The UK book trade has embraced digital, but expectations of growth are racing ahead of the reality. Booksellers are also at risk of being left behind as publishers chase this digital firecracker.
These are the standout conclusions of the second FutureBook survey of digital publishing, hosted by The Bookseller.
The survey showed that the book business is ready for digital, and is adapting fast. Almost 80% of respondents to The Bookseller's survey said they had read a book electronically, roughly double the number who responded affirmatively last year. A recent Forrester survey reported that just 7% of adults who read books read e-books.
Philip Jones, deputy editor of The Bookseller, who presented the results at FutureBook 2010, The Bookseller's digital conference, today (30th November) said: "Rather than conforming to its media image of dusty publishers skulking in the back of darkened bookshops with inky fingers, the book trade is embracing digital: we are early adopters."
The 2010 survey, completed by 2,600 individuals, also found that 47% of respondents had paid for an e-book, compared with just 18% last year. "We are reading digitally, we are buying digital content," Jones added.
But Jones warned that booksellers were being left behind in the race for digital sales. In total 85% of publishers said that they sold books or journals in electronic format, but just 37% of booksellers said they sold content electronically. And while digital sales were below where most people had expected them to be, publishers' expectations of growth far outweighed those of booksellers. While more than half of publishers believed that by 2020 over 20% of their overall sales would be taken by digital books, only one-third of booksellers agreed.
Jones warned that booksellers' expectations over digital were being downgraded by what they were being told would happen: that they would be marginalised by Amazon and by publishers selling direct. When asked who would win and lose from digital, 92% of respondents placed traditional booksellers in the loser list. But he warned: "We lose these book professionals at our peril."
Jones said booksellers needed greater help from publishers to get digital. When asked whether booksellers felt publishers were doing enough to help, 73% said not. And Jones said one bookseller respondent to the survey had summed up the way publishers were at risk of undermining booksellers' efforts to sell e-books: "Why don't the sales reps that visit us know anything about their companies' e-book plans or even who to ask about it?”
The survey also found that almost half of all respondents thought e-books should be priced at a significant discount to the lowest-priced edition available, (i.e the street price.) Unsurprisingly, publishers took a softer line, with the majority arguing that e-books should be about the same price as the street cost of the cheapest edition.
The industry consensus was that e-books should be about the same price or a little lower than this street price, although Jones warned that those publishers on agency terms were tending to price above this level. He conceded that prices did fluctuate as publishers looked to adapt to their new role.
Jones concluded that though digital sales were still relatively small for most, next year could see a quadruple whammy in the market. "We can expect greater sales, from an increasing number of outlets, across a larger range of devices, from a broader selection of titles. And possibly with clearer pricing!"
Courtesy: www.thebookseller.com
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