Quote:
Originally Posted by Piper_
One thing I wonder about using Amazon's unit sales numbers to project is all those ebooks that were free promos and $0.99 - 2.99 indy books they sell, and if/how they're included in the ratio.  |
Amazon made it clear free books were not included in their tally.
But, lets face it; a book sale is a book sale, regardless of price. And a lot of those discounted/promo books are displacing used book and loaner reads. (Remember, evil DRM makes resale impossible and--on paper--severely restricts lending.) Also a lot of those low price sales, as attested to by the writers and publishers, result in follow-up sales at higher prices. Don't deprecate them. There is method to their madness; they are literally making up in volume. The core goal is to sell *customers* on ebooks. To sell the idea of ebooks to the masses.
That's why I pointed out the *eventual* price pressure effect of expanding ebook unit sales.
eBooks are clearly expanding the market for books. For now. Act one.
That will not be true much longer, though. At some point in the very near future ebook sales will start to cannibalize print book sales, *precisely* because of all the lower-priced quality reads available in the ebook arena. That's act two.
Act three is when the declining volume of print books saps all the profitability out of the existing model of high volume batch-print runs. What follows depends on how soon the tipping point arrives and what the big publishers (who are most vulnerable because of their bloated overhead) do to try and stay afloat once they realize price-fixing isn't the answer.
The way it is playing out so far is that eBooks are expanding the overall market for books by drawing in the high volume readers and making high-volume readers out of some casual readers. So far, the total market is buying print books at a slightly higher rate than before; ebooks are all extra sales. Everybody is winning.
But...
The business started with early adopters and hobbyists (the likes of which frequent these forums) and is now filtering through the mainstream, bringing in what could be called early followers. Eventually, the economics of increased ebook sales (and cheaper readers) and increased visibility of the tech will bring in reluctant adopters and laggards. Included in that wave will be the legion of folks that read a handful of books per year and who can't currently justify a reader for that volume of use. And those "converts" will *not* be a net addition to the market but instead a full substraction from the pbook side of the business.
That's when the long-term losers on the upstream side will be revealed.
As I said, the real issue at stake isn't how many books of either kind are sold.
The issue is the number of *customers* that are sold on ebooks as their venue of choice for reading. And the best guide to that is unit sales because it reflects their commitment to the new platform.
Focusing on the dollar value of the ebooks is just a way to minimize and marginalize ebook penetration and pretend all is well. For a scary comparisson, look to the Detroit automakers in the 90's who were losing auto market share to asian brands left and right but consoled themselves counting the cash they were raking in selling high-priced trucks and SUVs. Then, when recession hit and buyers started looking for cheaper, more fuel efficient basic transportation, wham! The Detroit brands found themselves without viable product.
There are limits to any analogy but the one thing that is clear is that there are limits to how many books a person can read (even hoarders) and that cheap ebooks *are* every bit as significant as expensive hardcovers in feeding that demand.
A tipping point is coming.
Print book volume *will* start to shrink.
We just don't know when.