The monthly pool of money allocated retroactively to self-published authors whose work is offered through Amazon’s Kindle Unlimited subscription plan rose again for December — both in the closely-watched per book payout, which was $1.43 per borrow/read, and in overall dollars, with Amazon allocating a $4.25 million “bonus,” making the total pool for the month $7.25 million. Per book payments hit a low for the year of $1.33 in October, then rose to $1.39 in November. The December unit fee is still lower than the August and September payouts. The December pool accounts for roughly 5.07 million borrows in all. […]
eNews
DBW: Price Promotions, Direct-to-Consumer, Global Publishing
The evolution of ebooks into a mature market in the US was evident on the second day of DBW last Thursday, as the focus turned to nuanced questions of how to boost sales of titles in a crowded marketplace, as well as publisher experiments in selling direct to consumers or in international markets. On a price promotions panel Thursday afternoon, Rachel Chou, chief marketing officer at Open Road, described how the market has changed, saying that price used to be the primary tool a publisher had to drive ebook sales, and running a discounted price promotion on a title two […]
Real Data On Print Sales In the eBook Era — And the eBook Plateau
With overall ebook sales for most publishers at a point of stasis for now, the Digital Book World conference commissioned Jonathan Nowell at Nielsen Book to provide a closer look at how the rise of ebooks has affected what sells in print form. A number of Nielsen’s data points stand in contrast with popular assumptions. (You can view the full set of data slides here.) Hardcover sales are seen as being most vulnerable to cannibalization by lower-priced ebook editions — but Nowell indicated that hardcover fiction sales have eroded less than trade paperback sales since 2009. Their quiet PubTrack Digital […]
A Tale of Two Amazon Debates
On Thursday afternoon and evening, two groups debated hypothetical declarations about Amazon. The first, “Should Amazon Be Constrained, And Can They Be?,” was interrupted at the beginning with a grammar correction from the audience. The second, “Is Amazon the Reader’s Friend,” required definitions of “reader,” “friend,” and of course, “Amazon.” Both scored equally high on entertainment and irritation value. But such is the way with debates on Amazon: the sugar high is nice. The ensuing crash less so. Both panels were ably moderated, the first by Ken Auletta (who had spoken of his own experiences with that other tech behemoth, Google, in a […]
Moerer: iBooks Averages 1 Million New Customers Per Week Post-iOS8
In a keynote conversation at Digital Book World Thursday morning, Apple executive Keith Moerer revealed that since the launch last fall of iOS8 – which embedded the iBooks app within the operating system for the first time — the company has averaged more than 1 million new users a week of iBooks. While Moerer obviously touted this stat as significant, he did admit that device Pre-loading “makes it so easy for customers to download a free book,” Moerer noted; the company recently ended promotion that gave new iBooks users access to ten free ebooks from both major houses and indie publishers, which also spurred […]
DBW: Harper CEO Murray on Global Growth
HarperCollins ceo Brian Murray spoke at length Thursday morning at Digital Book World on the company’s recent acquisitions of Thomas Nelson and Harlequin, looking for other opportunities for global growth, and the encouraging signs from independent bookstore sales over the holiday period. “We’re happy with the integration of Thomas Nelson into the new HarperCollins Christian,” Murray said. “We see lots of opportunities for growth in Latin America and beyond the Americas.” Because that acquisition “exceeded expectations” it made HarperCollins more bullish on Harlequin, where a “similar strategy” could work with romance readers — especially as Harlequin is present in territories […]