Before I entered the publishing industry in November 2019 – and, actually, even till relatively recently! – I suffered from an illusion about modern developments in publishing.
The illusion was that all that an author or publisher had to do was to put their new title on Amazon, or a couple of additional electronic platforms, and the job was basically done, though it was nice to have books in bookshops.
How totally naïve I was!
In fact, it is only the old and established titles whose sales tend to climb on e-platforms.
Though new titles are forced to be on e-platforms by the nature of the industry, new titles hardly sell on e-platforms.
Why is that?
Because you and I are almost always on the internet to buy a specific product, at best-quality-and-cheapest-price. So, unless your latest title is already well-known to the public, and they are hunting for it, your product won’t go great guns on the internet.
Of course, you and I might on occasion browse on an e-platform within a particular large category of product. But then what choices are the e-platform’s algorithms going to put before our eyes? A new product?! Not on your life!!! What is going to be put before our eyes is the best-selling products in that category. And your new product is highly unlikely to figure there.
That is why new titles *must* build up a track record of sales if they are to do well online.
And in the case of books that means, pretty inescapably, success in physical bookshops.
Why?
Because it is the job of the publisher’s representative to speak with bookshop managers, discussing with them why they should give the new title a chance; and to persuade the managers, if possible, not just to stock the book, but perhaps even to display it in some special way.
Bookbuyers in bookshops tend to be discerning readers, readers with taste. Ultimately it is they who decide whether a book will be successful. But if they don’t even see a title as part of the choice confronting them when they are browsing in a bookshop, readers can’t possibly pick that title up even to look at, let alone to buy.
It is only as a book sells well in bookshops that algorithms of data build up, making it likely for the title to become increasingly successful on e-platforms.
So, of course I have to put information regarding all my titles on e-platforms – as soon as I can. But that information will simply sit there, waiting to be kicked into life whenever bookshop sales reach a certain magic number of sales.
Now we come to the crunch point: what is that magic number?
I am told that the magic number of copies which needs to be sold via bookshops is: at least 5,000!!!
You may think that 5000 copies isn’t that large a number. And you would be right in comparison to the world’s population.
But how many new titles sell 5000 copies?
A very tiny number.
That is why you as an author need to do all you can, and your publishing imprint as well as all its allied PR and publicity and sales and distribution staff need to do all they can, to have any chance of reaching that magic number of sales in bookshops. Or a greater number of course!
E-platforms will build on your success in bookshops. But, without that essential primary success in bookshops, e-platforms won’t generally give your book much of a chance.