The book publishing industry has a longstanding cultural history. A purveyor of prose, from the informational to the odd, the groundbreaking, the hard-hitting, humorous, and beyond, publishers have been responsible for connecting readers with books for centuries.
But, where does the publishing industry stand in the digital age? And, how are readers connecting with and consuming books? Well, the book industry isn’t quite as digital as you might think—these days, books (and the shelves that hold them) are proving incredibly Instagrammable.
Here we explore digital transformation in the publishing industry and how publishers, retailers, and consumers approach books in the 2020s.
The Publishing Industry in a Digital Age
The Revival of Print Books
Before we delve any deeper, it's important that we address a significant book publishing industry trend: physical books are currently outselling eBooks in the US.
In the UK, there has also been a notable rise in physical book sales, with Nielsen BookScan data reporting a 2.1% increase in print publishing industry value from 2017 to 2018—a trend that is most likely set to continue.
It appears that despite our mass migration towards a digital existence, we’ve entered a tangible publishing renaissance.
But, what is driving the change?
What’s particularly interesting about this development is the fact that despite being living, breathing digital natives, Millennials (people born between 1981 and 1996) are largely responsible for the recent spike in physical book sales. In fact, 63% of physical book sales in the UK are attributed to readers under the age of 44, while 52% of eBooks were bought by those over 45.
Like any budding industry-wide trend, pinpointing the exact driving forces is no easy feat, but experts believe that recent, challenging, political climates are forcing consumers to look for an escape (both in terms of content and the temporary distraction from the digital world that print books offer). And, the tangible quality of print books is helping to provide a healthy form of escapism, as well as information.
Speaking to CNBC, Meryl Halls, managing director of the UK's Booksellers’ Association, said:
"I think the e-book bubble has burst somewhat, sales are flattening off, I think the physical object is very appealing. Publishers are producing incredibly gorgeous books, so the cover designs are often gorgeous, they’re beautiful objects.
The book lover loves to have a record of what they’ve read, and it’s about signalling to the rest of the world. It’s about decorating your home, it’s about collecting, I guess, because people are completists aren’t they, they want to have that to indicate about themselves.”
A perfect storm of physical beauty, the desire to one’s reading history, and an ever-growing will to get away from the screen and absorb their favorite prose, distraction-free. That’s one driving force behind the physical book renaissance.
Digitalization in Book Publishing
Amanda Jones on Unsplash
Amanda Jones on Unsplash
Now, while the consumption of physical books is on the rise, a digital approach to marketing and distribution is still on the menu.
Chris Lavergne, the CEO of youth culture magazine, Thought Catalog, documented in TechCrunch his brand’s experiment of dabbling in print.
Among his many discoveries, the forward-thinking CEO found that while eBook formats sold more units for him (due to their cheap and instant nature), print copies generated seven times more revenue.
So, it seems that while eBooks are still popular in certain niches, print publishing provides a more valuable revenue stream in the current climate.
The launch of Amazon Kindle in November 2007 (the first wave of products sold out in five and half hours) popularized the eBook format, making literary content of all varieties accessible at the swipe of a screen or the click of a button.
A range of digital touchpoints and online eBook sellers (including Amazon, Apple Books, Smashwords, and Barnes & Noble) offer the allure of convenience and cost savings. Moreover, this radical digital transformation has made it possible for budding authors to self-publish their work through eBook distribution platforms like Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP).
But, while digital transformation has made the book publishing more accessible to the masses in terms of creative opportunity, marketing freedom, and the increased flexibility of consumption—which has perhaps remove some elitism from the industry—from an insider perspective, this deluge of new content is not entirely positive.
Dominique Raccah, Publisher and CEO of Sourcebooks, believes that the digital revolution presents two primary issues:
An excessive amount of digital literary content perhaps devalues books in terms of integrity and pricing. While offering consumers value for money is great, this model is driving down the value of eBooks.
An overwhelming influx of eBooks, both from official publishers and self-publishers, may be serving to bombard consumers with marketing communications, making consumers feel like people are constantly trying to sell prose to them.
These two factors could well correlate with the tangible book renaissance. General eBook sales fell by 4.5% in the first quarter of 2019 and since 2012, Kindle device sales have been in steady decline.
But in the meantime, digital audiobook outlet, Audible, has reported a significant increase in sales ($1 billion worth in 2018 alone) in recent years—indicating that digital readers now favor the dynamic format of the audiobook, coupled with its consumer convenience. A trend that appears to correlate with the evolution of digital technologies, the rise of mobile, and also podcasts.
Taking a Hybrid Approach to Marketing
Book publishers have an all-encompassing Philippines Photo Editor role that covers proofreading, copyediting, book development, printing, formatting, distribution, and of course, marketing.
Physical books may be outselling their digital counterparts at the moment, but the rise in audiobook sales serves to remind us that in our hyper-connected age, there is a solid mix of mediums, formats, and outlets available when it comes to connecting an audience with a work of prose.
That said, for publishers and retailers, taking a hybrid approach to marketing is the route to success in the digital age.
A solid mix of traditional promotional tactics coupled seamlessly with innovative digital marketing communications that extend to all relevant consumer touchpoints will help publishers and authors cut through the noise, connecting with the right audience in the process.
Let’s take a look Penguin Random House: note that like other big publishers, Penguin merged with Random House in 2013 to combine talent and resources. As one of the true innovators of the publishing industry, the great minds at Penguin not only revolutionized the paperback in the 1930s, but as a brand, has always moved with the times, cementing the brand’s longevity. Generations of readers belong to the Penguin family—and this is likely to be the case for years to come.