Consider these facts presented by Creative Strategies:
- 80% of US households did not buy or read a book last year
- 70% of US households did not enter a bookstore last year
- 42% of college graduates never read a book after college
- 33% of high school graduates never read a book again
- 52% of books are not read to completion
The last point I get. I probably finish a book about 70% of the time, because I usually get it about halfway through. In fact, I am more likely to read a full book with Seth Godin’s formatting in Tribes than I am to read a whole traditional chapter format book.
For us book publishers, those facts if indeed true, are downright scary. The solution, as regular readers of my blog know, is for book publishers to become content producers to provide product in any format a consumer wants to consume our education, message and entertainment.
This is why our DigiReady efforts at Thomas Nelson are so important. Our company is embracing DigiReady. DigiReady is one of many things we will need to do differently in the coming years to stay relevant. I am certain we will make the transition, despite the unavoidable pain that will come with it.
We have great content. We must reinvent it; not just repurpose content.
Posts
6 comments:
How do these numbers compare to same questions 10 years or 20 years ago?
Gary - This is a good question. If I get a chance, I'll dig into it.
I've wondered if the type of books publishers will have to seek out are geared more toward visual emphasis.... Something an ereader cannot provide, or at least very well. Dorling Kindersly educational books, cultural books (art, travel, cultural history, cooking...), and children's books.
No doubt multimedia will play a bigger role, especially as devices improve. Creative Strategies spoke extensively on this.
An underlying issue is the growing illiteracy rate in the U.S.The vast majority of content publishers currently produce is at an 8th grade level or higher (30 % of the adult population can read about the 8th grade level). Roughly 90 million adults read below an 8th grade level
So even if we find ways to profit from new areas of content delivery (on an eReader, smart phone, licensing content to a magazine, in a traditional book, etc.), roughly 50% of the U.S. population can't even read the content. So, in addition to finding new areas of content delivery, we also need to be striving to curb the growing illiteracy rate. If the # of readers out there continues to deteriorate, we're all sunk.
This is an interesting point. Sometimes we publishers don't get that many find our book itimidating.
Post a Comment