Amazon is moving forward to become a publisher - Is it good or bad for publishers and readers?

The New York Times has a story today on the growing efforts of Amazon to publish books. Amazon is for a long time much more than a book seller, but apparently its efforts to establish itself as a publisher are getting many publishers and other players in the book industry worried. Amazon, they fear is becoming too big and too strong and will be able soon to take bigger and bigger bites out of the market.



According to the article Amazon publishing books is not news as it has been publishing books for several years. Its efforts went up several notches in visibility when it brought in the longtime New York editor and agent Laurence Kirshbaum three months ago as head of Amazon Publishing, but this is not the news either. The news is that Amazon announced yesterday that Amazon Publishing's made its first major acquisition - it has signed Timothy Ferriss, the wildly popular self-help guru for young men.



Ferriss, the press release added is author of the #1 New York Times best sellers "The 4-Hour Body" and "The 4-Hour Workweek". He will publish with Amazon Publishing the next book in his "4-hour" series, "The 4-Hour Chef."



Ferriss explained that "My decision to collaborate with Amazon Publishing wasn't just a question of which publisher to work with," said Tim Ferriss. "It was a question of what future of publishing I want to embrace. My readers are migrating irreversibly into digital, and it made perfect sense to work with Amazon to try and redefine what is possible. This is a chance to really show what the future of books looks like, and to deliver a beautiful experience to my readers, who always come first. I could not be more excited about what we're doing."



On the NYT article Ferriss added two interesting observations:



"Amazon has a one-to-one relationship with every one of their customers. You can just imagine the possibilities that opens up.”

and

“The opportunity to partner with a technology company that is embracing publishing is very different than partnering with a publisher embracing technology."

Basically, Ferriss is saying that Amazon is better geared to be a publisher in the digital age than other publishers, providing readers a better reading experience and authors with better chances to sell more books. Is it true? It's not clear yet, but Amazon's technological capabilities and customer engagement experience give them a substantial advantage in the age of multi-reading platforms.

Should publishers be worried? Yes and No. Yes, because Amazon can create value for authors publishers can't and authors know it. No, because publishers also have added value and experience and if they will know to adjust themselves to the new technological demands of the market and readers they can still give Amazon a good fight.

Bottom line: Although this step might make publishers' life more difficult, it has the potential to move everyone forward and eventually readers will only benefit from it, as they will have more options and enjoy an enhanced reading experience.

Yours,

Raz @ Eco-Libris



Eco-Libris: Plant trees for your books!

Why RAN's rainforest-safe children's books campaign might not mobilize consumers to take action?

Rainforest Action Network (RAN) released yesterday a new report grading 11 of the largest children’s book publishers in the US. Their grades were given based on their paper policies and purchasing practices. It was also accompanied by a consumer guide, asking consumers to choose books from publishers who are committed to rainforest protection.

Both the report and the consumer guide follow a report launched by RAN in May, which found that a large number of kids’ books sold in the US are now being printed in Asia using paper that is closely linked to the loss of rainforests in Indonesia.

This is a very important campaign and we applaud RAN for their efforts to ensure that books will be printed sustainably and won't be contribute to the destruction or Indonesian rainforests. This campaign is clearly aiming at mobilizing consumers to buy rainforest-safe children's books this holiday season (and in general), but we have to ask ourselves - is it really effective? is it really change consumers' behavior?

First, let's look into what RAN's guide include. According to their press release,RAN’s guide recommends that consumers buy from industry leaders that have taken action publicly to decrease their forest and environmental footprints by creating time-bound commitments to phase out controversial Indonesian paper fiber and paper suppliers. The recommended companies include Hachette Book Group, Candlewick Press, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, MacMillan, Penguin Group (Pearson), Scholastic and Simon & Schuster. (the last three publishers, by the way, took part in the Green Books Campaign).

Some top publishing companies have yet to take public action to protect Indonesia’s rainforests. These companies have failed to make public commitments or adopt purchasing policies that improve their environmental footprints and ensure the papers they buy are not linked to Indonesian rainforest destruction. RAN’s guide recommends that book buyers avoid these companies this year: Disney Publishing Worldwide and HarperCollins.

So this is the message. Loud and clear - buy books published by the recommend publishers and avoid the ones that got a Failed grade. What tools RAN is using to get the message out to consumers? You got the following:

- A pocket-size shopping guide, which can be downloaded and printed. You can also share it with friends on Facebook and tweet it.

- There's the full report you can read online: Rainforest-Safe Kids' Books: How do Publishers Stack Up?

- Rainforest-Safe Book Database

- 'Roar At the Store' week - from December 6th-12th, hundreds across North America will hand out rainforest-safe guides in front of their favorite bookstores.

