With 50 percent of book discovery happening online, and nearly half of all purchases taking place via e-commerce, book publishers require solid and secure websites that not only attract readers and book buyers, but that can also be relied upon day in and day out for promotions, reader engagement, and sales. A website outage -- even a short one -- can be disastrous.

As the fourth largest university press in Canada, Wilfrid Laurier University Press (WLUP) has been publishing scholarly monograms and collections, mainly in the area of social sciences and humanities, since 1974.

The press currently publishes 30 to 40 books per year -- an ambitious publishing program for a small team. This was a big factor in WLUP’s requirement for a website that was reliable, easy to update and maintain, and that provided lots of automated features to minimize the demand on staff time.

Change has been in the air at the University of Regina Press for the past several years; most recently with the launch of its new website. But it started back in 2013, when the press, after 40 years of operation as the Canadian Plains Research Center Press, relaunched with a new brand, a new publisher, and a new goal to expand its publishing program. “Canadian Plains had focused on Indigenous issues, and we have continued that focus,” said sales and marketing manager Morgan Tunzelmann, “but we’ve expanded to include a broader readership and titles.”

In 2020, Canada will be the guest of honour at the Frankfurt Book Fair, the oldest and largest book and cultural trade fair in the world. The honour comes with a tremendous opportunity to showcase Canadian literature and authors on the world stage. “There’s big momentum building up, it’s like an Olympiad,” said Gillian Fizet, executive director of Canada FBM 2020, the organization representing the Canadian publishing industry and its preparations for the 2020 book fair with the funding and general oversight of the Department of Canadian Heritage. “Germans are really into Canada, but they don’t know that much about our literary landscape, in part because we’re often overshadowed by the U.S.,” she said. “When we accepted this honour and started talking to people in Germany, it became quite evident that we needed a promo tool.”