Could An Overdependence on Data Hurt The Book Industry?
Data in Moderation
All of this is not to say that data is poisonous to the book industry. Many publishers are mindful of looking beyond mainstream trends and are applying sales data in interesting ways to do so. Dan Lubart, SVP of strategy and publishing operations at Hachette, explains that sales data is actually helping Hachette identify promising self-published authors before they hit the bestseller lists. "[Data] won't say what author we should sign, but it will give acquiring editors a list of high-value targets of authors that have multiple books ranked in the top 1,000 in Barnes & Noble, for example." Elsewhere, Hachette can also monitor books that haven't gone viral yet but are still quietly gaining traction, using retailer rankings or even social media. This allows acquiring editors to gain "weeks or months of lead time" on reaching out to or signing the authors of those books, Lubart says.
- Companies:
- Hachette Book Group
- HarperCollins
- People:
- Caleb Mason