Softcover Is A New Self-Publishing Platform Aimed At Technical Authors

Softcover is a startup offering what it calls a “frictionless” platform for self-publishing e-books.

Co-founder Michael Hartl is an author himself, having written the Ruby on Rails Tutorial. (He’s also a repeat entrepreneur, having founded Y Combinator-backed social-networking startup Insoshi.) Hartl told me via email that between a publishing deal with Addison-Wesley and direct sales from the tutorial website, the book has made $750,000 — and Softcover is based on that experience:

Originally, Softcover came from scratching my own itch: I wanted to make follow-on products to the Ruby on Rails Tutorial, a book and screencast series that has become one of the leading introductions to web development. I knew from experience what a pain it is to make a new website, install a sales system, and upload the files to make them available, and I didn’t want to have to do that for every new product. I also wanted to use my custom-built Rails Tutorial production system (or something comparably powerful) to output multi-format ebooks from common source files. Finally, I wanted the same level of control with additional products as I had with the Rails Tutorial, including full access to my customer list and support for custom domains. I couldn’t find such a service, so a couple of friends and I built Softcover.

And that’s basically what Softcover offers with an e-book self-publishing system that recently left private beta. It allows authors to view an HTML version of their book as they write, publish HTML, EPUB, MOBI, and PDF e-books on the Softcover website, and bundle those e-books with screencast and other media to create premium packages. (Hartl said the e-books can include “syntax-highlighted code listings, numbered tables and figures, mathematical equations, and linked cross-references.”) In exchange, the startup takes 10 percent of the sales revenue.

Hartl emphasized that the startup will still give authors a lot of control. For one thing, they can offer a free version if they want (something that he credits for the Ruby on Rails Tutorial’s success). In addition, the system is open source, writers will have access to their sales lists, and they can use custom web domains, so there’s nothing to stop them from moving away from Softcover if they choose.

With features like the code and screencast support, Softcover seems to be a particularly good fit for technical authors, but Hartl said it can also produce “less heavily formatted documents such as nonfiction books and novels.” He added that he wants to lower the technical barriers to using Softcover’s production system (right now it’s “best-suited to writers who are comfortable using a text editor and a terminal window”), and to introduce a marketing guide to help new authors build an audience.

Softcover has been funded by profits from the Ruby on Rails Tutorial. Hartl said he’s open to taking outside investment “on the right terms.”

Introducing Softcover.io from Softcover on Vimeo.

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Banjo Raises $16M To Grow Its Experiential Real-Time News And Events Platform

Startup Banjo has raised a new $16 million Series B round of funding, bringing its total raised to date to $21 million. The round was led by Balderton Capital, and included participation from BlueRun Ventures and Vegas Tech Fund, among others. For the Redwood City-based startup, the fresh injection of cash means ramping up growth, through talent recruitment, international expansion and building out its media platform product.

The startup has evolved from a mostly consumer-focused product that let you view the social media updates of people around you, to a cross-platform product that allows both consumers and media companies to experience and share real-time events and headline-making news as they unfold across the social web. The startup recently debuted its first web-based version, and also introduced Rewind, a product that allows users to re-live specific events in the past over again, and provides a historical look at what was going on in the world at any time you choose.

“Banjo is all about delivering live content that is indexed by location and context, however when people miss a news or major event, Rewind allows the user to relive the moment,” Banjo CEO and founder Damien Patton explained in an interview. “It’s the first location-based social graph, with a complete historical reference, drawing on posts that may have otherwise expired on your Facebook, Instagram or Twitter feeds.”

I asked why this is different from traditional news media, which is now seen by many as inferior to Twitter or the social web as a news source since it’s usually so far behind. By the time something makes the evening news, for instance, it’s already been tweeted about nearly to the point of audience saturation – Patton says that there’s a difference between experiencing something on the social web and reading or listening to a constructed retelling, however.

“With Rewind, you can go back and catch those moments through the eyes of the people who were actually there,” he said. “Even a breaking news event such as the Boston Marathon bombing or [yesterday's] building collapse in Harlem, New York, by the time it’s trending on Twitter or you’ve figured out the correct hashtag, it’s likely you already missed a significant amount of content.”

The company, which was founded in 2011, partners with media companies including NBC, FOX and BBC to provide them real-time looks at the public response to big news stories and major events like live sport as they happen, and also offers consumer-facing apps for mobile and now the web. Patton says both point of focus are important to the company, and feed one another.