This is an impressive campaign. But will these tools help the campaign to meet its goals? Will it mobilize people to take action and buy only rainforest-safe children's books? I'm not sure about it and there are couple of reasons that makes me worry that the campaign won't be as effective as it could be:

1. The first step in mobilizing consumers into action is to get them aware of the campaign and its messages. RAN makes an effort to make it social network friendly and to have presence in bookstores during the first week of December, but I wonder how many consumers will actually hear about it.

First, a growing number of consumers buy online (online spending this holiday season is expected to grow by at least 9% according to analytics firm comScore), and the chances they will hear about the campaign are relatively slim. Second, even though RAN will have presence in hundreds of stores during the first week of December, they will still be able to reach to only a small percentage of the buyers.

What can be done? The best option would be to collaborate with book retailers such as Amazon, B&N, Indigo, Borders and the American Booksellers Association. If even one of them would agree to collaborate with RAN, there's a much better chance to reach a much greater number of consumers both at brick and mortar stores and online.

But I guess that's not going to happen as no retailer would agree to call his customers to avoid books they're selling. It just doesn't makes sense for them. So if we're looking at RAN's options realistically then I believe their best option then is to go viral - a viral campaign, just like what Greenpeace did with their 'Ask Nestle to give rainforests a break' campaign is the only way to get the word out effectively and reach a large number of consumers.

2. The most problematic part is how to mobilize consumers into action. OK, so you got people to hear about the campaign and let's assume many of them really relate to the message and care about the rainforests in Indonesia. Will it be enough to convince them to prefer books published by "good" publishers and avoid ones published by "bad" publishers? I doubt.

And the reason I doubt is that according to the rules of green marketing there's a good chance it won't work. Now, you can wonder why an activism campaign should look into rules of green marketing - RAN is not a company and it doesn't try to sell anything. That's true, but at the same time it tries to influence consumers' behavior and get them to buy a "green" product over a "non-green product", which is exactly what green marketing is all about.

One of the basic rules of green marketing, according to green marketing expert Jacquelyn Ottman, is to avoid trade-offs and if you can’t, make sure the cost to consumers of the green attribute doesn’t outweigh the product’s benefits.

Let's look for a moment at the equation here. The cost is very clear - you need to avoid certain books, even you wanted to buy them in the first place because of their publisher's practices. Instead you're being asked to buy books from a list of rainforest-safe books of publishers who got a Recommended grade. The benefit is that by doing that you're supporting publishers who help to protect Indonesia's rainforests.

Would this benefit be enough to persuade consumers to pay the price? Not to most of the consumers. This is unfortunate of course, but that's the reality. For the majority of the consumers you need actual benefits and not just the good feeling of doing the right thing to outweigh the costs. These benefits can be for example a discount on the recommended books, an hard to resist deal such as buy two recommended books and get the third one for free, discount coupons, etc. Without such benefits that will reward consumers for taking green actions you will be able to persuade only a small percentage of consumers to do the right thing.

What can be done? Again, the best way is collaborating with retailers, but since it's not realistic, maybe RAN should check with the recommended publishers how to create an hard to resist deal or provide consumers with discounts (maybe through websites like groupon). Another way to incentivize consumers is to find a green sponsor that will give a coupon for every purchase of a recommended book (RecycleBank is an inspirational example of this concept).

Another way to change the equation is to reduce the costs. The shopping guide is really small and informational, but still it's a hassle to check every book with the list of the publishers on it (especially when each one of them has many imprints). How about an App, where you can scan the ISBN of the book on your mobile phone and get an immediate YES/NO recommendation? This can also be a convenient way to provide coupons or discounts.

I'm sure that such an App will significantly increase the number of consumers that will use the guide and take it into consideration, as it will lower the cost they need to pay for taking a positive green action.

In all, we wish RAN all the best with this important campaign, but because of its importance and the effort they already put into it, I do hope they'll take into consideration some of the comments made here and will make this campaign as effective as it can possibly be.

Yours,
Raz @ Eco-Libris

Eco-Libris: Promoting Sustainable Reading!

Which publishers participate in the Green Books Campaign?

The Green Books Campaign includes not just 200 bloggers who will review 200 books printed on eco-friendly paper, but also the publishers that publish these books.

56 publishers from the U.S., Canada, Australia and the U.K. are participating in the Green Books Campaign. This group of publishers is very diversified and includes both small and large publishers, but there's one thing that is in common for all of them - they print books on environmental-friendly paper, such as recycled paper or FSC-certified paper.

