Major, Major Market trends in Publishing

 
Major, major market trends in book publishing




By Dr Ned Roberto & Ardy Roberto
 
 
The past two weeks have been an immersion in the publishing world. First, the Jr MRxer was in Singapore to attend MarketSquare Asia 2010, an exhibit and conference for Christian Publishers. Second, was the last week's Manila International Book Fair (MIBF) at the mamoth SMX MOA convention center in Manila Bay where we received a Gintong Aklat Finalist award and did two days of book signings. So this week, we let go of the usual format of this column to answer a question that has been on every marketing professional and executive in the publishing industry: what are the major market and consumer trends in publishing? In particular, we focus on trends in the book publishing. 


Aside from the MBIF exposure and observations last week, the trends we cite below are from the MarketSquare presentation of Jim and Ellen Elwell, senior executives of Tyndale International, one of the largest Christian book publishers in the world. The Elwell's presented 9 trends in publishing, 3 or 4 of which I will share with you. 


Market Trend #1: "Books are not dead."
The good news for publishers is that books are not dead. Based on the waves and waves of books that were displayed and being sold at the MIBF, consumers are still buying books. National Book Store, the Philippines largest retailer of books, is opening 10 new bookstores this year on top of the 120 stores that it already has. The sales of the JrMRxer's publisher, OMFLiterature, for the past 3 years has been increasing; they've also expanded into retail opening 10 specialty book stores in the same period.

What was different this year at the MIBF was the presence of at least two booths featuring digital books. For the first time, homegrown VIBAL Publishers, led by it's tireless 85 year old President and Founder, Esther Vibal (who is a finalist for this year's Ernst and Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award), had a booth that was almost solely dedicated to display its foray into e-books. Vibal proudly shared with me that they now have 200 book titles digitized and available on Amazon's Kindle and Apple's iPad among other digital readers.
The Elwell's report confidently declared: "Books are not dead...they're just shifting in how they are published and where they can be purchased."  The bad news is that, except for a few publishers like Vibal and Diwa, Filipino publishers seem to be anxious or unsure on their strategies to take advantage of this digital shift. 
The book is not dead, it's just taking a new form.
That leads us to the next trend...


Market Trend #2: "eBooks will eventually outsell printed books"
Book marketers are waking up to this eventuality. At last year's MIBF, a Publishers' Representative who sells books and journals to the school library market commented that scholarly journals are all but published digitally and sold online. The Elwell's shared a July 26, 2010 Publishers Weekly report that with the Kindle reader now priced at below $200, "sales (of ebooks) have tripled....and Kindle eBooks now outsell hardcover editions on Amazon.com" They also estimated that within the next 12 months, eBooks will also outsell softcover books! (Remember Richard Gordon's presidential campaign promise to have each Filipino student have a Kindle reader instead of lugging a ton of books in their backpacks? That alone should have been worth 10 million votes. Oh well...) 
A client gifting the SrMRxer with an iPad recently signaled for us the beginning of a new digital era. People reading some kind of book or magazine on a Kindle, iPad, or mobile phone in planes, classrooms, and cafes are becoming a common sight. When Apple launched the iPad this May, they sold more than 3 million units in just 80 days. Businessweek says that iPad sales are estimated to reach 5.5M units in 2010 and will double to 13 million in 2011. 
While sales of iPad-like readers are going to increase exponentially (China's manufacturers already have their own version of the iPad ready for sale) publishers who digitize and market their books online now have a global opportunity to supply readers with a library of ebooks. Reflect on this for a moment, the Elwell's report that 56% of China's 420 million netizens (internet users) are looking for books online. 
To illustrate the boom, the Elwell's shared that Tyndale's sales of eBooks on Amazon rose from US$20,000 to US$1M in just 24 months.(Half of which were sold in the past 4 months.)
Wait, we are not yet finished. We haven't even counted the Mobile/Smartphones that are and will be used for reading books. Yes, books on your mobile. People already have bibles uploaded in their mobile phones. In Japan, 400,000 "copies" of cellphone novels were sold in 2007. In the Philippines, the JrMRxer is helping GoNegosyo launch GO NEGOSYO SMS (Success Motivation Serye) where the public can receive daily "sachet" installations of Go Negosyo's self-help and inspirational stories of entrepreneurs for P2.50 a day (via Globe and Smart; text GONEGO to 2910). The launch of GO NEGOSYO SMS  will be held during the Go Negosyo Youth Summit at the World Trade Center this September 27th.
The implication to publishers, according to the Elwell's is "E-publish or perish!"


We'll visit 2 or 3 more market trends in publishing (touching on trends in product and promotions) in our next column!
         
WE welcome your comments and questions. Send them to us at MarketingRx@pldtDSL.net or DrNedmarketingrx@gmail.com. God bless!