How to sell digital content in the publishing industry
The digital world offers a new growth opportunity for the publishing industry. Creating your own digital content store requires strategic thinking and long-term development. It’s important to understand that making your content digital doesn’t mean hindering or replacing your print products. On the contrary, it is a complement that can attract new sales if executed properly with a good strategy. The idea is to provide different options for the reader to choose how to consume your content.
Your digital content won’t increase sales on its own. To begin with, you will need to consider some strategies to attract buyers to your digital content. This article will also shed some light on how to sell digital content in the publishing industry and get your buyers to buy online. But first, let’s look at some reasons for going digital.
Advantages of selling digital content
The benefits of publishing a book digitally are obvious, especially for those who work in publishing. With Publica, this task is made easier. Here are some of the advantages of digital publications :
Low costs
An eBook has lower production costs since printing hundreds or thousands of copies is not necessary. The same ePub or PDF can be sold as many times as needed without any additional costs. Undoubtedly, this is one of the main reasons to take into account when deciding whether or not to publish your content digitally.
No risk of running out of stock
Selling your print content implies thinking about the number of prints you will distribute. Bookstores work better to generate a link with the community, working better with new releases. On the other hand, with digital stores you don’t have to worry about running out of stock because the content is always available. Also, the best way to sell and get your editorial content to your readers is through online stores.
Higher profit margin
Having your own digital content store implies low costs that compensate those coming from print sales. In this sense, sales are practically translated into profits.
No logistic problems
Every time you produce a sale, your digital content automatically reaches your users. Therefore, the costs related to logistics disappear, as well as organizational issues related to this.
Much more flexible content
You can use your digital content and your users' analysis that you make with your Publica store strategically to increase your sales. Generating coupons, giving away content for a limited time, or offering subscriptions to publications that may be of interest to a particular user, are valid techniques to sell your digital content and increase your readers' loyalty!
No direct impact on the environment
The waste related to paper production is reduced to zero in the case of digital content. The same happens with waste linked to the distribution of books. By creating your own digital content store, you will reduce your company’s ecological footprint and the impact that the print industry has on the environment.
How can you sell digital content
Making your digital content available is not enough to generate the expected sales. To achieve this, you must generate a marketing strategy that attracts your readers or potential customers. Keep in mind that physical stores have a shop window that, in many cases, determines the purchases of your readers. With a digital store, it is different. Therefore, there are some key issues to keep in mind:
Understand your users
First of all, your strategy should include identifying the profiles of those who would buy your publications. Defining your Buyer Persona is, without a doubt, the most important step because it will tell you who your ideal reader is and to whom you will aim your resources and efforts. On the other hand, you must generate your own user analysis from the tools that your digital store can provide you with. Other tools such as Google Analytics and Facebook Analytics can provide you with the necessary data to improve your efforts and sell more digital content.
Boost your social networks
These are the media of choice these days. For this reason, it is important to think of a marketing strategy that includes them to generate a direct relationship with your readers. The best thing to do is to create a content calendar that incorporates your new digital content, recommendations, and promotions like offering a chapter of a new book for free. Of course, you must keep in mind that your digital communication must be constant. This implies thinking about everything you need before getting started to make sure you don't abandon your networks from one day to the next. This is a strategy that requires time and dedication, but the fruit it reaps is well worth it.
Improve your user experience
This refers to the entire journey that users have with your digital content: from the moment they learn about your products to the moment they purchase them. Therefore, all channels must be designed to make the user journey as successful as possible.
In addition, having your own digital content store on Publica will allow your users to enjoy your publications through Publica’s interactive reader. Your readers can generate their own quotes, highlight them in different colors and even translate them into other languages. The interactive reader is also great for people with vision impairment since it has a built-in option to convert text to audio.
Conclusion
In the current context, digital content sales, whether eBooks or audiobooks, are increasing. Accordingly, the publishing industry must take advantage of this market and start carrying out these types of sales. While doing so, it is also important to have in mind a marketing strategy, user analysis, and online visibility because this will significantly improve the buying experience for the process of your readers.
