According to a recent article on Shelf Awareness:
The percentage of e-book consumers who “exclusively or mostly” purchased book content in e-book format decreased from nearly 70% in August 2011 to 60% in May 2012.
In addition, the percentage of readers who purchase both eBook and print book formats rose from 25% to 34%.
What does this mean for authors?
Statistics like this prove that print books are not going away anytime soon, and that they’re still an important revenue stream for authors. In a world where consumers have countless book-buying choices, you want to make sure you can meet their needs.
Interestingly, these stats are coming out at the same time as our sister company, CD Baby, reports that its artists (independent musicians) have collectively sold more CDs so far this year than they had at this same time in 2011.
Are physical media sales on the rise across the board?
I’m not predicting a return to the 20th century here, so I kinda doubt it– but I do think it’s promising that print books can still play an important part in building your independent author platform.
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[Image of books from Shutterstock.]