“Both [enterprise and consumer products] are of equal importance as the media partnerships drive consumer growth, and in turn the consumer growth makes our product more attractive to media,” he said. The use of the funding will reflect that dual aim, as Banjo looks to be the bridge between events unfolding in real-time, the people on the ground, and those watching from a distance.

View the original article here

Banjo Raises $16M To Grow Its Experiential Real-Time News And Events Platform

Startup Banjo has raised a new $16 million Series B round of funding, bringing its total raised to date to $21 million. The round was led by Balderton Capital, and included participation from BlueRun Ventures and Vegas Tech Fund, among others. For the Redwood City-based startup, the fresh injection of cash means ramping up growth, through talent recruitment, international expansion and building out its media platform product.

The startup has evolved from a mostly consumer-focused product that let you view the social media updates of people around you, to a cross-platform product that allows both consumers and media companies to experience and share real-time events and headline-making news as they unfold across the social web. The startup recently debuted its first web-based version, and also introduced Rewind, a product that allows users to re-live specific events in the past over again, and provides a historical look at what was going on in the world at any time you choose.

“Banjo is all about delivering live content that is indexed by location and context, however when people miss a news or major event, Rewind allows the user to relive the moment,” Banjo CEO and founder Damien Patton explained in an interview. “It’s the first location-based social graph, with a complete historical reference, drawing on posts that may have otherwise expired on your Facebook, Instagram or Twitter feeds.”

I asked why this is different from traditional news media, which is now seen by many as inferior to Twitter or the social web as a news source since it’s usually so far behind. By the time something makes the evening news, for instance, it’s already been tweeted about nearly to the point of audience saturation – Patton says that there’s a difference between experiencing something on the social web and reading or listening to a constructed retelling, however.

“With Rewind, you can go back and catch those moments through the eyes of the people who were actually there,” he said. “Even a breaking news event such as the Boston Marathon bombing or [yesterday's] building collapse in Harlem, New York, by the time it’s trending on Twitter or you’ve figured out the correct hashtag, it’s likely you already missed a significant amount of content.”

The company, which was founded in 2011, partners with media companies including NBC, FOX and BBC to provide them real-time looks at the public response to big news stories and major events like live sport as they happen, and also offers consumer-facing apps for mobile and now the web. Patton says both point of focus are important to the company, and feed one another.

“Both [enterprise and consumer products] are of equal importance as the media partnerships drive consumer growth, and in turn the consumer growth makes our product more attractive to media,” he said. The use of the funding will reflect that dual aim, as Banjo looks to be the bridge between events unfolding in real-time, the people on the ground, and those watching from a distance.

View the original article here

Banjo Raises $16M To Grow Its Experiential Real-Time News And Events Platform

Startup Banjo has raised a new $16 million Series B round of funding, bringing its total raised to date to $21 million. The round was led by Balderton Capital, and included participation from BlueRun Ventures and Vegas Tech Fund, among others. For the Redwood City-based startup, the fresh injection of cash means ramping up growth, through talent recruitment, international expansion and building out its media platform product.

The startup has evolved from a mostly consumer-focused product that let you view the social media updates of people around you, to a cross-platform product that allows both consumers and media companies to experience and share real-time events and headline-making news as they unfold across the social web. The startup recently debuted its first web-based version, and also introduced Rewind, a product that allows users to re-live specific events in the past over again, and provides a historical look at what was going on in the world at any time you choose.

“Banjo is all about delivering live content that is indexed by location and context, however when people miss a news or major event, Rewind allows the user to relive the moment,” Banjo CEO and founder Damien Patton explained in an interview. “It’s the first location-based social graph, with a complete historical reference, drawing on posts that may have otherwise expired on your Facebook, Instagram or Twitter feeds.”

I asked why this is different from traditional news media, which is now seen by many as inferior to Twitter or the social web as a news source since it’s usually so far behind. By the time something makes the evening news, for instance, it’s already been tweeted about nearly to the point of audience saturation – Patton says that there’s a difference between experiencing something on the social web and reading or listening to a constructed retelling, however.

“With Rewind, you can go back and catch those moments through the eyes of the people who were actually there,” he said. “Even a breaking news event such as the Boston Marathon bombing or [yesterday's] building collapse in Harlem, New York, by the time it’s trending on Twitter or you’ve figured out the correct hashtag, it’s likely you already missed a significant amount of content.”

The company, which was founded in 2011, partners with media companies including NBC, FOX and BBC to provide them real-time looks at the public response to big news stories and major events like live sport as they happen, and also offers consumer-facing apps for mobile and now the web. Patton says both point of focus are important to the company, and feed one another.

