The current Publishing model is based around the big hits.
The one big success subsidizes the 9 failures.
It’s just that no one knows which book is going to be the big success so they have to publish all the books.
That leads to a lot of things -
- A model where risk is high and hedging bets is crucial.
- The big hits keep the business alive.
- You have big advances as you try to gobble up authors who you think might produce the next big
It’s rather random if you think about it.
Could there be another model for Publishing?
What if we picked a different model – where we don’t look for colossal hits at all. Instead we only look at books that have a very high chance of moderate success.
This might seem strange – Why not go for the biggest hits?
That’s an easy answer – we never know which ones are going to be the huge successes. On the other hand we do know the titles that have a good chance of earning back more than we invest -
- Books that are past bestsellers. There is already a start-up that does this – they got the rights for Catch-22.
- Books that have a ton of promise based on user reviews and sales trends. Amazon Encore is doing this.
- Books that are going to be decent hits because it’s a celebrity or the author has a fan base or some other reason.
Not talking about getting Barack Obama’s next book. Think more along the lines of a TV star or a blogger with millions of daily visitors.
There are a lot of books just below the level of ‘expensive acquisition’ that would do very well.
Would it be worth it?
The problem with a model that relies on one huge success like Twilight or Harry Potter is that it’s big risk and big reward.
If you switch to a model where each book has to earn its keep you get 2 big benefits -
- You aren’t ruling out the huge hits. There’s still a chance one of your books turns into Harry Potter Part Deux.
- You aren’t losing money on 9 of 10 books.
We are in a world where you can get a lot of information on how customers react to a book.
- Reviews for the book.
- Sales trends.
- User reactions - Do they recommend it? Do they become fans? Do they ask for (or buy) the next book?
Why not use it?
Who gets the big hits?
A major concern for Publishers will be – We might miss out on the next big success.
That’s a strange concern because neither is the prediction engine good nor are there any other signs that Publishers can use to figure out the huge successes.
If it’s all a bit random then you might as well not pay huge advances. Or, better yet, let authors show you that they are likely to succeed.
That’s the most interesting path – let Authors put in the work and then cherry-pick.
Filed under: publishing Tagged: | the middle path
Uhh, dude, there’s a name for a publishing company that does this.
It’s called a Small Press.
If you’re nimble and knowledgeable, you can fairly easily dominate certain lucrative niches, be largely indifferent to what goes on with vampires ‘n wizards ‘n whatnot, and maintain a pretty decent lifestyle as a small press publisher, even kicking out for advances and professional services such as copy-editing and cover design.
There are also things like regionalism coming into play. Not much of a market for “Midwestern Boy Moves to Brooklyn and Lives Ironically, v83″ in the Deep South; but they might enjoy books that were optioned to make the film noir you see on Turner there.
Issues remain for small presses, like getting paid by vendors (AMS, B&T), and the fact that a lot of the indie booksellers are being killed by the economy. Prior to Kindle, there was no market for ebook literary fiction, so at least nobody was hurt by Overdrive screwing us all.
Many of the “imprints within conglomerates” that you see with things like HarperStudio are designed to capture indie Mojo.
/If it matters, most of my best-selling print hits are Silk Pagoda, with Munsey’s and Olympia-literary roughly tied… and that one Black Mask book creeping stealthily in. (Olympia then has the following 80 slots after the top 20 are settled, but… money’s money, and Silk’s lead-times to recoup are 2-3 years, vs. 2-3 days for Olympia.)