5 Key Questions
1) Who have been able to been able to nre of books are most bought paperbacke-reader compared to books bought in a store?
In picking the idea of whether an eBooks are now
going out of fashion due to the increase in people using-readers so they are
purchasing eBooks, in doing this I researched which genre of books are more
likely to sell on each of the different types whether it be an
e-reader or an paperback. On the first website that I found to Mancee about the
best kinds of books that you could write in order for them to sell to the
audience, that article tells you that if you are trying to sell a fiction book
you are better off writing fiction books that contain mystery, thriller and
crime. This is followed by statistics that state that science fiction was the
second most selling with 26% readers, literature came third with 24% and not
far behind was romance with 21%. However if you are trying to write an
non-fiction book then you are better off writing a novel based on the genre of
history at 31% of the market buying the books, this is closely followed by
biographies that had 29% of the market and in third place was religious novels. I then looked at another source which allowed me
to find more information about what books sell the best; this showed me that in
the USA they summed up that in the last 20 years the best-selling books are self-help,
kid literature and erotica. The article just continues to talk about how the
increase in eBooks has affected people and that the increase in this had led to
an increase in books like self-help, inspiration and advice books which have
changed the way we think. This has also increased the amount of erotica and
romance novels that are being read as the public are able to read the books and
not feel as though they are being watched as people cannot see what books they
are reading. The article also talks about how since 2009 the number of people
reading fiction books has increased as readers are now look for and escape where
they can live in a world that is not theirs. I continued to look at what types of books are
selling more and found a website which showed me that the fifth highest selling
book was horror with sales of £46.87 million showing how many people were
buying horror books, in forth it showed that science fiction and fantasy made
as much as £347.50 million showing that though many were buying horror more
were purchasing books that had a fantasy aspect towards them for example the Harry
Potter books sold well. In third it was religious books that made as much as
£423.93 million which was an increase in £76.43 showing that though we am
believe that people are more interested in religion rather than books of
science fiction and fantasy. Though in second is crime and mystery whilst
romance and erotica is first showing that through being able to read books in a
more private setting as people do not know the books that they are reading on a
e-reader so they are able to read these books anywhere they please.
http://bubblecow.net/what-is-the-best-genre-to-write-if-you-want-to-get-published/
http://www.csmonitor.com/Books/chapter-and-verse/2013/1101/What-books-sell-best-Self-help-kid-lit-and-erotica
http://www.therichest.com/rich-list/which-5-book-genres-make-the-most-money/
2) When where paperback book sales at there peak before e-readers came along?
Whilst I was researching what books were sold the most on eBooks I found that the types of books were
romance and erotica novels which led me to look at what types of books that
would mean that paperback books would be at their highest peak in sales. In
order for me to be able to find out what books are most likely to be sold I looked
through the types of books that were sold most on e-readers gave me a brief
idea on what the sales would be like for books the sold more on e-readers would
be compared to those that are sold as paperbacks. In doing this research I began
by looking up best bookseller charts in order for me to see what the stores had
listed them in, in looking up the different stores I found that many of them
had Minecraft: The official Combat Handbook showing that the majority of people
that are buying paperback books are people who need books for them to be able
to complete a game. However when you look on the Tesco website you can see that
there is a range of different types of books that were on their bestsellers
list for example they had a range of different romance to crime to baking books
showing that it depends on the people who are shopping there making the
audience for the books at Tesco older than people in their teens. Though I was not able to specifically find when the paperback books were at their peak I did find that during the year of 2012 there was a decrease in the amount of people that went and bought eBooks preferring to actually having bought the book which shows that though they do enjoy reading eBooks they still have a passion for buying books that are paperback
http://www.tesco.com/direct/paperbackchart.event
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2013/dec/27/bestselling-print-books-2013
http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424127887323874204578219563353697002
3) Are eBook sales more than book sales?
Whilst I have been gaining information on whether eBooks are better than and ordinary paperback book, i have been able to gain information into different areas of what eBooks are like, the different prices of the different books and what these do to impact others who prefer to have the paperback and are paperback books now going out of fashion due to the lack of interest in actually having a book rather than downloading one. As I was looking through whether eBooks are better than paperback books I noticed that though eBooks seem to be the better option this is not necessarily the case as there was an article which suggested that people were going back to buying books as they were now buying tablets that were for a multipurpose so they were more likely to do other things on their tablets for example they may have got films or television programmes that they had recently downloaded to watch on trains and on a long journey rather than read a book as watching television is seen as the more typical option for one who is on a long journey and has a tablet. The article went on to say that there was a report done to see if Americans still valued paperback books the way they used to, and the findings showed that the percentage of adults in which read an eBook rose from 16% to 23%, however it also showed that 89% of paperback readers had read at least one printed book in the last 12 months and only 30% said they had read an e-book.
http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424127887323874204578219563353697002
4) Who are more likely to read eBooks over a store bought book?
