Compared with other bookstores, Zhuhai Wujie Bookstore has some advantages: it is the only bookstore in the city facing the sea, located in a large community, with bookstores and art galleries... In trying new ways of selling books, live broadcast, blind Boxes, communities... none of them were absent.
Jiang Wei, head of Wujie Bookstore, feels that the proportion of people who prefer to buy books in the live broadcast room and those who are used to spending in physical bookstores is not too high.
"In the live broadcast room, books are only a commodity, and its value is mainly reflected in price; and the meaning of the existence of bookstores to a city is not to fight online shopping. It is a book and people that grows around. space to serve books and readers.”
Li Youyi, who is engaged in the IT software industry, is born in the 1990s. She likes to try new things, and she "will not refuse" new book marketing methods.
She once bought a suspense book in the Douyin live broadcast room. "This blogger is very temperamental and has a good voice. He can read aloud when introducing books, which immediately attracted me."
It's just that it's been half a year since she bought the book, let alone reading it, she hasn't even read it.
Regarding the matter of selling books, the discussions outside the live broadcast room are as lively as in the live broadcast room.
Selling books, publishing houses and bookstores are working hard
The various attempts of Wujie Bookstore are a microcosm of the current brick-and-mortar bookstore.
On World Book Day in 2020, Wujie Bookstore launched the "Unbounded Blind Box" for the first time, which was welcomed by readers and became a must-have star product in April every year. ”, with AR navigation quick book search, AR smart book recommendation, AR deep-sea scene reading and other scenes, at the same time, it mainly recommends books related to technology and future themes; it organizes exhibitions, salons, and workshops in conjunction with art museums, and classifies original picture books according to age and content. It is packaged and sold as "Growth Energy Pack"; cooperated with Penguin Landon, introduced the classic series of books from the publishing house, and sold them at the same time; launched live book sales, and established three online communities of art, culture, and parent-child. 62 events were carried out...
Publishing houses are also working very hard to sell books.
Liu Qiang, head of the Marketing and Publicity Department of Writers Publishing House, said that the publishing house's book sales still mainly rely on "distribution-retail".
However, the current retail trend is shifting from the previous brick-and-mortar bookstores, online bookstores and other platforms to new media platforms, and the proportion and influence of sales are increasing.
Liu Qiang said that specially printed books have obvious advantages in live broadcast and delivery. Readers can watch the physical display and listen to the anchor's explanation, such as "Liu Wendi's Painting Liu Xinwu Comments on Jin Ping Mei" and "Li Boyi's Commentary on Jinxie Zhonghua Romance of the Three Kingdoms", etc.; Short videos bring goods, and they pay more attention to the copywriting of the video, the influence of the UP master, the quality of the book content, etc. In 2021, a million fan anchor will bring the goods "White Deer Plain", which will generate nearly 6,000 copies of sales.
Yang Xiaoyan, editor-in-chief of the New Classics Humanities and Social Sciences Division, believes that book marketing will always be combined with the current hottest form of communication.
Twenty years ago, books were mainly promoted through paper media; later, with the rise of Weibo, WeChat public accounts and other self-media, Weibo publicity, public accounts sold books, etc.; due to the new crown pneumonia epidemic, many offline activities could not be carried out, live broadcasts. This online form has attracted attention, and with the emergence of book bloggers, live book selling has gradually become an irreplaceable part of book marketing; now, Douyin, video accounts, Pinduoduo, Bilibili, Xiaohongshu, etc. have become important promotion and even sales platform.
For example, talk show actor Li Xueqin has publicly expressed his love for the poet Yu Xiuhua.
In April 2021, Li Xueqin's fans mixed a video of Yu Xiuhua, which added the purchase link of "Moonlight on the Left Hand".
After the video was released on Douyin, the publishing house took advantage of the situation to follow up, triggering the printing of nearly 100,000 books. "Although the situation of this book can be met but not sought after, the sales of books caused by new media and new forms have increased. It’s one after another, and it’s always visible.”
Is the "extremely low discount" in the live room wrong?
At the same time that the live broadcast books sold tens of thousands of copies, controversy followed, and there was no lack of dazzling words such as "cheap sale" and "piracy" in public opinion.
Liu Shanshan, a post-90s girl who works in the media, loves reading, and online purchases are the main method, but she feels a little conflicted about selling books through live broadcasts. When watching Douyin, I accidentally swiped to sell books on the live broadcast. I clicked in and found that there are almost no famous books in it. There are only one or two books, which are still "bad street". .
In her opinion, most of the books sold in the live broadcast room are in the category of "teaching you how to behave in a week" and "the most efficient management". It’s a unified model.” Liu Shanshan said, “If live-streaming book sales can be like beauty makeup, with careful selection, careful interpretation, and serious promotion, the future is still promising.”
In Yang Xiaoyan's view, low price is the business logic of live streaming. Not only books have low prices in live streaming rooms, but also all commodity prices.
"Why should consumers buy from your live broadcast room? First, he has demand; second, it is cheap. The anchor allows fans to benefit - the lowest price, and consumers will come often."
Yang Xiaoyan said that the profits of most live broadcast sales are very thin, and the anchors are also picky about their selection.
