coming soon)

There is robust reporting for the business

200-400% revenue increase in the first year and year-to-year increase of 65%

Not only has it improved the process, but the number of requests for permissions has increased -- it grew the market.

The permissions department now has real revenue which has given in clout within the business.

Smaller amount of staff doing more.