HACHETTE PUBLISHING

Brief:
Update one the largest publishing houses through technical innovation.

What we did:
Using existing technology platforms we brought back to life the richness that lies within great story telling.

Results:
• 300% MORE SOCIAL SHARING
• 30% MORE WEB TRAFFIC

1. THE JOURNEY OF 100 BOOKS

We followed the journey of 100 books we'd planted in various locations. 
• Inside each front cover was a note introducing the project and directing people to the website

• On the site, people could log the book, its location and give it a review

• Once they'd finished reading it, they'd need to leave it in another interesting location for someone else to pick up

• By using readers' involvement, we'd be able to map each of the books journeys, who read them and their experience of it

2. GOOGLE EARTH FLY-THROUGH BOOK JOURNEYS

We created fly-through tours for books set in interesting locations that use the best of Google Earth and Streetview. By taking the reader there digitally, it would further bring the book to life.

• E.g. A Thousand Splendid Suns - the reader could fly to Kabul and see where the first few chapters took place. They could then follow the character's journey into Pakistan and onwards.

• Preset into the reader's journey would be a multitude of pictures, maps and markings that would focus in on parts of the story

3. TWITTER MICRO-STORIES

Authors generally have large followings on Twitter. So, we made the most of this and promoted them and their new releases with Twitter micro-stories. 

• Authors tweeted a micro-story for their followers to pick up and continue in the world they've created - like an exquisite corpse

• They also tweeted an update of a longer story every couple of hours, leaving it at a cliff hanger every time

4. AUTHOR INFLUENCE MIND MAP

A visual exploration that allows readers to explore what influenced an author in the penning of a book. This is especially useful for books that use a multitude of references.

• Each link coming from the main book would be anything that influenced the authors thinking - from books, films, places - you name it

• Users could click through each to gain more info

• These in turn traced back to further influences and enable readers to delve deeper into certain subjects. E.g. real FBI protocols that appear in The Scarecrow that have been researched from the FBI Encyclopedia