Is "fancy sales" of books a breakthrough innovation or drinking poison to quench thirst
The "blind book box" was launched by the concept of tide play, which book you buy depends on luck; the anchor sells "1 yuan books", and the live broadcast brings the goods to break down the reserve price...
Recently, the book publishing industry has launched an endless stream of "new ways to play" sales, which has caused a lot of controversy.
Some people praised it as an industry breakthrough innovation, while others criticized it as drinking poison to quench thirst.
Consumers frequently "step on thunder", and publishers "lost money and shouted"
The traditional book publishing industry has recently become more and more trendy.
The "blind box economy" continues to be popular, and some institutions have launched "blind book boxes" while they are hot.
The reporter searched on multiple e-commerce platforms and found that there are many types of "blind book boxes", most of which are priced far below the total price marked on the books included, and there are even extremely low prices of 6 yuan for 10 copies and 4 yuan for 5 copies.
However, many consumers reported that most of the "blind book boxes" they bought were of low quality, and it was suspected that the unsalable books would clear the inventory.
Moreover, most of the "blind book boxes" do not accept returns.
Ms. Lin from Beijing bought the "Book Blind Box" twice, but the experience was not good.
She told reporters that once she bought it in the live broadcast room, the books in the blind box had nothing to do with the type introduced by the anchor. There are also typos."
"'Book Blind Box' is a new marketing strategy. Some businesses focus on selection of blind boxes, which are welcomed by readers; some businesses only regard blind boxes as a gimmick to satisfy readers' curiosity, and even the purpose is to clear inventory. It is not desirable, and it is difficult to attract readers to continue to consume." Xiang Liping, general manager of Shandong Little Dolphin Culture Media Co., Ltd.
More popular than the blind box is live streaming, and more and more publishers are pouring into this new track.
In September last year, "big V" Liu Yuanyuan achieved sales of nearly 80 million yuan with a 16-hour book live broadcast, which caused shocks in the industry.
In the live broadcast, "500,000 books broke down to less than 10 yuan", and "100,000 books for 1 yuan", the low price "is cheaper than pirated copies and pulp."
The practice of breaking the bottom line of the industry's price has been controversial.
According to industry insiders, live broadcast sales have indeed led to large sales of some books, but the profit margin left for publishing houses is very limited, excluding the pit fees, logistics fees, discounts, etc. of live broadcast.
"Selling books on live broadcasts, on the surface, the readers get benefits and the publishers have cleared the inventory, but the cost of investment is huge, and even 'losing money and making money'." Zhao Qiang, a senior publisher, said that it seems to be very popular, but it is actually a kind of "false" Prosperity".
The "low-selling" of books is unsustainable, and "drinking poison to quench thirst" is difficult to relieve anxiety
Behind the "fancy sale" is the general anxiety in the book market.
However, if you only use "playing tricks" and "breaking prices" as selling points, instead of attracting readers with high-quality content and novel ideas, it is tantamount to drinking poison to quench your thirst.
In recent years, traditional book retail channels have been hit by the double impact of e-commerce and the epidemic, and are in a difficult situation.
The "2021 Book Retail Market Report" recently released by Beijing Kaiju Information Technology Co., Ltd. shows that the size of my country's book retail market in 2021 will be 98.68 billion yuan, up 1.65% year-on-year, but it has not returned to the pre-epidemic level; of which online channel sales The proportion is close to 80%.
Luo Dongqi, dean of the School of Business Planning, Chongqing Technology and Business University, believes that the rise of online sales channels such as live streaming and short videos has indeed driven some book sales. Authors, editors, and sales staff can directly communicate and interact with consumers, which is conducive to expanding channels. , better serve readers.
However, under the limited profit space, practitioners generally have a sense of urgency of "small profits but quick turnover".
Xiang Liping said that the discount is so low that there is no bottom line, which will cause polarization.
