YEAR IN REVIEW
Despite the challenges facing our world and industry this year, our team still worked hard to improve and build upon our suite of products so that we may serve as an effective conduit for the flow of books from publishers to booksellers, librarians, and readers. While these challenging times are not yet behind us, Edelweiss remains committed to supporting publishers at every stage of the book’s journey. Check out some highlights below!
Launch of Edelweiss Community
This year, we fully launched Edelweiss Community! While we continue to develop new features and functionality, it's already become a bustling hub for readers. This new mobile-friendly site isn’t meant to be a replacement for Edelweiss+ but rather a simpler interface for readers who don’t need the robust B2B professional features Edelweiss+ offers. Users join reader communities to discover new books and bookish events, access review copies, write and read reviews, collaborate on lists of books, and engage in conversations with other readers.
Edelweiss Community allows publishers to promote their titles to readers and buyers of specific genres (i.e. Fiction, YA Romance) or book professional groups (i.e. ABA members/IndieNext, public librarians/LibraryReads, B&N employees). Publishers can also post their virtual events on Edelweiss Community for free. Learn more about new targeted advertising here.
Coming Soon: Edelweiss Reader
We're very excited to announce the imminent release of our new web-based reader within Edelweiss. This means readers will not need an Adobe ID, Kindle App, or other external app to read digital review copies. Once approved by the publisher, readers may open the review copy immediately to begin reading. All current reading options will remain, but this additional option will be ideal for those who have avoided digital review copies due to technology challenges in the past. Publishers will determine whether their review copies are available on the Edelweiss Reader or not - at no additional charge. Stay tuned for more information coming soon!
Connecting readers to Books with Virtual Events
Virtual book events are here to stay! In June 2021, we hosted our very first Edelweiss Bookfest - two full days of content for book professionals and readers including 75+ sessions, 125+ authors, and 28+ author panels. The success of Bookfest signaled a natural synergy between the Edelweiss community and virtual book events, and we continue to build out opportunities for publishers and authors to connect directly with readers. Learn more about our Editors' Picks and Edelweiss Presents series here, and subscribe to our publisher marketing list to be the first to hear about new opportunities in 2022!
Growth of Edelweiss360 Consumer Collaborative Marketing
Edelweiss360 for Bookstores is a tool that allows bookstores to efficiently promote titles and events to targeted segments of their customers via email – and then track conversion to sales. In addition to achieving email open rates between 40-60%, stores are seeing significant boosts in online sales! With Collaborative Consumer Marketing, publishers can sponsor placement in these email campaigns.
Edelweiss University is open for enrollment!
This year, we launched Edelweiss University, a free on-demand learning management system for Edelweiss user education. Learners can enroll in individual courses or certifications. Publishers can check out certifications for catalog administrators, sales reps, and more. We continue to add to our course catalog, so keep an eye out for new learning opportunities in 2022!
International Growth
This past year, we've added resources, prioritized development items, and cultivated relationships with international bookshops and publishers - all in the name of improving Edelweiss' merit and flexibility in many different international markets. With the upcoming addition of Edelweiss Designer and the rollout of the web-based reader, we continue to build upon the value that our platform provides internationally.
Investments in Site Performance
As our user base and product offerings expand, we continue to invest in ongoing improvements to site performance and speed. Cloud-based big data processing technologies allow us to scale our data ingest routines and accommodate ever-growing data streams.
Services Architecture Improvements
We've implemented more independent services in our application architecture to speed deployment of fixes and new features, take advantage of more efficient cloud-based hosting resources, and promote overall site resiliency.