eBook Sales Increase as Print Declines, New Marketing Opportunities?
March 29, 2011 3 Comments
Since the introduction of eBook readers, the technology has morphed and changed drastically. From eInk displays, to iPads, and even most smart phones now, the number of eBook purchases has been climbing steadily. Typically offered at a discounted rate, eBook sales are increasing nearly every quarter. Couple this with Borders filing for bankruptcy and closing 30% of its stores, it makes you wonder which direction publishing will go. Amazon reveals that it sold 143 eBooks for every hundred print books last year.*
A recent study found that people using digital readers, on average, read 6-10% slower than physical print.** Though research has also found that owners of eBook readers increase the amount of time reading overall by nearly 40%.** As eBook sales continue to rise, publishers are struggling to maintain a dominant hold on the markets while powerhouses like Amazon step in as new distribution methods.
Proliferation of digital media offers up new and exciting social and media marketing opportunities. With cell phones came location specific ads, texting, and apps. Future speculation aside, advertising opportunities and competitive prices offer new and exciting opportunities to use the technology as a tool in any effective marketers arsenal.
Whether its having access in ways you didn’t before, or simply just convenience (1st year of law school + 50 books = no brainer for me) eBook reader use is drastically increasing. What that means for publishing, a $35 billion a year industry, nobody knows, but we sure are excited to find out.
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*http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/jacketcopy/2010/11/ebook-sales-headed-for-1-billion.html
**http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703846604575448093175758872.html
You’re probably right. It gives the really bigs one more op to strangle all others in the long run.
Maybe that is a good thing? Or perhaps it may not happen at all? As more ebooks are sold online, the price decreases. Maybe we will see a huge rise in content being purchased, albeit online. If the costs of distribution is less, I suspect that new marketing techniques will arise to monetize and control delivery just as with print media. DRM embedded in ebooks, to discourage sharing or copying, for example. What I am more interested in though, rather then speculating on the future of distribution, is the new marketing techniques. What do you hope to see, or hope not to in terms of advertising and marketing? How would you feel about paid ads accompanying a book at a discount rate, something like that? Or even on the advertising side, now that people can more readily self publish?
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