Bestsellers are the main source of profit for publishing houses and book companies, and they are also the backbone of the development of China's book retail market.

This year, the top 5% of books contributed more than 64% of the market's sales, so every company is working hard to develop bestsellers.

At present, the market can be divided into nine market segments: teaching materials, social sciences, literature, children, language, science and technology, art, life and biography.

In addition, the four categories of books of social science, literature and art, children, and life and leisure are collectively referred to as popular books, and all of Zhang Chu's works belong to the category of popular books!

Nowadays, digital reading is becoming more and more widespread, and many classic and best-selling books have been made into e-books, and with the popularization of smartphones and tablets, e-reading has made great progress.

However, physical books are still slowly recovering, and they are not ushering in the end as people feared in the past, but there is a sense of prosperity.

This is due to the fact that the number of people reading books is gradually increasing, and the reading popularity rate is increasing.

In the past, when the standard of living was low, everyone had no money to buy books to read, and at that time, they all borrowed or rented books!

Now that the material life has been greatly improved, the average number of works read has also increased.

When the level of knowledge and culture has improved, of course, there are more people reading books than before, after all, they have already achieved nine years of compulsory education.

Of course, although the development of the Internet has not eliminated physical books, it has also brought earth-shaking changes to the sales channels of physical books.

Now the online sales channel has surpassed the physical bookstore to become the main sales situation, Dangdang, Amazon, JD.com, physical bookstores, and various Taobao stores constitute a wide range of sales channels.

It is precisely because of the success of online sales that the physical book market has actually rebounded, because the sales of physical bookstores have remained almost unchanged, and most of the growth has come from online channels!

It can be said that as long as a book can complete the counterattack in online channels, then the offline physical store will also grow exponentially.

Zhang Chu is a typical example, he first became popular through the Internet, and then drove the sales of physical books.

"Sherlock" was picked up by Sherlock Holmes fans and rotten female readers, and then "Life of Pi" was sought after by netizens with its shocking reversal in the finale.

In the end, with the help of "Ghost Blowing the Lamp", he established the status of the most popular writer on the Internet, and now it is almost impossible to become popular with word of mouth among book critics!

Now the Internet is an important voice channel for readers, they can speak freely on the Internet, and increase the popularity of their favorite works and writers.

The influence brought by this is by no means stronger than the recommendation of three or five friends in reality.

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Times Publishing & Media Co., Ltd. was listed as early as 2008 and was established in 1999 after 20 years.

"The company's stock price is falling again, and it has been falling for 7 consecutive trading days. Originally, I thought that yesterday I would basically be able to stay stable, but today, why did it fall by a full 3 points?"

The Wanhui Publishing Group, which is the company behind Times Publishing Media, has achieved an average annual growth rate of more than 20% in sales revenue, profit and main business income in previous years.

But now at the end of 2019, there has been a big decline in performance!

As a publishing group, the most important thing is the sales of various types of works, and after the annual report of Times Publishing in 2019 came out, investors found that although the company has published thousands of works, there are not many outstanding sales, and the total sales growth is not as expected.

Not to mention 20%, not even 10%!

Even if the published work has won various awards, it cannot be converted into sales.

For example, "The Spirit of Contemporary China" for the first prize of outstanding philosophy and social sciences in East China, "Test Pilot Heroes" recommended by young people across the country for 100 excellent works, and "Where Does the Wind Come From" for the excellent award for books on both sides of the Taiwan Strait in Chinese, these are all icing on the cake.

If the sales are good, of course it is a good thing to win these awards!

However, among the works promoted this year, what are "On the Field of Hope - Focusing on the Story of the Three Farmers", "The Light and Shadow of Sino-Japanese Relations", and "My World: Steve's Adventure Story", "Tea Ceremony Artist's Tea Soup Selection".

Honestly, none of these books have any chance of selling well!

Even though Times Publishing Culture Media Co., Ltd. still has periodicals, film and television works, and new media businesses, the publishing business is still the top priority.

With growth slowing down so much, it's certainly normal for investor confidence to be low.

"A small part of the reason for today's stock price drop is probably inseparable from the announcement of Nanhai Publishing Company to raise Zhang Chu's "Norwegian Wood"! Originally, our two books had the appearance of champions on New Year's Day. Assistant Chen Ou calmly analyzed: "If the fierce man joins the battle, the possibility of achieving a win-win situation is very small, and it is very likely to achieve both defeats." ”

Tian Haiming, the chief content officer, that is, the editor-in-chief, frowned, "Originally, the New Year's Day was chaotic, and there were still people stirring up the situation. What do you think of the sales of these two books in our company?"

Product content and product operation are two different sectors, Chen Ou shook his head and said: "Not optimistic. After all, Zhang Chu's "Norwegian Wood" has a pre-sale bonus, and he is now in full swing, and few of them can reach the same level. The number of retweets and likes on Weibo posted by that kid yesterday is not lower than that of the little fresh meat in the entertainment industry, which is very scary!"

Times Publishing urgently needs a sales champion to return to blood, otherwise the stock price will remain so green, and it will be difficult for shareholders to explain.

In fact, it is not necessary to win the championship, as long as you can have outstanding results in sales.

This time, Times Publishing launched a total of seven or eight new books in January, but many of them were cannon fodder, the main ones were "My Youth Love Story" and "The Return of the King".

The former directly collides with the genre of "Norwegian Wood", both of which are about youth love, but this one is more Japanese-style, and Zhang Chu's is more realistic.

"The Return of the King" is LeBron James's autobiographical work, James, who has set various records, also has many fans in China, and the Chinese publishing rights of this biographical work were specially placed on New Year's Day after being grabbed by Times Publishing.

Originally, the NBA Christmas War attracted more attention, but for the sake of sales in 2020, they delayed it until New Year's Day.

If you advance a little earlier, you can take advantage of the heat of the Christmas war and avoid strong enemies at the same time!

It's a pity that people are not as good as heaven, and this time it hit the muzzle of the gun directly.

"I guess we are not the only ones affected, let's see how the rest of the companies respond, we have to teach Nanhai Publishing Company what the rules are!"