"Sometimes, if it is an old book with a certain inventory, it is more appropriate to deal with it. But the low-price promotion of the anchor can only be done occasionally, not the norm. When the upper, middle and lower reaches have their own profit margins, the entire chain of the book industry can only If it operates normally, the book industry will be healthy.”
Regarding the sale of books at extremely low prices in the live broadcast room, Liu Qiang said that he "very disagree".
"It destroys the circulation of commodities. First, because to achieve a 'extremely low discount', the pricing may become higher and higher, and the so-called low discount will become a false discount; second, in order to reduce costs, it may affect the quality, There is even a batch of low-quality and low-priced goods specially customized for the live broadcast channel, and a large number of pirated books have appeared." Liu Qiang said that there is no right or wrong in the new technology and new method, but it will magnify the benefits and damages at the same time.
According to Lu Yi, an expert in book industry marketing, today, a consensus has been reached on selling books on live broadcasts, but the big V has pressed the "lowest price on the entire network" again and again, so that the publisher has sales but no profit.
"Selling genuine books at ultra-low prices, on the premise of excluding unfair competition, is actually a 'lose-lose' situation for publishing companies and bookstores. Publishing brands are not strong enough, and a few ultra-low-priced varieties have not boosted the publishing house's product line. Less than the actual profit. And the online platform occupies a lot of consumers' time, and the exposure of the physical bookstore is becoming less and less."
Lu Yi said that now, publishing companies and bookstores have begun to try to run their own live broadcasts, and there are two types of accounts that have succeeded. One is to cut into the sub-tracks such as "suites, comics, novels", and accurately output the content expression; the second is the anchor style. It is particularly distinctive, forming the "personal charm" of the account.
In the live broadcast room, Wujie Bookstore mainly recommends new books, so that more people can understand the book before they actually read it, and at the same time promote sales with preferential discounts.
"Books are a medium that carries knowledge, culture and ideas. Compared with traditional sales, this is our more important mission and responsibility, and it is more interesting and meaningful to work in this way." Jiang Wei said.
The era of "picking two young people for propaganda" is long gone
Lu Yi said that whether it is a publishing company or a bookstore, the core difficulty in developing a new business model is still “having professional talents and implementing an incentive mechanism”.
Different types of books adapt to different promotion channels. For example, in short videos and live broadcasts, the variety of books that can be displayed is very limited, so they are naturally more inclined to popular books; subdivided communities are more conducive to "mother help, postgraduate entrance examination party" , Handmade Circle” and other vertical content books.
Ma Tianwei is a doctoral student in the Department of Philosophy at Peking University. For him, e-books are enough to meet daily reading needs. Now, there are only two types of books that can stimulate the desire to buy physical books: philosophical works and picture albums.
"Philosophy books need to be read and sketched repeatedly, and they are read very slowly, so they are not suitable for reading on Kindle. Books such as picture books have very high requirements for editing. Good authors + good publishers + good printing houses + editors are well arranged. Well, I will buy it."
Ma Tianwei never watched live books, but once tried to buy a blind box of books from Shanghai Translation Publishing House.
However, he couldn't get it.
Li Youyi once bought a blind box of books, which made her call "the door to a new world".
"I never read romance books, but 3 out of 5 in the blind box were."
Unexpectedly, one of them made her fall deeply into it, "It's not bloody at all, and the description of the emotions of the male and female protagonists is particularly delicate.
"Li Youyi read the book completely twice, "Without the blind box, how could I have discovered this 'treasure'".
Lu Yi analyzed that the appeal of blind book boxes lies in the "sense of surprise with the expected range", but there is little room for profit to readers. If the creativity in execution is insufficient and there is no "content added value", readers will not get extra emotional experience, so most of the book blind box attempts failed to last long.
There are many ways to sell books, but selling books is by no means the whole of publishing houses and bookstores.
Yang Xiaoyan believes that these new methods of book marketing are useful supplements, and may wish to try them. However, traditional book sales channels are still the mainstream.
"There are many ways for books and readers to meet, but the most important thing is that the content of the book is good enough, and word of mouth is always the most advanced way of communication. Really good things will definitely be discovered, spread, and readers who find it, no matter what. How did you get there?"
Jiang Wei introduced that the current Wujie Bookstore's survival mainly relies on the "tradition and innovation parallel" model.
Tradition refers to the sales of books, cultural creativity and coffee; innovation includes those mentioned above, "In addition, we are also trying to explore from bookstores to 'cultural institutions', such as cultural classrooms, research classrooms, corporate, cultural The cultural space of the institution is planned and purchased as a whole, so as to increase revenue and realize the transformation of brand value.”
"Sales data is a result of selling books in a new way. As a new-style bookstore, we need to use innovative thinking to innovate operations, and book sales gradually begin to tilt towards secondary tasks." Jiang Wei said, "When bookstores are gradually recognized by many people, Through this 'recognition', the proportion of cultural service project cooperation has also gradually increased, which makes us realize the meaning of 'social effects generate economic benefits'."
Jiang Wei said: "In our ideal, the encounter between a book and a reader can be a hit-and-miss, or a mutual dislike; it can be an unexpected encounter, or a long-separated reunion, but in the end it is a kind of 'natural' in a very comfortable state.”
China Youth Daily and China Youth Daily reporter Jiang Xiaobin Trainee reporter Li Danping Source: China Youth Daily