Notes from The Literary Consultancy's conference 2013 - Writing in a Digital Age: Statistics
At The Literary Consultancy's recent conference, Writing in a Digital Age, there was a panel of experts looking back at the past year and developments in publishing. The panel included Steve Bohme of Bowker Market Research. He presented some very interesting statistics about how and why people buy books and e-books.
From interviews with the book buying public, Bowker has discovered the following:
1 in 8 books purchased in 2012 in the UK were e-books and this trend seems to be on the rise.
The figure changes to 1 in 6 of those were purchased for 'own' reading, which shows that when people buy as gifts it's more usual to buy the paperback or hardback copy.
In percentage terms, 13% of all books sold in the UK in 2012 were e-books, and in some genres it was higher. For example, for romance, crime, classic fiction, and true crime it was 20%.
The type of market where e-books have made little or no impact have so far been illustrated books, which only made up between 0-5% of the market.
So far it has been straight text e-books that have been gaining popularity.
Self published books
2% of all 3 million books (all formats) sold in the UK in 2012 were self-published. The figure is higher for fiction books, and hardly any children's books.
Of all e-books sold in 2012 in the UK, 1 in 8 were self-published (for adult fiction the figure is higher: 1 in 7).
Certain genres were more significant: Crime, sci-fi, fantasy, romance, humour.
Interesting statistics were them given as to how people discover books. The most popular ways were:
1. Familiarity with the author
2. Browsing in shops
3. Word of mouth
4. Request e.g. in a shop or library
5. Browse online (half as much as in shops)
For e-books, it is slightly different:
1. Repeat purchase from same author
2. Browsing online
3. Word of mouth (1 in 9)
4. Seen book on bestseller list
5. Read book before (so for example someone may have already read the paperback and then goes on to buy an e-book copy)
For self-published e-books, here's how they're discovered:
1. Browsing online
2. Have read another book by the same author
3. Recommendation/review - online
4. The book is in a bestseller list
5. Word of mouth
From these statistics, it was concluded that social media itself is not a massive driver... unless of course a recommendation of the book is seen on a networking site like Twitter or Facebook.
The initial data that Bowker has for 2013 seems to indicate that 7% of books sales may be influenced by following an author on social media.
When asked where people first saw a book, the answers for all books were that the reader was browsing for a book in particular. But for self-published books it was that a book was recommended, or they were browsing by subject.
When trying to find out why people buy a book, the results were as follows:
The determining factors for all books were:
1. Subject
2. Author
3. Price
4. The book is part of a series
5. Blurb
6. Gift
7. Because of a review
For e-books it is similar to the above, although another determining factor will be that the reader has read an extract from the book.
For self-published books, the order of priority changes when people were asked why they buy a book:
1. Price
2. Blurb
3. Subject
4. Extract
5. Author
6. Series
7. Review/Recommendation
So this seems to indicate that if a self-published book is cheap enough it will sell.
Pricing statistics for self-published e-books was then discussed. The results of the survey show that if a book is priced £2 or over it needs more promotion if it is to sell. The most popular price for e-books was just under £2.
Other statistics were that most book buyers are females, and it is older females who are more likely to buy self-published books, as they are the most avid readers.
For self-published books 3 in 5 are bought by people who read every day.
These statistics are perhaps not surprising to those who are involved in publishing, especially self-published writers, but they definitely give food for thought.
As publishers, whether traditional or self-published, it is important to know what type of things drive potential sales so that we can build a marketing strategy around that.
I'll be posting some more notes from this interesting conference soon.
From interviews with the book buying public, Bowker has discovered the following:
1 in 8 books purchased in 2012 in the UK were e-books and this trend seems to be on the rise.
The figure changes to 1 in 6 of those were purchased for 'own' reading, which shows that when people buy as gifts it's more usual to buy the paperback or hardback copy.
In percentage terms, 13% of all books sold in the UK in 2012 were e-books, and in some genres it was higher. For example, for romance, crime, classic fiction, and true crime it was 20%.
The type of market where e-books have made little or no impact have so far been illustrated books, which only made up between 0-5% of the market.
So far it has been straight text e-books that have been gaining popularity.
Self published books
2% of all 3 million books (all formats) sold in the UK in 2012 were self-published. The figure is higher for fiction books, and hardly any children's books.
