Publishing has traditionally been thought of as an industry that instinctively knows the reader and draws primarily on experience and general market trends to design publishing and marketing plans. Even as that instinctive factor remains a critical element of success, Random House has built a Consumer Insights team that draws on a number of data sources to help marketers and publishers better understand consumers. One of the most useful resources is the Random House reader panel, which allows direct access to and feedback from readers.

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This month, the Random House Sales Analysis team offers an answer to the age-old questions “Do women prefer to buy books written by women? And do men prefer to buy books written by men?” We share their point of view, including some surprises about how this varies by genre.

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Authors increasingly create content on an ongoing basis through social media, blogs, and video. But what makes a piece of content likely to be shared—and maybe even go viral? We look at some of the latest research in this fascinating area.

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In an age where we are defined by social media, it’s constructive to make a good impression when engaging with others. Each platform comes with its own rules of etiquette, which leaves many people feeling like outsiders until they catch on. This can be true of Twitter, as new users decipher the use of RT or MT, and fret over whom to follow back. Play by the rules and use common sense, and you’ll have the best chance of being rewarded with responsive followers. Keep in mind: You are what you tweet.

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What happens to a manuscript after it leaves an editor’s desk? This video explores the next critical steps in the pre-publishing process, from copy editing the text to designing and coding each interior page so the book renders beautifully in print and digital formats. Watch the video and go behind the scenes of preparing a manuscript for print and eBook production.

Finally seeing the cover for your book can be a thrilling moment. More and more authors are choosing to share that moment with fans with a dramatic “cover reveal.” As well as being fun, cover reveals can help build buzz and momentum in advance of a book’s publication. Plus they are easy to do—with a bit of planning and good communication with your publishing team.

Here is some advice on whether cover reveals are a good tactic for your book, and tips on execution. (more…)

What is Tumblr?

Tumblr is both a blogging platform and a social network. It’s a network of over 165 million blogs, and a great place to build a readership for your books or just share your daily thoughts. Your posts get distributed, liked, and reposted just like on Twitter—but instead of displaying 140 characters, you can display unlimited text, images, animated gifs, photo sets, audio files, videos, and more. You can follow whomever you like and get a beautiful dashboard that streams the content you’ve selected throughout the day.  (more…)

Watching videos online has become a major national pastime. YouTube is the third-most-visited site on the web (after Google and Facebook). 78 percent of all adult Internet users report watching online videos; 31 percent have also uploaded them. Many authors have used video to great effect. In this article, we’ll give you some simple ideas for videos you could make, and teach you how to upload content you may not realize you already have.

As we ring in 2014, we are excited to begin our first full year as Penguin Random House. Our primary goal for the new year continues to be the one we announced on our first day: to bring your books to the largest and most diverse possible audience. It gives us great pleasure and pride to support and advance your work, as we look forward to building upon the publishing achievements of the year past. (more…)

If you’re not already on Pinterest, it’s time to consider sharing your voice and increasing your reach through this fast-growing community. Since we last explored Pinterest, they have gained over 53.3 million users (source: Comscore) and have added exciting new features such as article pins, which allow users to discover and collect articles from around the web. Pinterest also released their first set of APIs (application programming interfaces) to Random House and other select partners, allowing us to create new ways for readers to discover your books online.

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