Chapters Indigo Makes a Brave Play into Online Social Network
http://www.bookshorts.com/ - September 21, 2007 -- As of Monday morning, visitors to the national retailers home page will see two new green tabs tucked up into the top right hand corner of the home page. Those two little tabs represent a very brave move on the part of Canada's national book retailer. They are the launch point into a robust and amazingly well-thought out nline community forum that Chapters hopes will provide a locus for booklovers that buy.
Self-described as a "retailer that fell into technology" rather than a technology company that sells, the online team has diligently perservered in pulling together a hybrid user experience. It pulls standard blogging features together with the most popular elements of social networking, made facile by close-at-hand content represented by the books in the systems database. After joining the community and creating a Profile, users will be able to personalize lists of books they love, have read, or intend to read; post comments and mini-reviews, and of course most exciting to the cross-over fan like BookShorts, embed videos!!
The Facebook-like Group feature in the new Chapters Community area will allow pretty much all the benefits of that feature, with a particular eye to the needs and rabid desires of book clubs. Artists get special consideration too -- if you are an author, director, actor or creative of any type, you'll be able to create your Profile and start a Group fan club, and identify yourself as the star :)
Kudos for Chapters Indigo for doing in their retail environment what has been sorely lacking in any of the major online news and entertainment portals -- they are giving us Canadian bibliophiles a fantastic place to hype, cajol, educate and convert ourselves into the best supporters of Canadian artists that we can be!
Visit ChaptersIndigo.ca for a Monday morning launch, September 24, and a bunch of cool contests and stuff that we're told will come online in October.
Self-described as a "retailer that fell into technology" rather than a technology company that sells, the online team has diligently perservered in pulling together a hybrid user experience. It pulls standard blogging features together with the most popular elements of social networking, made facile by close-at-hand content represented by the books in the systems database. After joining the community and creating a Profile, users will be able to personalize lists of books they love, have read, or intend to read; post comments and mini-reviews, and of course most exciting to the cross-over fan like BookShorts, embed videos!!
The Facebook-like Group feature in the new Chapters Community area will allow pretty much all the benefits of that feature, with a particular eye to the needs and rabid desires of book clubs. Artists get special consideration too -- if you are an author, director, actor or creative of any type, you'll be able to create your Profile and start a Group fan club, and identify yourself as the star :)
Kudos for Chapters Indigo for doing in their retail environment what has been sorely lacking in any of the major online news and entertainment portals -- they are giving us Canadian bibliophiles a fantastic place to hype, cajol, educate and convert ourselves into the best supporters of Canadian artists that we can be!
Visit ChaptersIndigo.ca for a Monday morning launch, September 24, and a bunch of cool contests and stuff that we're told will come online in October.
Labels: book networks, chapters indigo
posted by BookShorts @ Friday, September 21, 2007
<< Home