Of all e-books sold in 2012 in the UK, 1 in 8 were self-published (for adult fiction the figure is higher: 1 in 7).
Certain genres were more significant: Crime, sci-fi, fantasy, romance, humour.
Interesting statistics were them given as to how people discover books. The most popular ways were:
1. Familiarity with the author
2. Browsing in shops
3. Word of mouth
4. Request e.g. in a shop or library
5. Browse online (half as much as in shops)
For e-books, it is slightly different:
1. Repeat purchase from same author
2. Browsing online
3. Word of mouth (1 in 9)
4. Seen book on bestseller list
5. Read book before (so for example someone may have already read the paperback and then goes on to buy an e-book copy)
For self-published e-books, here's how they're discovered:
1. Browsing online
2. Have read another book by the same author
3. Recommendation/review - online
4. The book is in a bestseller list
5. Word of mouth
From these statistics, it was concluded that social media itself is not a massive driver... unless of course a recommendation of the book is seen on a networking site like Twitter or Facebook.
The initial data that Bowker has for 2013 seems to indicate that 7% of books sales may be influenced by following an author on social media.
When asked where people first saw a book, the answers for all books were that the reader was browsing for a book in particular. But for self-published books it was that a book was recommended, or they were browsing by subject.
When trying to find out why people buy a book, the results were as follows:
The determining factors for all books were:
1. Subject
2. Author
3. Price
4. The book is part of a series
5. Blurb
6. Gift
7. Because of a review
For e-books it is similar to the above, although another determining factor will be that the reader has read an extract from the book.
For self-published books, the order of priority changes when people were asked why they buy a book:
1. Price
2. Blurb
3. Subject
4. Extract
5. Author
6. Series
7. Review/Recommendation
So this seems to indicate that if a self-published book is cheap enough it will sell.
Pricing statistics for self-published e-books was then discussed. The results of the survey show that if a book is priced £2 or over it needs more promotion if it is to sell. The most popular price for e-books was just under £2.
Other statistics were that most book buyers are females, and it is older females who are more likely to buy self-published books, as they are the most avid readers.
For self-published books 3 in 5 are bought by people who read every day.
These statistics are perhaps not surprising to those who are involved in publishing, especially self-published writers, but they definitely give food for thought.
As publishers, whether traditional or self-published, it is important to know what type of things drive potential sales so that we can build a marketing strategy around that.
I'll be posting some more notes from this interesting conference soon.
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Brian
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Jun 12, 2013 09:51AM
interesting post - I have self published e-book and paperback and finding promoting difficult - the statistic that more females buy was particularly noted - do you know the %? - I must push my strong female heroine in my sci-fi story - www.dicepterons.com - thanks
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Very interesting indeed - glad to see mine are the 'right' price, but that is what I suspected, as I don't go over 2.50 when buying an ebook unless i really, really want it, and think the 77p ones might be a bit crap. I've also often thought that it's the subject that appeals most, which is why I always tweet what mine are actually ABOUT, instead of just the "I couldn't put it down" stuff!! Because I buy books based on what they're about, and after seeing how well written the blurb and the 1st couple of pages are, not the fact that the author's mate liked it :)
Brian wrote: "interesting post - I have self published e-book and paperback and finding promoting difficult - the statistic that more females buy was particularly noted - do you know the %? - I must push my stro..."Hi Brian, glad you enjoyed the post. The conference definitely made me realise we have to 'target' people more if we want to sell. I think they said two thirds of all self-published books were bought by the older female reader (I think they mean over 35 years old). If you want the full statistics you can get them from Steve at Bowker. His e-mail was given at the conference: steve - at- bookmarketing.co.uk
Terry wrote: "Very interesting indeed - glad to see mine are the 'right' price, but that is what I suspected, as I don't go over 2.50 when buying an ebook unless i really, really want it, and think the 77p ones ..."Interesting that you say you think the 77p ones might be crap; that's precisely why I'm always reluctant to do the 99 cents sales on my books because I'm sure lots of readers think that. But I do the occasional marketing 'push' with the 99 cents sales.
It definitely puts things into perspective when you see the lists of what makes people buy stuff. Sad thing is, most authors are not very good at marketing, but these days we have to be!
Great reporting Maria, captured everything that was really useful & inofmrative about those pnaels at the conference
