Andrew Davis

A bit of Andrew history.

Tippingpoint Labs is a Boston-based online content marketing agency. Since 2002, Andrew has been creating and implementing digital content strategies for consumer brands including Putnam Investments, TomTom, and Breville.

Prior to Tippingpoint Labs, Andrew developed and marketed products for ThinkAgent Technologies, SallieMae Solutions, and The Stock Market Photo Agency. He developed content for broadcast networks including CNN, Fox News, ABC Family, NBC and CBS.

Andrew also managed the Muppet workshop for The Jim Henson Company in the late 1990's, working on films, Muppets from Space and Elmo in Grouchland, as well as TV, Sesame Street and Bear in the Big Blue House. He has a B.S. in Television and Film from Boston University. He co-authored a book of short stories in 1998 entitled "The Way Things Were." In 2001, Drew co-wrote and produced a documentary film called "Roadside Ambition: One small town with two huge balls." (Couldn't make this up.)

Since online content is Andrew's specialty, in his session he will connect the dots between such content and new opportunities in print. I ask him 5 questions.

1. Andrew, what kinds of "online content" will you be addressing in your session? The phrase covers an awful lot of territory.

   The life-blood of the Internet is content: user-generated content, articles, blog posts, comments, editorials, videos, podcasts, transcripts, interviews…and the list goes on and on.

   In our hour together, I'm going to focus on text- and image-based content opportunities for today's print or creative professionals. We'll look at a wide-variety of content creation platforms and channels (including Flickr and SlideShare) and we'll talk about how we can start turning web-based text and image content into valuable printed content.

2. Seems to me that you're promising to deliver a kind of silver bullet to us print producers and manufacturers. Have you helped clients turn e-content into printed content? Can you share a few examples?

   First of all, there aren't any magic bullets (or silver bullets), but what I am promising to deliver is a creative approach to redefining the role print plays in a new media world. My job is to challenge print professionals. Television didn't kill radio, radio didn't kill film and moving pictures didn't kill still photography. The World Wide Web isn't going to kill print. Printers just need to evolve.

   At Tippingpoint Labs we've created online content for one of the world's largest construction companies, one of the country's most successful retail real estate firms and an internet technology provider - all of whom took web content we created and turned it into large print runs of corporate marketing material. Everything - and I do mean everything - that we've written, photographed or videotaped is designed to work across media. That's the most cost-effective way to create content in a new media world. Only the best content - the content that works - ends up being printed. Therein lies the value of print as a medium.

3. I think that people with their feet planted in printing have to appreciate the significance of the shift to online content - without viewing it as "The Enemy." Do you agree?

   Sure, but it's hard to view a publishing platform like the World Wide Web as anything but a printer's enemy when the barriers to production are so low. Today, everyone's a publisher. What print producers and manufacturers must do is embrace the new media opportunities and, in effect, elevate the stature of print as an even more effective communication medium. The web is merely a proving ground designed to validate your content or to build a platform for your content's distribution.

4. 4. Where do you suggest that we begin to understand/study the complicated online landscape? What resources do you recommend? Is there a simple roadmap?

   Unfortunately, I don't think there is any simple online road map. To be frank, I don't think there every will be. The ever-changing nature of the web prohibits the generation of any uber-guide. As soon as it's created, it's out of date. I would recommend that any professional start by reading the Wikipedia definition of Social Media. Notice the constant referrals to the words content and publishing? The new media world is full of opportunities to repurpose existing content.

5. What will your audience take away from your session?

   It's my hope that after attending my session, print professionals will be able to revisit their client's web properties with a new approach to winning higher impact, innovative new print business. Gone are the days of a constant stream of product brochures and corporate literature; the future is in the creative dissemination of the most effective online content. For corporate print buyers, I hope they go back to their office looking for ways to take their existing online content and turn it into longer lasting, high-impact, consumable, offline print material. Overall, I hope all attendees feel excited to be on the frontlines of the evolution of the print industry.

Thanks so much, Andrew. Your session topic really injects some innovation into our Conference program.

If you want to see online content in a whole different light, select Andrew's session for 3:15 on Wednesday, November 4th, when you register for the Conference - and check out his 1-minute video. His firm's web site is www.tippingpointlabs.com.