Selling Books OnlineExploiting Content On The Web For

Publishers Conference

Tuesday 2nd October 2001

Kieron SmithHead of Internet Site Management BCA

1 9 9 8 1 9 9 9 2 0 0 0 C h a n g e1 9 9 9 /2 0 0 0

C h ild re n ’s2 0 0 0

T o ta l M a rk e t £ 1 .7 b n £ 1 .7 b n £ 1 .8 b n 5 .4 £ 2 5 0 .7 m% % % % %

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I n t e r n e t S a l e s C a t e g o r y b y v a l u e

S c ie n t i f i c , t e c h n i c a l a n d

m e d i c a l2 4 %

A c a d e m ic a n d p r o f e s s i o n a l

2 2 %

S c h o o l t e x t b o o k s

3 %

N o n - f i c t i o n3 4 %

C h i l d r e n 's5 %

F ic t i o n 1 2 %

“Since May 1999, average selling prices throughout the book market have fallen from £7.29 to £7.03, down three per cent. In the direct-to-consumer market (excluding Internet) – mail order, book clubs and publisher direct – prices are down 14% and, on the Internet five per cent lower.”

Philip Wisson - Marketing Week

“One of us recently went to purchase The Anatomy of Buzz,a business book about word-of-mouth marketing.The site promptly suggested we might like Gray’s Anatomy too.Gaffes like this teach customers not to trust a web site’s recommendations.”

Paul F Nunes and Ajit Kambil - HBR

Book Buying Offline

Advantages: Disadvantages:

Able to relax and browse freely Price seen as higher (full retail)

Wide choice close at hand Choice can be limited by size of the shop, despite growth in large stores

Increasingly knowledgeable staff Getting to the shop in busy lives, including parking, ordering and returning to collect

Even if not in stock books can be supplied Whilst pleasant it becomes time quickly consuming

Book Buying Online

Advantages: Disadvantages:

Review and suggestions Perceived difficulty of (esp. Amazon) browsing

Ease and convenience – some are happy to Fears of credit card admit they are lazy security

Frequently cheaper Unable to “test read”

Home or office delivery liked Unable to pick up books and read the back cover

Time-saving in busy lives Have to wait for post

Some novelty value in (esp. in early majority)

Dick Brass Microsoft’s vice presidentof technology and development, has said that by 2020:

“90% of everything you read will be delivered in an electronic form.”

Anderson Consultant’s estimate that ebooks will be 10% of book sales or $2.3bn (in the US) by 2005

“E-books are solving a problem that consumers don’t have”

David Streitfied writing in the Chicago Tribune

Likelihood of Payment

Bandwidth

Content Type

Text/ebooks

News

Music

Porn

Movies

High

Low

Kieron’s ‘Will They Pay For It?’ (WTPFI) Model

Low High

Conclusion

Whatever the future for books as a productthe real future for selling them online is through buildingmulti channel customer relationships.

•Provide different channels to suit all the different ways that people shop

•Emphasise the relationship over the transaction

•Increase total revenue per customer

•Deliver excellent customer service though andacross all channels