By Rachel Guise — PPS Editor
Did your elementary school have book club days? Teachers passed out Scholastic catalogs filled with the newest books that students couldn’t wait to get their hands on! After filling out the order form and including payment in the envelope, students would wait a few weeks until the book orders arrived. Today we’re still living in a subscription-based world. The popularity of streaming podcasts, audiobooks, TV shows, and movies is at an all-time high. Find out what subscription publishing can do for you and your book.
Let’s Define
Subscription publishing is a “system of obtaining orders (and sometimes payment) in advance to enable publication of a book” as defined by The Oxford Reference. Perhaps you haven’t heard of book-based subscriptions. However, you’ve probably seen subscription offers for newspapers, magazines, and blogs, which have been using this service for quite some time. But what about books?
Publishers and Subscriptions
Publishers have been using subscriptions as a business model for a long time. WNIP explains that this has been effective because publishers have long understood the importance of customer relationships. Let’s look at the jump from print to digital media. Publishers have managed to stay on top of, if not ahead of, changes in how their readers are accessing content. So of course they’ve been offering book subscriptions to their readers.
You and Your Book
Working with a publisher who uses this platform could have many benefits for you.
- Publishing a book can be a costly affair. If you work with a publisher who requires readers to pay in advance of obtaining your publication, you can use the subscription payment as an advance to pay publishing fees.
- Publishers who have already established a reputation for delivering interesting publications with their subscription-based clients could do wonders for your marketing. They can spark interest in readers who may not have originally reached (or clicked) for your book, in addition to your target audience.
- Let’s not forget the increase in podcast and audiobook popularity over the last few years. Several of these platforms are subscription-based, so if you’re looking to publish your book in more than one format, you’re off to a good start.
So whether you’re looking to boost marketing for your book, or get a jump on pesky publishing fees, consider working with a publisher who has experience with subscription-based publishing!