Canadian publishing companies are becoming increasingly enamoured with digital. In fact, close to 90% of publishers currently produce eBooks, and the remainder are either in the process of starting to produce eBooks, or plan to produce them in the future.
Digital books are big business in Canada with major publishing companies reporting that 10% of their entire revenue stream is now derived from eBooks. Boutique and smaller publishers have stated that their sales fluctuate, with 1% to 10% of their sales, on average, stemming from eBooks.
When it comes to customers buying eBooks, 93% of all publishers have said that they do business with Kobo, while 83% of publishers elect to do business with Amazon to have their content available on Kindles. Apple placed a strong third, with 76% of publishers choosing to sell eBooks in the iBookstore. Google, B&N and Sony had more or less than 50% of Canadian publishers distributing to their ecosystems, and data suggests it’s mainly the larger publishing companies.
What’s stopping publishers?
What are the barriers for digital adoption in Canada right now? Well, the majority of traditional publishers (53%) do not have a staff member specifically dedicated to digital. While 100% of large publishers and 71% of mid-size publishers have a dedicated digital staff member, only 31% of small publishers do. Another barrier is a lack of new titles being digitized. Almost half (49%) of all respondents have more than 50% of their active print titles available as eBooks, and 19% reported that 100% of their active list is available in some type of digital format.
In order for the publishing industry in Canada to not just survive, but to thrive, small and medium companies need to devote more resources to their digital infrastructure. Having at least one staff member to facilitate the digital conversion is essential – and making sure your entire catalogue is readily available will boost sales. Most major publishers now have between 22% and 30% of their entire revenue stream derived from the sales of electronic books. This is putting smaller companies under the gun to better compete.
Another problem for smaller companies is that larger companies are starting to form mutually beneficial partnerships. Sony and Kobo, for example, recently joined forces in the U.S. and Canada, inking a deal that facilitated Sony’s eBook and e-reading customers to move to Kobo’s platform. Kobo will sell eBooks to Sony eReader and tablet eBook buyers. A new Kobo app will come pre-loaded on select Sony tablets sold in the U.S. and Canada. This means that Sony is actually abandoning its digital reading involvement for reasons that are not known at this time. However Sony did comment that it views Kobo as the best solution for its current and future customers and has assured “a seamless transition” to Kobo while its readers continue to read the titles they want. Kobo currently has 18 million customers who have access to about 4 million eBooks. You can expect more news from the major players in the eBook market in the near future that will continue to change the eBook publishing landscape.
On the consumer side, high eBook prices in the marketplace seem to be slowing sales – at least according to one watchdog agency. To combat this, a February 2014 decision by Canada’s Competition Bureau has allowed some retailers to lower the prices of e-books. The Bureau said it reached agreements with four major e-book publishers that will force them to drop their practice of stopping retailers from offering discounts on e-books. The Bureau signed an arrangement Simon & Schuster, HarperCollins Canada Ltd., Macmillan Inc. and Hachette BookGroup. Each company agreed to remove or alter wording in their current distribution agreements with individual eBook retailers that the bureau felt restricts eBook competition in Canada.
The state of digital books in Canada