The resources of the top anchors are concentrated and the bargaining power is strong. The profit of the publishing house will become thinner and thinner, and the sustainable investment will not be guaranteed, which will affect the long-term development.
"Bad food hurts farmers, and cheap books will also hurt the bones of the publishing industry, losing the ability and motivation to produce high-quality products." Zhao Qiang said.
"Low-priced books have become an eye-catching gimmick, which will affect consumers' perception of book prices, and excessively bind low prices to purchases, 'only recognize the price but not the book'." Ma Ruijie, associate professor at the School of Journalism and Communication, Nankai University It is believed that this market environment will force the publishing house to further reduce costs and compete with peers on price, which will easily lead to the phenomenon that high-quality books are difficult to appear and inferior books flood the market.
Ni Wan, a professor at the School of Journalism and Communication of Shandong University, said that the blind-box marketing strategy, e-commerce "popular-driven" sales orientation, and "algorithmic recommendation" drainage model are not completely compatible with the "richness" requirements of books as content products match.
Selecting books and recommending books is also a key part of selling books. You cannot ignore quality control because of sales anxiety and affect readers' consumption experience.
It is urgent to improve the book pricing system, and publishers need to "content is king" to meet the challenges
Industry insiders believe that books are a special cultural product that plays an important role in enlightening wisdom and inheriting civilization.
Blindly dumping books at low prices has a negative impact on the long-term and healthy development of the publishing industry and on the improvement of the quality of the entire nation.
The online and offline "price war" has always been a "pain point" in the book publishing industry.
According to the survey, the price of books in online bookstores is on average about 20% lower than that in physical bookstores.
The addition of live broadcasts and short videos has exacerbated the price war.
"Books' 'price war' apparently benefits readers, but actually disrupts the book market order and destroys the book publishing industry chain," said Wei Yushan, president of the China Press and Publication Research Institute.
Ma Ruijie said: "You can learn from foreign price-limiting policies. For example, new books cannot be sold at a discount within a few months of publication, so as to protect the content of high-quality books. At present, some books in my country are priced inflatedly, just to deal with the discount sales in the future."
Recently, the National Press and Publication Administration issued the "14th Five-Year Plan for the Development of the Publishing Industry", which clearly proposed "regulating the order of online and offline publishing", "strengthening the supervision and management of publication prices, promoting book price legislation, and effectively prohibiting online and offline publishing. Vicious 'price war' in commodity sales and create a healthy and orderly market environment."
"China's publishing needs to transform from quantitative growth to quality improvement, implement the strategy of high-quality products, and produce more good books. It must legislate and improve the book pricing system to prevent winning or losing based on discounts alone." said Bai Bing, editor-in-chief of Relay Publishing House.
In addition to regulating the market, the industry generally believes that "content is king" to meet challenges.
"At present, the deep-seated reason for the anxiety of my country's book market is the output of high-quality content." Ma Ruijie said, "Book sales cannot always use their brains on skills and channels. The publishing industry should understand itself as a 'knowledge service provider' ', the core is knowledge and content, which can give full play to professional expertise, starting from the source of the industry, exploring IP operations, research and development of peripheral products, etc."
Xiang Liping believes that my country, as a country with a large population and a large developing country, still has great potential to be tapped in the number of readers and the amount of reading, and the development prospects of the publishing industry are still broad.
She suggested that the government should give full play to the functions of guidance, supervision and service, promote reading for all, so that original high-quality content has a larger market and more readers.
"The essence of publishing is to disseminate knowledge, transmit information, and inherit culture. Historically, the carrier forms of publications have changed many times, but the essence has never changed. China's publishing industry is still far from the world's advanced level, and we need to use high-quality The concept of development, consciously make good use of new technologies to catch up." said Wu Shulin, chairman of the China Publishing Association.
(Reporters Shi Jingnan, Bai Jiali and Wang Yang from Xinhua News Agency, Beijing, January 10)