“Both [enterprise and consumer products] are of equal importance as the media partnerships drive consumer growth, and in turn the consumer growth makes our product more attractive to media,” he said. The use of the funding will reflect that dual aim, as Banjo looks to be the bridge between events unfolding in real-time, the people on the ground, and those watching from a distance.

View the original article here

How to increase adsense and ad revenue

If you are a blogger and Adsense is your prime source of revenue, you can’t afford to ignore the importance of Adsense optimization. When we talk about Adsense optimization, there are many things but the main target is to get high eCPM and get more Cost per click. Else, despite of good Adsense CTR, you might not be making good money. This is something very common about non-English blog. If you fall in the category of those adsense publishers, who are getting huge traffic but Adsense earning is still low, it’s time to understand points which are mentioned below and this will surely helps to increase Adsense CPC and overall revenue.What is Adsense CPC:

Factors that Affect Adsense CPC :

Domains – Blogs on Internet Domains Like Yahoo, Go Daddy etc. It pays highest CPC.
Gadgets – Tech Gadgets like Apple products
Google – Google Products
Microsoft – MS office
Banking
Automobile
Health
Real Estate
Home Loans
Jobs
Dating & Romance – It pays lowest CPC.

Try to block those category which are completely irrelevant to the content or niche of your blog. Suppose blog is about Technology then block the ad categories for Dating, Politics, Religion etc. This will surely increase your CPC and Adsense revenue.

Lets start with answering basic question first and then we will move to some working tips to increase adsense CPC. CPC stands for Cost per click, in short money which you make/click is what CPC. Now, you might have noticed Adsense publisher talking more about CTR and less about CPC. If you are really serious about your Adsense revenue, you should work more on CPC than CTR. Getting thousands impression on your ad won’t be of much help but a blog with good CPC with decent CTR can create a huge difference. CPC has nothing to do directly with your traffic, if you would realize and noticed micro-niche blogs, you might have realized despite of less traffic such sites make more money from Adsense. Reason is simple and that is eCPM for such blogs are so high that you get paid really well for CPC and then there are other factors like Ad competition, Keywords and many more. Lets discus some of them here:

Niche
First thing first, choosing a right niche for your blog or website is of utmost important. Cost Per Click or CPC of an ad directly depends upon the topic on which you’re writing your blog.Well! Let me clarify one thing here that you’re going to choose niche however there are niches that can pay you high CPC. Yes! Here is the list of niches that can give you high return, I have arranged them in decreasing order of CPC.

Content
Second thing is the content, you must write content that should answer readers query. So before writing blogs try to find what your readers are searching on the Internet and then try to present them with solutions.
Remember you should always directly engage with your readers. Your content must be tailored according to your niche so that more and more readers can read your blogs. Hence good content will certainly ensure higher Adsense CPC rates. More over, Good content is what search engine loves, hence more click and more revenue if your ad is highly targeted and your traffic is from the countries like U.S.A, U.K. When you do a Keyword research, make sure to use Approximate CPC column.

Page Rank
Google Page Rank is not a new phenomena. In this your entire website or a particular page in a website are ranked from 1 to 10. Therefore try to rank above 4, if your PR is 5 or 6 then Google will show ads on your site which will pay you higher if someone clicks on them. Simply it means that ads of higher quality will be more shown on your website. For example your CPC will automatically increase from 10 cents to 40+ cents. So always try to improve the quality of your blogs as CPC directly depends on higher Page Rank.

Ad Review Center
In Google Adsense you will find Ad Review Center. You can go there and see yourself how much each ad category is paying you. This will show you different ads category that are showing on your website. If you find that any ad category is not paying much then feel free to block that category.

Competitive Ad Filter
Just like Ad Review Center there is Competitive Ad Filter in Google Adsense. You can go there and block the specific or general ads from appearing on your web pages. You can block the ads for entire domain or just a particular website in that domain name.The ads that you would block may belongs to your competitors. Therefore you can increase your CPC by not showing those particular ads.

Platform
Your blogs are read from different platforms like desktop, laptop, mobile etc. Although CPC is generally not much affected by the platforms on which ads are shown but you should try your best to target as many as readers. You will get most of the readers from desktop and laptop devices.
If you are able to reach to hand-held or mobile readers than CPC may increase as ads shown on cellphones are of higher quality. If you are blogging on WordPress platform, you can use plugins like Wp touch which will make your blog mobile friendly and you server adsense ads which is optimized for mobile screen size.

