Publishing Trends industry survey
By Joe Wikert
[Editors note: this is from Joe Wikert's Publishing 2020 Blog. PB] … I received an e-mail with a press release attached from Publishing Trends. The announcement summarized a publishing industry survey they recently conducted. Although they’re promising to provide more details on both their main site and blog, I have yet to find anything other than the summary included in the press release.
The survey was sent to “several thousand publishers, agents, editors, booksellers, and individuals in related business, and received a double-digit response rate that included comments and opinions on a wide variety of topics.” Here are the nuggets included in the release:
* 48% of respondents get most of their publishing news from the Internet, followed by trade magazines (24%). 59% are on Facebook.
* 36% say the main threat facing the industry is people purchasing fewer books. “I feel like books are a dying commodity. I wish more people read,” wrote one agent.
* 54% of respondents read book and media blogs regularly, up from 31% last year. 11% are bloggers themselves.
* 82% of respondents think publishing jobs are less secure than they were a year ago. Many have watched their companies enact cost-cutting measures, including hiring freezes, “claustrophobic expense control,” and decreased bonuses.
* When asked where they’ll be in five years, 26% of respondents answered, “I’m not sure yet . . . depends on how the election goes.” And as befits the “mainstream media,” 85% are voting for Barack Obama in November.
On the plus side, I’m impressed that such a large percentage of us are on Facebook. Perhaps everyone feels the need to do more networking in the midst of a challenging economic climate. The rate of blog readers is also growing nicely, although I wish more would jump in and start blogging too; 11% is a pathetic rate folks!
I’m curious to see more of the results on Publishing Trends as I imagine you are too…
October 9th, 2008 at 12:13 pm
“36% say the main threat facing the industry is people purchasing fewer books”. If this is true, and I have no reason to doubt it, then publishing needs to DO something! Like - reduce the cost of books, encourage reading by sponsoring reading for the very young, below 10 years old. If you can foster a love of reading at an early age, you will have them for life. These are the readers of the future. Obviously the publishing industry has not done enough to ensure a market for their product in the future. Also, getting rid of DRM - which many people simply refuse to buy in to, price e-books at 20% or more below paper books and reduce that when the book goes to paperback. Discounting those people who simply will steal because they can or kids with too much time and not enough money (and who wouldn’t buy a book they can steal at any price, so they are not your customers = no real lost sales), the darknet exists because people can not get the books they want or they can’t get them at a price they think is reasonable. If publishers could embrace these ideas I think they would see a turn around in sales volume overall = more money.