10 Jul Entendiendo el mercado de ebooks en UK [en inglés] [+infografía]
Understanding the E-Book Consumer Today: Nielsen insight into the UK e-book consumer market
Nielsen has published its latest report based on Kantar Worldpanel UK data which provides insight into the pace of e-book adoption, combined with the measured effects of peoples’ book buying behaviour following the purchase of their first e-book. This data is valuable as it uses a continuous panel, asking the same questions of the same people so we can provide this level of insight.
Predictions that one in two books bought in a few years’ time will be digital editions seem to be inflated on the evidence of the trends in this latest report, based on Kantar Worldpanel data. For the second month running, e-book sales have fallen, and are back at their level – representing less than 20% of the market – of the spring and autumn of 2012. The rate at which new purchasers of e-books are coming to the market is slowing.
Sales declines:
- A second month of falling e-book sales contrasts with the trend in early 2012, when sales rose continuously apart from a blip in May. E-books are failing to compensate for a sharp drop in print sales, with total sales in the first quarter of 2013 down by some 8m units on the 2012 figure. The revenue figures show a decline of more than £50m, to £344m.
- As the revenue figures indicate, the book trade has been unable to compensate for falling volumes with higher prices. Indeed, average selling prices (ASPs) have fallen too, for print and e-books. The average price paid for an e-book in March was £2.82, 12% less than in the same month last year. However, Sony’s 25p e-book promotions, matched by Amazon, ended in March, so we may see a rise in e-book ASPs in coming months.
New buyers:
- Acquiring an e-reader and buying e-books for the first time sparks a surge of enthusiasm for books in both digital and print forms. In common with their predecessors, the new buyers in the first quarter of 2013 bought many more books in total than they had at the same time in the previous year, and included among them 15% more print books. However, Kantar Worldpanel’s trend data show us that the book industry faces a challenge in maintaining this enthusiasm, which in previous new e-book buyers has waned to such an extent that in the first quarter of this year they bought fewer books in total than they did before they entered the e-book market.