Reinier Evers of trendwatching.com

Reinier Evers, the Dutch trend watcher, entrepreneur, and presenter has created an empire of trendwatching, relying upon a network of 8,000 spotters around the world.  His monthly trend brief is sent to over 130,000 business professionals in more than 120 countries and his daily updated site, Springwise, is a must read for those trying to stay in-the-know.  He talks to PSFK about his business, about independent publishing and what keeps him motivated. 

1.  There seems to have been so many changes in independent media and publishing. What’s changed in your world – in media and personally?

We’ve turned Springwise New Business Ideas into a daily updated site, while our monthly trendwatching.com Trend Briefings are getting longer and longer, and yet, we still spot more new business ideas than we can post. There are a lot of innovations, new ventures, trends out there, AND even more spotters and other trend sites to let us know about them. So there’s just no end to topics to report on. I think we’re not only experiencing information overload, but innovation overload as well. And there is no excuse not to know about anything anymore. So we’re hiring more people to track even more sources. It feels like the playing field is wide open: even though bigger media companies are getting ‘it’ now, few companies have nailed the global aspect of publishing: truly having a global outlook, and working with smart people all over the world, much like PSFK is doing.

2.  To what extent is the publishing you do your business or your shop-front? How has that changed over the last year?

It’s still very much our core business: we’re now working on a trendwatching.com 2007 Trend Report that is really an extension of our publishing business. Springwise is all about publishing and relies on advertising. So compared to last year, publishing has become even more prominent. We are doing fewer customised client presentations for example, as we need all our time for output on our sites. Think the key to success right now is to maintain a clear proposition, a clear focus for readers: amidst the abundance of everything, they will want experts for each and every topic, niche etc.

3.   Beyond any financial reward, what do you get out of it all? What drives you?

Spotting trends and new business ideas is a great excuse to travel, to meet people, to read anything and everything…it of course also involves hours and hours of researching and writing, scanning not-so- interesting documents for that one gem, answering countless emails…but to be able to satisfy one’s curiosity and getting paid to do that is worth it

4.  Are you conscious of YOU the brand as much as your site? Do you leverage the fact?

We set out to build trendwatching.com and Springwise as brands revolving around observations from spotters worldwide and a huge amount of diverse sources. However, when it comes to presentations, I am more than happy to be the company’s spokesperson…and add a bit of a personal and opinionated view to our output.

5.  How do you view the other independent publishers that cover the same content areas as you?

The more the merrier. The smart ones will always manage to give a different spin to topics that all of us may eventually cover:  different advice, different local touch, different context….and yet it also encourages us to try to get even more scoops: we’re more focused than ever to get new companies to contact us first…so ‘competition’ ‘keeps us sharp.

Anyway, it’s a good spot to be in: only a small fraction of business professionals has turned to non traditional sources: the market still has huge potential for growth, and more players actually grow the market and add to visibility of the sector!

6.  How is mainstream media covering your content areas? Is there a noticeable reaction to what you and your peers are doing?

We get loads of media coverage for our trends: journalists can always get a quote from us, on a very short notice, so
they’re happy to contact us and we’re happy with the exposure obviously.

7.  How is your world going to change over the next 12 months?

The biggest change will come from a number of new services aimed at connecting: tools to connect all of our trends, services to connect our subscribers to jobs, to events, to each other. And we’re working on setting up a number of ventures that are not trend-related or info-related, but rather trend-inspired: we see so many cool new business business ideas pop up all over the globe, that it’s time to build us a few of our own again. There has never been a better time to be an entrepreneur than now;-)

Thank You

Springwise

Trendwatching