Filipino Writer Signs Book Deal with McGraw-Hill Education Asia

This is a press release.

[January 20, 2004] Janette Toral, the site owner of DigitalFilipino.com (https://digitalfilipino.com), signed a book publishing contract with McGraw-Hill Education Asia for her 2nd book – DigitalFilipino.com E-Commerce Workshop E-Book last December 3, 2003. She is the first Filipino writer to be published by McGraw-Hill Asia.

The DigitalFilipino.com E-Commerce Workshop E-Book was first offered as a free comprehensive online learning designed for individuals who would like to learn more about it. Close to 1500 Internet users from all over the world signed up and received 16 lessons in 8 weeks through e-mail. Janette Toral explained,“I offered it first as an online workshop to help me test the content and market acceptance for such a book project. Surprisingly, in less than a month, close to 800 individuals joined the online workshop. This helped sell the idea to McGraw-Hill in publishing this book.”

The McGraw-Hill Philippines office took notice of the book project and pushed it to its regional office. According to Estela Suyat, General Manager of McGraw-Hill Philippines, “We’re excited with this project as this is the first Filipino book to be published by us in the region. More than just the content, market potential is very important. The size of the DigitalFilipino.com community and the role it plays in advocating for e-commerce literacy was vital for its approval.”

With 2000 copies to be printed, the book will be out this May 2004 and be sold at the retail price of 280 pesos. In preparation for its release, Janette Toral is organizing a 5-day E-Commerce Trainors Workshop this May 17 to 21, 2004 for instructors and professors who’ll commit in using her book for their e-commerce subjects.

Toral noted that hardly any educational institution is offering an e-commerce elective subject today due to lack of instructors and affordable reference material that students can use. “Most books on this subject are very expensive and are not reflective of the country’s situation. That is why we’re not only offering the book, but semi-annual trainer training as well to equip the instructors with the latest hands-on knowledge on this subject to be passed on to their students.”

Despite the dotcom crash, Toral believes that e-commerce is growing and bustling. “There’s so much hype about the crash. But actually, only those who don’t have solid business models and were not prudent failed. Those who kept re-inventing themselves are moving on and gradually growing their business.”

Toral’s free e-commerce workshop online initiative was not left unnoticed. It got nominated in the World Summit Awards (http://wsis-awards.org) to represent the Philippines in the e-learning category in 2003. This year, her free online workshops just got nominated in The Tech Awards (http://www.techawards.thetech.org/). “I used to ignore these awards and not pro-active about them. However, nominations made people take us more seriously.”

The E-commerce Workshop Online also bagged the runner-up prize in the E-Services Philippines Best Education Award.

Praises for the DigitalFilipino E-Commerce Workshop E-Book

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About Janette Toral
Janette Toral is the founder of the Philippine Internet Commerce Society and dubbed as the mother of the E-Commerce Law as she actively lobbied for it from 1997 to 2000. She published the 1st e-commerce book in the country titled, “The DigitalFilipino: An E-Commerce Guide for the eFilipino.” She launched https://digitalfilipino.com in September 1999 to promote her book prior to publication and became the country’s premiere e-commerce resource site today.

About McGraw-Hill Education
McGraw-Hill Education publishes more than 400 titles per year, including textbooks, study guides, multimedia products, testing materials, online learning systems and software across all education and professional markets.