The upcoming holiday season is the most important selling season in the year, but it also presents special challenges for independent book retailers. Just when it is most important to have lots of staff on the selling floor, helping customers and recommending gifts, it also becomes crucial to keep key titles in stock, which demands time in the back office, tracking consumer demand and sourcing inventory.
In our increasingly digital world, virtual author appearances have become popular with book-loving audiences in libraries, classrooms, book blogs, and book groups. Here are our tips and thoughts on the virtual platforms we have worked with to date in this evolving area.
For authors who have the time to post regularly, blogging can be a wonderful way to build a following and engage with readers. One question authors often ask us is “What should I blog about?” While every author is different, these are the key factors we think authors should take into account when deciding what to include in their blogs.
MARKUS DOHLE
CHAIRMAN AND CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER
MEMBER OF THE EXECUTIVE BOARD OF BERTELSMANN SE & CO. KGaA
October 29, 2012
To Our Authors,
Our most important mission will always be to publish the work you entrust to us for everyone, everywhere, in every format, and on every platform. That mandate is a primary motivation behind Bertelsmann and Pearson, the parent companies of Random House and the Penguin Book group, signing an agreement this week to combine our respective trade book activities. Read more
MARKUS DOHLE
CHAIRMAN AND CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER
MEMBER OF THE EXECUTIVE BOARD OF BERTELSMANN SE & CO. KGaA
October 29, 2012
To Our Literary Agents,
As you now know, our parent company Bertelsmann today signed an agreement with Pearson to combine Penguin and Random House’s respective trade-book publishing activities. In this new partnership with Penguin, we will be retaining the distinct identities of both companies’ imprints. You and your clients will benefit from an extraordinary breadth of publishing choices, and editorial talents and experience. Our Random House imprint leadership remains endowed with tremendous autonomy and financial resources to decide which books to publish, and how to publish them. We expect this to continue in our new business. Read more