World music publisher and past Media Pioneer awards winner is at it again. Songlines’ Kindle Fire edition went live just before Christmas: the first UK music magazine on the new tablet, according to pioneering publisher Paul Geoghegan.
So far, it’s just available in the US market, but through the Kindle app it can be accessed on iPads as well. The Kindle Fire edition is just a PDF replica of the UK magazine. Songlines has a long association with Amazon, who have the widest catalogue of world music of any online retailer. Songlines’ online digital sampler magazine had links through from reviews and audio extracts to purchase the albums on Amazon. See 2011 Media Pioneers story.
Single issues are selling at $3.99, and subscriptions work out at $2.99 an issue. It’s still early days on sales, so it will be interesting to see updates in the coming months. The edition is just static content for now, but Paul plans to add audio excerpts of music reviewed in the magazine, plus links to the Amazon store to purchase albums. This is where the Kindle Fire tablet and Amazon ecosystem can start to work together beautifully.
Facebook driving voting in Songlines Music Awards
Meanwhile, Songlines have been working hard on their Facebook page, and now have 3,700 likes after less than a year, driven by regular original content from the Songlines blog. There is a sampler edition of the magazine powered by Issuu, and they run regular competitions and concert ticket offers. They have had some big boosts from celebrity world-music enthusiasts – such as the composer of the Slumdog millionaire soundtrack A R Rahman, with over 7 million likes – and are also working closely with artists and record labels. They are using the Facebook community to drive voting in the annual Songlines Music Awards. To date, voting is 250% ahead of last year. The sampler edition of Songlines magazine is also available as a free app on Apple’s app store. The @songlinesmag Twitter feed has now over 3,000 followers, and one person is responsible for both Facebook and Twitter updates.
Overall, an impressive story of how a niche publisher is tying together web, social media, tablet editions and a burgeoning travel business to unite world music fans from around the globe.
The Media Pioneer Awards recognise innovation and entrepreneurial achievement in specialist consumer and B2B markets. Winners are announced at the Specialist Media Show on 24 May 2012. We’re delighted to welcome Audience Media as sponsor for the 2012 Media Pioneer Awards. Audience Media provide a publishing solution with a single CMS to publish to web, print and tablet plus subscription management.