As I was finding the information for all the other questions, the sources that I had found seemed to apply to all the questions that I had so I was able to look up one question and come up with a consensus for another question, which further allowed me to be able to answer the question as to who are more likely to buy e-books. In this I found that the books that are most likely to be bought on an e-reader are Romantic and erotica, religious, crime and mystery, and science fiction and fantasy showing that many genres of books are likely be read over an e-reader as there is more privacy to what you are reading when on an e-reader as it is not clear to the another person what the book is unless they have read the particular book before. In an article in the Guardian, the Observer about why women read more than men it tells us that women are more likely to read a book than a man is, as a recent survey has suggested and found that nearly half of women are avid readers and are less than likely to put a book down once they begin, they also found that women are likely to read a lengthy amount of books in a year compared to an average man. The article goes on to say that men on the other hand and more than likely less able to keep up with the standards of women who read books and that twice as many men admitted to not being able to finish a book.
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2009/mar/22/women-reading-books-study
http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424127887323874204578219563353697002
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2013/dec/27/bestselling-print-books-2013
5) Are eBooks cheaper than most books?
Through doing my research to see whether
paperback books where going out of fashion due to the increase of people now
buying e-readers, in order for me to be able to see whether this is true I
looked into whether the prices of eBooks was the reason that the
paperback books were now not being bought as much as they used to be as the
prices of eBooks are much cheaper than the books you can buy from a store or
online. I first looked at Amazon as they are a company in which has created the
Kindle and provides the eBooks for the device, Amazon are also known for
selling books so it allowed to be able to compare the difference in prices. In doing this I chose a book which I knew
was popular which the general audience, for example I used the Hunger Games Trilogy
as it is a worldwide phenomenon so people would be looking to buy the books if
they had not already. When I looked up the prices on Amazon I saw that the
Hunger Games Trilogy as an eBook was only £10.44 for all three books, when I further
looked into this I was able to see that if I wanted to buy the paperback books
it would cost me £16.06 which is a total of a £5.62 difference in the prices of
the different kinds of books, this shows that due to there being a £5.62 people
are more likely to spend the hundreds of pounds on buying an e-reader so that
they are able to buy cheaper books. In order to see whether this information that
I have found is correct I also checked other websites in order to see if they
are similar in prices in terms of eBooks. The first e-reader I checked after
the Kindle was Kobo which is also an e-reader; the price also showed that
though it was slightly pricier at £14:87 it is still cheaper than the paperback
version showing that this could be the reason that people are likely buy eBooks
over the paperback, in order to make sure this is also true I also checked one
last e-reader which was Nook by Barnes and Noble which showed that the trilogy
is £12.35 showing that even though it is more than the kindle price it is still
cheaper than most of the other e-books. Ii also made sure to look at other
bookstores that sell paperbacks so that I could compare the prices of the
books, on the WHSmith website I found that it cost £16.75, the Book people sold
the trilogy for £20, and Waterstones sold the books for £17.99, this showed
that eBooks are a lot cheaper than the prices of the paperbacks allowing people
to be able to by a trilogy for less than what you would pay if you bought them
for as a paperback. As a way of seeing whether the book audience thought that
this was the reason that paperback books were now out of fashion, in doing this
I came across an article where a woman named Felicity Hannah wrote an article
on how she thought that e-readers were better but as she started to use them
more she realised that to a certain extent paperback books would be better,
though on e-readers you are able to buy books for free.
The Hunger Games trilogy, eBooks:
How has this research helped develop your idea?
By researching these questions I have been able to have a better understanding of the topic of paperback books vs e-reader as the information allowed me to better understand whether an e-reader is better than a person buying a paperback book. When researching i found that though many people were now using e-reders there was still an healthy amount of people who buy paperbooks. Through this research i was able to see that many people buy eBooks so that they are able to read romance and erotic novels in a sort of private setting as people would not know what they are reading.