Country
One of the most important factor that can increase CPC is the country you are targeting. For example a click on an ad from USA can pay you up to $2 to $3 and click on same ad from India can end up paying only 20 to 30 cents.
Hence always tailor your blog and its content to audiences in English-speaking countries. It will also increase Page Rank of your website. So always keep in mind the country you are targeting.

Text & Image Format
Perhaps I should have explained this suggestion in the beginning of the blog. Anyhow, you must know to choose right format for your ad. If you can place three ads on a page then choose two 336 X 280 ads and one 468 X 60 ad.
Then ad format must be text because text ads have higher CTR (click through rate). You can even try ad format for both text & image simultaneously as it gives you more CPC. Image ads are usually less preferred for both reasons less CTR and lower CPC. Though at times, depending upon the niche and blog type, image ads perform better in terms of higher CTR but CPC won’t be as good as text ads. Anyways, as I mentioned above it differs from niche type and most important ad placement.

Placement
Never neglect the placement of your ads on the web page as it is directly proportional to your Adsense revenue. So where to place ads for maximum CPC? Answer is simple. Place 2 ads inside your blog post and 1 outside the post.As far as placing inside goes then place one 336 X 280 rectangle ad on the top of the blog just below the title and place second 468 X 60 ad in between the blog post. Remaining one ad you can place on your right side that is outside your post.
Though it should be your choice and depending upon your reason of blogging. For example, if you are a professional blogger and dependent on Adsense, you should not miss a chance to optimize ad and use maximum possible ad units on a single page. Though if you are a hobby blogger or blogging on personal blog, your first target should be giving quality content and less ads, as readers hate advertisement which distract them from reading.
Let me tell you the maximum clicks and higher CPC will come from 2 ads which are inside the blog post especially on the top.

Keep Experimenting
Always keep trying something new. Experimenting can really pay you high dividends. You can try out for different niches, choose different ad placements and finally take as many as advice from Google Adsense center. Never bogged down into one style always try something new.

Conclusion
In conclusion I would only say if you follow and implement these 10 tips then you can surely increase your Adsense revenue from 30% to 40%. It is completely legal and genuine way to increase your earning in short time. You can also search for highest CPC adsense Keywords and compile one-two posts around it.
Do let me know what’s one trick which worked for you to increase Adsense CPC? Do you believe niche and traffic from certain countries creates a huge difference in Adsense earning?

Banjo Raises $16M To Grow Its Experiential Real-Time News And Events Platform

Startup Banjo has raised a new $16 million Series B round of funding, bringing its total raised to date to $21 million. The round was led by Balderton Capital, and included participation from BlueRun Ventures and Vegas Tech Fund, among others. For the Redwood City-based startup, the fresh injection of cash means ramping up growth, through talent recruitment, international expansion and building out its media platform product.

The startup has evolved from a mostly consumer-focused product that let you view the social media updates of people around you, to a cross-platform product that allows both consumers and media companies to experience and share real-time events and headline-making news as they unfold across the social web. The startup recently debuted its first web-based version, and also introduced Rewind, a product that allows users to re-live specific events in the past over again, and provides a historical look at what was going on in the world at any time you choose.

“Banjo is all about delivering live content that is indexed by location and context, however when people miss a news or major event, Rewind allows the user to relive the moment,” Banjo CEO and founder Damien Patton explained in an interview. “It’s the first location-based social graph, with a complete historical reference, drawing on posts that may have otherwise expired on your Facebook, Instagram or Twitter feeds.”

I asked why this is different from traditional news media, which is now seen by many as inferior to Twitter or the social web as a news source since it’s usually so far behind. By the time something makes the evening news, for instance, it’s already been tweeted about nearly to the point of audience saturation – Patton says that there’s a difference between experiencing something on the social web and reading or listening to a constructed retelling, however.

“With Rewind, you can go back and catch those moments through the eyes of the people who were actually there,” he said. “Even a breaking news event such as the Boston Marathon bombing or [yesterday's] building collapse in Harlem, New York, by the time it’s trending on Twitter or you’ve figured out the correct hashtag, it’s likely you already missed a significant amount of content.”

The company, which was founded in 2011, partners with media companies including NBC, FOX and BBC to provide them real-time looks at the public response to big news stories and major events like live sport as they happen, and also offers consumer-facing apps for mobile and now the web. Patton says both point of focus are important to the company, and feed one another.

“Both [enterprise and consumer products] are of equal importance as the media partnerships drive consumer growth, and in turn the consumer growth makes our product more attractive to media,” he said. The use of the funding will reflect that dual aim, as Banjo looks to be the bridge between events unfolding in real-time, the people on the ground, and those watching from a distance.

View the original article here