It seems everyone has an opinion these days on the future of publishing and the imminent death of the book business. What do you think? I personally don’t see the death and subsequent obsolescence of printed books. However, I do see a radical change in the production and delivery of books to readers and I think the changes are great! These changes may bring down the mega chain bookstores and large New York publishers and that doesn’t bother me at all.
I came across an article in the Huffington Post today - The Last Country House Party? E-Books and Publishing’s Phony War by Peter Ginna. Read what Peter has to say. If you want to read the entire article please click on the link above.
From what I can gather around town, major trade publishers have been having a pretty good year — a surprisingly good year, given a lingering recession and the widespread predictions of the death of the book business. And it seems pretty clear a primary reason, perhaps the reason, for our good results is the explosive growth of e-book sales…Even for houses where gross sales have declined, profits may well have increased. And many of us in the industry expect a bonanza after Christmas, when everyone who has just opened their gift Kindles and iPads loads them up with new e-titles to read. We could see a surge in e-book sales that makes the year look triumphant for book publishers.
Right now e-book sales are, not exactly gravy for publishers, but a profitable layer on top of print sales that have yet to fall off drastically…As the e-book trend continues, more bookstores are going to close–both independents and chain locations. Both B&N and Borders have been closing superstores and also devoting more space to non-book items, further reducing shelf space and inevitably book sales.
I don’t know when it will happen, but we’re likely to see bookstore sales go from “declining” to “plunging” in the near future…
If you have not already done so, now is the time to really begin to build your brand online and create celebrity for yourself and your book. Don’t rely on major bookstores and traditional publishers to market and sell your book. Why? Because, it’s just not going to happen. Take control of your writing career. Your fans want to buy your book from you and support your writing career.
Awesome opportunities await you!
