Targeting Teachers to Sell E-Textbooks

With the jury still out on digital iPad textbooks, publishers are adapting a new strategy for selling e-textbooks, according to The Chronicle of Higher Education. They’re pitching them to professors by integrating the digital format with course-management systems they probably already use.
Blackboard announced that it will partner with publisher McGraw Hill and college bookstores Follett Higher Eduction Group and Barnes & Noble college booksellers. Together, they will sell textbooks through the tech company’s course-management system. This will allow educators to connect online assignments from e-texts directly to existing online grade books.
“We think the easier we make it to use Connect, the more likely it is that people will use it,” said Mary Skafidas, vice president for communication and marketing for McGraw-Hill Education.
CourseSmart, a distributor of e-textbooks, similarly announced a new feature that will better link its texts with major course-management systems. CourseSmart calls its new service the “Faculty Instant Access program.” So far, only 10 universities will be testing the pilot program, but they hope to have it widely available soon.
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