Amazon has been aggressively getting into the publishing game as of late. The New York Times just wrote a great overview on what Amazon has been doing, which has stimulated a lot of discussion online.
The key quote was one by Amazon executive Russ Grandinetti:
"The only really necessary people in the publishing process now are the writer and reader. Everyone who stands between those two has both risk and opportunity."
I couldn't agree more. What has changed is that distribution of books is quickly moving online. The whole ecosystem around books, which has largely been designed to distribute and sell physical books, is having to change too. A man I greatly admire, Om Malik, wrote "we finally are seeing a change" - and that's exciting.
A publishing executive told me a few years ago that "the best way to sell a book is to get it on the front table of every bookstore in the nation." Amazon is making a big bet against that statment with its new publishing arm. And I think they are smart. Ebooks are already 20% of revenue for most major houses - and it's a good bet it will be 50% within a year or two.
Today, it's incredibly easy to get a book listed in every major online bookstore: Amazon, Kindle, Nook, iBookstore, Google, Kobo, and more. What's more, as Bill Barol noted in a post on Boing Boing on Monday, what many readers may not grasp in this brave new world of publishing is how authors are now having to hustle on the marketing and promotion of their books. Bill's post has another gem of a quote:
"Take all that time you spend screwing around on Twitter and put it into marketing your book. And, at least in the beginning, sell it as cheap as you can. In fact, you know what? Give it away."
This is essentially the argument that Chris Anderson makes in his recent book, Free. In a digital economy, free is an extremely powerful marketing tool - and we can afford to use it, because the marginal cost is essentially zero.
At Goodreads we see every day that the major problem most authors face in today's world is discoverability. Goodreads has made great efforts to bridge the gap between readers and writers, because we see a tremendous opportunity to help readers and authors connect.
Over the past five years, we've built numerous ways for readers to find new books to read. And find books they have - we just crossed 200 million books added - and we are currently growing at 12 million a month!. On the author side our Author Program has grown to over 28 thousand authors using Goodreads to promote their work and connect to readers. Our recently launched recommendation engine is a big step in the direction of discoverability, and the response to it has been extremely positive and encouraging.
We're excited to be a part of the new digital ecosystem for books, and even more excited to see what amazing books are yet to be discovered by Goodreads members.
posted by Otis on October, 22