In the next two weeks we'll highlight some of these publishers and their efforts to go green and print their books in an eco-friendly manner. In the meantime, here's the full list (in an alphabetic order) of all the participating publishers with links to their websites:

ABRAMS

Allworth Press

Barefoot Books

Channel View Publications Ltd / Multilingual Matters

Cleis Press and Viva Editions

Constable & Robinson

DK Publishing

DunDurn

Easton Studio Press

ECW Press

Ester Republic Press

Fiell Publishing

Firefly Books

Five Mile Press

free spirit publishing

Fremantle Press

Ghigo Press

Gibbs-Smith

Goose Lane Editions

Guernica Editions

Harvard Business Press

Holiday House

HOPS Press

House of Anansi Press

Island Press

Key Porter Books

Lantern Books

Leap Books

Lost Horse Press

Loving Healing Press

Marshall Cavendish Children’s Books

McArthur Co.

McClelland & Stewart

McGraw-Hill

New Society Publishers

NeWest Press

Nolo

North Atlantic Books

Om Baby World

Penguin Group

Picador

Profile Books

Ronsdale Press

Scholastic

Second Story Press

Simon and Schuster Children's Publishing

Sterling Publishing

Texas A&M University Press

Tightrope Books

University of Alberta Press

University of Arizona Press

Wayne State University Press

Whit Press

Wings Press

WSU Press

Yours,
Raz @ Eco-Libris

Eco-Libris: Promoting sustainable reading!

Are publishers and bookstores in the same boat when it comes to e-books?

Not too long ago it looked like the book industry is a unite front when it comes to dealing with the new challenges of the digital era. When talking about the the future of books or trying to answer questions like 'Is Print Dead?', the general notion was that bookstores and publishers are in the same boat.

But are they?

I believe that right now the answer is no. While both publishers and bookstores need to deal with difficult challenges, it looks like publishers in general are better positioned than bookstores.

Here is some evidence: Let's start with publishers. Last month Publishers Weekly reported on the results of the five largest trade publishers in the US:

"Four of the five houses reported significant changes in their operating performance in the first half of 2010 compared to one year ago, with big books, or the lack thereof, playing a major role in the shifts...In general, the major houses were optimistic about the second half of the year."

On the other hand, when it comes to bookstores the headlines aren't that positive:

Does The Independent Bookstore Have A Future? (Treehugger, October 4, 2010)

Borders Posts Net Loss of $46.7 Million for 2Q (GalleyCat, September 1, 2010)

Barnes & Noble to Shutter Upper West Side Superstore in NYC (GalleyCat, August 31, 2010)

Now, this is of course generalization, as you still have many publishers struggling and new bookstores that are opened, but I believe it reflects the current state of the book industry, where bookstores have much harder time to adjust to the e-book era than publishers.

Don't get me wrong. Publishers have their own unique challenges to deal with and you can find some of them on a great piece that Stephen Page wrote on the Guardian ("The future of publishing takes shape"). Still, it looks as publishers have more flexibility and capabilities than bookstores to meet the new e-challenges. As Publishers Weekly reports from "This year, e-books are looked at more as an opportunity than a threat." And yes, it is referring only to publishers.

At least for now. Both bookstores and publishers are making more money from sales of e-books -B&N CEO reported last month to investoers that "over the last two quarters, these eBook sales have been driving the growth of our BN" and, according to Publishers Weekly, at the end of June, e-book sales accounted for about 8% of adult sales at the publishers. Still, book sales at bookstores are declining while publishers manage to show better performance. Contradiction? Not really. Readers just go elsewhere to buy their books, paper or electronic.

The conclusion is that publishers look more prepared for a hybrid future of both paper and electronic books, although they still have to prove they are capable to adjust their traditional business model to the new era and be able to provide an added value to both writers and readers. Bookstores still need to figure out how to respond to the e-book challenge. If for publishers, e-books begin to look like more as an opportunity, then to bookstores, it's still both a risk and an opportunity.

Yours,
Raz @ Eco-Libris

Plant a tree for every book you read!

Eco-Libris is collaborating with Pubmission, online submission manager for publishers and writers

We are happy to announce on a new collaboration with Pubmission, a great new online service for publishers and writers. With every ream of paper that Pubmission saves, they will plant 5 trees with Eco-Libris.

Pubmission is offering a very valuable and green service, taking the submission process online and makes it more manageable and proactive for publishers and writers.

Pubmission can't guarantee publication, but they can save you time, frustration, and unnecessary slush-pile suffering. (And they spare a few trees, too, not to mention the new ones they plant with us).

Wolf Hoelscher, the founder and owner of Pubmission, has 13 years of experience in the publishing industry, most of it as a senior editor or an acquisitions editor at both print- and web-based companies. He’s also a writer well-acquainted with the challenges posed by the submission process. As he has been on both ends of the slush pile, he is well-aware of how inefficient, unfair, and frustrating manuscript submissions are for writers, agents, and editors.

For more information about Pubmission, check their website at http://www.pubmission.com. You can also follow them on twitter and facebook.

Yours,
Raz @ Eco-Libris

Eco-Libris: Plant a tree for every book you read