Book Review: A Simple Girl - Stories My Grandmother Told Me

I've collected biographies of successful businesswomen, female diplomats, and other fascinating women all my life. They fill a bookcase six feet wide and seven feet tall. So, when I heard Josh Flagg, young star of BravoTV's Million Dollar Listing had written a biography of his grandmother, Edith Flagg, who arrived in the US with just $5 in her pocket after WWII and quickly rose to being one of California's top fashion designers, I immediately ordered a copy from Josh's site.

It arrived in the mail today and is already even better than I expected. The stories are all written as Josh heard them, in his grandmother's voice, so you feel like she's sitting beside you. And her stories are wonderful. Fashion school in Vienna; fighting with Dutch underground against the Nazis; her initial take on American fashions (secretaries dressed shockingly like hookers to Edith's European eye); and the birth of her fabulously successful business in Los Angeles.

Most biographies are frustratingly sparse on photos, but this one is packed, including a picture of the dress that sold a million copies. (How many of us have sold a million units of anything?)

Josh has two co-stars on the real estate reality show that's made him famous. One has just come out with a real estate book to further his business, the other spends all his time "building my brand." Josh, instead, has published a book in which he is only a very minor character. And he's giving 100% of the net profits to charity. In fact, he hopes to raise more for charity by allowing online buyers to pick how much they'd like to pay for their copy, anywhere from $20 to $1000.

In this week of thankfulness, and at a time when I'm finalizing plans our year-end promotions, etc., it's good to be brought down to earth a bit. Really it's all about following our passions and a life well lived. I have the feeling Josh, no matter what he ends up doing, will be more successful in life than those other two fellows.

My New Subscription & Membership Site Benchmark Report: Real-Life Stats for a Too-Hype-Ridden Industry

My labor of love, a real-life stats Benchmark Report for the paid content industry is published at last. Since 1986, my entire career has centered around publishing and marketing subscription content. At first print publications, then in 1992 electronic site licenses, and finally in 1995, Web-based subscription sites.

In fact, one afternoon in mid-1995, I did a press conference, to publicize the launch of a subscription website, at the National Press Club in Washington DC. Back then the reporters in the room wondered aloud, "Who will ever pay for content on the Internet?" 15 years later, hordes of people, including an unseemly number of reporters, still wonder if paid online content is possible.

... which makes me crazy. I'm SO proud of my industry, the industry I both grew up in and helped to grow up. Tens of millions of American consumers and businesses are paying customers of subscriptions to online content at this very minute! I estimate $14.88 billion will be spent by Americans on online subscriptions in 2009. Next year, that number will almost certainly jump by another billion. And that's not even counting subscriptions sold elsewhere (match.com alone is in 24 countries.)

So, that's why I started, what turned out to be a gargantuan project, gathering a complete collection of real-life stats about every aspect of the online subscription and membership site industry.... including stats on traffic, profits, conversion rates, renewal rates, M&As, you name it.

The Subscription & Membership Site Benchmark Report is packed with 185 charts, tables and illustrations, most of them both new for 2009 and exclusive.

Lots (and lots) of thank yous --

• The 302 subscription and membership site executives who took my (long) survey, revealing their real-life stats on everything from profits and conversion rates to typical renewals.



• Our indefatigable reporter, Natalie Myers, who examined 550 subscription sites' pricing, search marketing, and site design for the Observational Study included in the Benchmark Report.



• The Specialized Information Publishing Foundation (SIPF) who allowed us to analyze and slice out their data on 87 subscription site publishers.



• Tim Kerber CEO Membergate, Russell Perkins CEO Infocommerce Group, Charlie Terry head of CWT Group, Bill Baird of Baird Direct, Miles Galliford CEO SubHub, and David Evans head of Online Dating Insider who all actively encouraged their readers and clients to take our executive surveys.



• Compete Inc, the VSS Communications Industry Forecast, Forrester, Belden Interactive, MarketData Enterprises, Pew Research Center, Vindicia, and Ask500People for allowing us to include pieces of their data in the Benchmark Report so it's as complete as possible.



• Everyone on the design-side, including Terra Hughes, Steve Hicks, Sissi Haner, Shawn Baron and Ron Perry, all of whom went beyond the call of duty, often after-hours, to help make this Report beautiful and easy to read.

I could not have done it without any of you. This Benchmark Report was truly a community effort. Without the efforts of more than 500 people who were involved in some stage or other, it would not have been possible.

Thank you so much. Now let's go build a bigger, hype-free, naysayer-free, bigger and better industry!