Children are flocking to virtual worlds and online games. Club Penguin, Stardoll, Moshi Monsters and Farmville have become well-established brands in the online world. It makes sense that some of the biggest brands in children’s publishing are now getting in on the act. This year saw the launch of Pottermore, and Scholastic’s Horrible Histories World. And the concept of ‘transmedia’ – taking a story across several different media – was much discussed at The Bookseller’s annual Children’s Conference in October.
 
A virtual environment can, of course, bring a child’s favourite book to life – but importantly, it can also create additional revenue for the publisher. The most popular revenue models for online worlds are:

• Free basic subscription and paid premium access (to exclusive content, higher game levels and so on)
• Sale of merchandise (real or virtual goods). This can either be done via a straightforward e-commerce route, or via coupons that can be redeemed for relevant products (books or tickets, for example). Coupons can be a great way to encourage children to try new books.

But children are a tough audience, and less forgiving than adults if a site doesn’t capture their imagination. The top things (in my view) that a publisher should get right, are:
 

• Make it fun. Focus on the story, and the journey through the site, and keep children busy. Of course great design is important, but if you don’t have great activities, you’ll lose your audience
• Make it social. Being the only child in the playground can be a very lonely experience.
• Give children a reason to come back. Different layers of games – graded by difficultly, for example, or themed differently (as with Horrible Histories World) – will give them a reason to come back to the site again and again
• Keep it simple. If a site is too complicated, a child will lose interest. It has to tread that fine line between being interesting and easy to use
• Reward users for completing challenges. If a child has done something well, reward them. Give them access to different levels of a game, or vouchers for virtual goods, or a coupon towards something real
• Keep it safe. Moderate content properly to make sure it is safe for children to play in. If you’re allowing social interaction on your site through free text, make sure it’s properly moderated and there are clear user guidelines
• Manage the community. Help children get round the site, by using signposts, or a ‘host’ within the community
• Think about the parents. They’ll be the ones forking out for subscriptions or merchandise, so make sure you’re offering content that they’ll want to buy for their children. Make content informative as well as fun
• Promote it. It’s not enough to build an online environment and then wait for people to find it. You must put resource behind it to promote it properly. Start with your existing channels (Facebook, website and so on) but consider advertising and point of sale promotions too.

Online environments don’t signal the death of reading – far from it. They can actively promote books to children, and pique their interest in new characters and stories. But just as a child will clamour to see a film adaptation of a favourite book, so they will seek out the virtual environment that brings that book to life. An online world that presents new challenges, new content and new games for a child is like giving them a new variation of that film every day, and letting them star in it.

Steve Richards is MD of specialist social media agency, Yomego (www.yomego.com)