Entries tagged with “long tail” from Tools of Change for Publishing

Anecdotal Evidence from the Digital Shift

Andrew Savikas
October 6, 2009 | Permalink | Listen

Back in 2004, when I spent most of my time doing format conversions and production automation, I had the privilege of turning much of what I learned doing things like batch running Word macros from the DOS command line with Ruby into a book, Word Hacks. Like our other Hacks books, it's a lesson in the value of curation and convenience -- much of the contents came from existing information, culled from blog posts, help forums, and other sources (all with permission and attribution, of course).

While it sold quite modestly, it was reviewed well, I earned out my advance, and as recently as September I ran into someone who told me the book has helped them do their job more effectively (their job being substantially similar to the one I was doing at the time I wrote the book).

This weekend my quarterly royalty statement came, and even I was struck by the relative proportion of sales coming from digital sources (this is from Q2 2009). Please note this is totally anecdotal data from a single book that probably hasn't been on the shelves in most retailers for years, so do take with the appropriate grain of salt:

Less than 20% of sales were for the print book. This is something we've seen for other "long tail" titles that show very little demand when viewed through the lens of retail print sales (i.e., Bookscan). Making titles available in digital form means the opportunity to capture sales long after a title has left most bookstore shelves.

There's still (a few) spots open for TOC Frankfurt next week on Oct. 13. Use discount code TOC09BL.

Long Tail Evidence from The App Store

Andrew Savikas
July 20, 2009 | Permalink | Comments (5) | Listen

Last week we released 16 of our books as iPhone Apps (and on Saturday added The Twitter Book), and there's some interesting Long Tail data coming in. We've seen Long Tail behavior in the data from Safari Books Online and from Google Book Search, though in this case it's about geography: even though regions like Colombia, Belgium, and Greece are individually generating a small number of sales, together they add up to more than the total number sold in the US:

Open Question: What is the Best Use for Print on Demand?

Mac Slocum
June 11, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (5) | Listen

PublicAffairs Books recently used POD services from Lightning Source to manage demand for Scott McClellan's What Happened: Inside the Bush White House and Washington's Culture of Deception.

From a Lightning Source press release (pdf):

PublicAffairs' experience with this title demonstrates how POD can be used to supplement offset printings in specific cases in which demand exceeds supply for a short term. In this instance, the POD copies of the book will supplement large scale conventional offset reprints, which are underway.

PublicAffairs used POD as an insurance policy, and panelists in a Digital Custom Publishing session at BEA also noted POD's use in short runs, niche titles and its importance as a Long Tail tool.

But do insurance policies, niche books and Long Tail plays represent the extent of POD's opportunities? What options do you see for POD? How have you used it in your own organization? How will POD evolve? Please share your thoughts in the comments area.

Borders Stores Turn Back on Long Tail

Mac Slocum
March 12, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (0) | Listen

Borders is counting on a simple turn of the wrist to boost profits and reduce in-store inventory. According to the Wall Street Journal (subscription required), the retailer is displaying three times as many books "face out."

Shelf Awareness notes:

" ... The new approach has led to sales increases 'in the double digits' and has led to the removal of 5%-10% of the average store's titles -- many of which sell only one copy a year in each store."

Borders' move could introduce a unique opportunity for retailers with offline and online storefronts: eschew the long tail in brick and mortar outlets and embrace the long tail on the Web.

Enterprising book marketers could also take a note from the seamless integration we're all experiencing on the Web: just as Web apps unite the desktop with the server-side, a retail store could merge with the retailer's online presence through in-store kiosks (perhaps with a Cover Flow layout to continue the "face out" concept) and print-on-demand equipment.

For these offline-online companies, the long tail doesn't need to be an either/or proposition.