Manu Vatuvei and students from Ranui Primary school share a good book. Image courtesy of Photo Sport

In June 2009 Konica Minolta together with the Vodafone Warriors launched Rugby League Reads in Auckland.

The AC team was challenged to show kids that ‘reading is cool’ and to encourage them to learn that reading is a valuable life skill whether they dream of becoming a rugby league player, doctor, fire fighter or dancer.

Children were invited to write a short story or poem about their favourite Vodafone Warriors player for the chance to win a reading session at an Auckland library with some team members. There were four select libraries who hosted RLR 2009, a big thank you to Pakuranga, Waitakere, Glenfield and Manurewa libraries.

Konica Minolta received an overwhelming response from 50 Auckland schools and over 500 individual entries; unfortunately, they could only select eight winning schools.

In addition to the library readings, RLR 2009 included a surprise school visit from Manu Vatuvei. Dropping by Room 11 at St Thomas’s school, winner Zac Chan was presented a signed Warriors shirt by Vatuvei.

Results

The local community newspapers were very supportive and super keen on the involvement of the Vodafone Warriors. We achieved excellent coverage in the East and Bays Courier, Howick and Pakuranga Times, North Shore Times and the Western Leader.

The Vodafone Warriors Community Ambassador Manu Vatuvei was especially appealing and gained coverage in the New Zealand Herald on two occasions; Warriors fire young literary imaginations and Warriors at school spread the words.

Select Vodafone Warriors were also interviewed on radio; Kevin Locke and Manu Vatuvei featured on Newstalk ZB with Mike Hosking discussing their views on literacy and joking about each others reading skills.
Brent Jameson was interviewed on both BigFM and Radio Rhema regarding the RLR programme.

Online media also played a role on helping generate awareness about RLR with articles featured on times.co.nz, nzherald.co.nz, stuff.co.nz, infonews.co.nz and voxy.co.nz

PublishMe was created in May 2007 by Jane and Graeme Beals who established Zenith Publishing Group in New Plymouth 17 years ago. They identified self-publishing as a growth area due to the impact of digital technology and the internet on traditional publishing methods.

We interviewed Graeme for the nzherald.co.nz Inspired People blog last year and discovered what a wonderful business model he and Jane had.

The internet has made self-publishing much more exciting and accessible. With PublishMe’s wider goal of lifting the quality of self -published books, we could not resist working with them to tell more people about it.

Jane’s opinion piece Note to Self : Write my Book featured in the online Herald business section and was very well received and republished on getfrank.co.nz , grownups.co.nz and livemygoals.com.

Jane was invited to talk on TV1 ‘s Breakfast programme after this. She presented a great case for why folk who wish to write a book, whether for pleasure or for business – should self-publish. 98% of unsolicited manuscripts are rejected. PublishMe received unprecedented hits to their website after that interview adding around 300 new sign-ups to publishme.co.nz.

Jane has also been interviewed on Kiwi FM – Radio Wammo, EasiMix, NewstalkZB as well as having been featured in the Herald On Sunday and quoted in Unlimited and NZ Marketing magazines. NZ Business mentioned PublishMe in a review of ‘Deliver’ – Ray White NZ CEO Carey Smith’s first book, which he chose to self-publish and was pleased with the end result.

We introduced Carey to PublishMe, and he continues to be a good advocate for the business. He mentions PublishMe in his media where appropriate.

Of course we share their ongoing story to interested online communities on Twitter, Facebook and Linkedin.

It does not end there. Jane and Graeme will continue to benefit from the growing numbers of businesspeople writing a book. Their website now caters for this growing sector .  Fred Stewart, Dr Tom Mulholland and Fiona Christie are also recent ‘featured” business authors.

Enquiries continue to grow. Many people are realising they have a book inside them. The Sunday Star-Times Magazine Sunday is currently interviewing a few of PublishMe authors.

This online community will continue to benefit from the confluence of new technology (like the Oce printer- an Amazon.com like super-printer), the world-wide-web as well as the growing feeling that self publishing is a viable, quality option for authors.

Thankyou YouTube, Twitter, Facebook and WordPress for making self-publishing accessible, easy and the creating confidence in authors of today to persue this route.

We interviewed Carey Smith for our “Inspired People” Blog on www.nzherald.co.nz about 12 months ago. In this interview he mentioned how he had planned to write a book.

So many people do. But Carey delivered on his promise. We feel proud to have been part of the team that helped to make it happen.

• We encouraged Carey to create a web 2.0 social networking & sharing enabled site
• We linked him up with another client of ours www.publishme.co.nz who helped him create and publish the book.
• We worked with his great web team – Big Fish Marketing - to assist him in creating a site that would display his media links and enable people to read up great testimonials and download chapters
• We syndicated some of his content onto mainstream online media to generate some hype
• We shared our enthusiasm for his book and the content on Twitter, Facebook and Linkedin
• We networked him into Unlimited, (the mag), NZ Business, NZ Marketing , ASB Business Breakfast TV and also press and mentions on radio and other online sites.
• We have bought some of his great books and plan to share them amoung our other clients – the people who can benefit – leaders.
• It was a great project to work on from beginning to middle. The end is no where in site as his books are now selling on www.publishme, www.trademe.co.nz, www.nile.co.nz  and a host of other sites.
• We are encouraging him to write again.

About Carey Smith

The basis of many of my achievements has been an annual letter that I write to myself. The book Deliver is part of one of those promises, and I have had great enjoyment in bringing it together. I hope that it becomes something that I can continue to build on.

At a Glance

• Chief Executive of Ray White New Zealand. Ray White New Zealand has more than 125 offices nationwide, transacting approximately $5 billion worth of property sales per annum.
• Chief Executive of The Loan Market New Zealand. The Loan Market New Zealand has 38 brokers facilitating $600 million in loans per annum.
• Entered the Real Estate Industry at the age of 17 and joined Ray White Group in Australia in 1990 as an Auctioneer and Development Associate
• Assisted in the changeover and conversion of United Realty to Ray White Zealand, which I have led for the past 10 years
• Currently involved in the international expansion of Ray White
• Inaugural recipient of the Chairman’s Cup 1996 and White Family Trophy 2005.
  Author of the book Deliver.
• Ex-Rugby League player and current referee.
• Proud, family oriented Father

From the outset of the brief from Results.com we knew that we wanted to ensure that our client received recognition for bringing Tom Peters out and that the market acknowledged the firm for showing leadership in a time of upheaval in New Zealand small and medium business.

• We interviewed Tom Peters on what he felt were the key issues facing small to  medium businesses and the world;
• This inspired live TV3 ASB Business coverage in an interview with Emma Brannam complete with Results branding behind Tom (who was charming by the way) and interviews with both Tom and Results.com MD, Ben Ridler for The Herald on Sunday, www.nzherald.co.nz , The New Zealand Herald’s The Business, the National Business Review and NewsTalkZB;
• Of course we shared some of his pithy thoughts on Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin and Scoop as well.