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BML acquired by Bowker

BML has been acquired by Bowker, the global leader in bibliographic information management solutions.  The company will become part of Bowker’s Publishing Services division.

“BML is a great strategic fit in our Business Intelligence Division as we grow our footprint in the international market,” said Kelly Gallagher, Bowker Vice President, Publishing Services.  “BML has a strong tradition of serving the UK market with reliable and actionable consumer information and we look forward to not only continuing this work, but developing and enhancing the range of services BML offers.”

BML, based in London, has been providing research and information to the UK book industry for 20 years.  Bowker’s Publishing Services runs a consumer information service, comparable to BML's Books & Consumers survey, in the US called PubTrack Consumer, which has fast become the publishing industry’s exclusive resource for understanding consumer book buying behavior.  Launched in 2007, PubTrack Consumer is an ongoing panel of consumer-based research encompassing feedback from more than 40,000 book consumers annually.  PubTrack also provides advanced cover review services, standard and custom reports as well as special studies — including a recent partnership with the Book Industry Study Group on a landmark e-Book Consumer Study.

BML’s entire staff including Jo Henry (jo-at-bookmarketing.co.uk), Steve Bohme (steve-at-bookmarketing.co.uk) and Rachel Levin (rachel-at-bookmarketing.co.uk) have moved to Bowker’s London office located at:

St Andrews House
18 – 20 St Andrew Street
London
EC4A 3AG
United Kingdom
+44 (0)207 832 1770

Book your place at BML's annual conference to discover all the latest book buying trends from the Books & Consumers survey, including channel performance, genre winners and losers and key book buyer demographics and influences.  The conference will take place during the morning at 1 Birdcage Walk, Westminster London SW1H 9JJ. 

The 2010 Conference will chaired by Toby Mundy, Chief Executive, Altantic Books and will be packed full of consumer insights:

• Steve Bohme, BML’s Research Director, will reveal the latest trends from the Books & Consumers survey: how the market for adult and children’s books performed in 2009; which consumers bought which types of books, what sources they used, and what drove their book buying decisions;
• Julie Meynink, Business Development Director, Nielsen BookScan, will be joining BML’s Rachel Levin with case studies showing how data from BookScan and Books & Consumers can be used to provide a fuller understanding of key market sectors;
• Dawn Burnett, Marketing Director, Simon & Schuster; will reveal how consumer insights drove the sales and marketing campaign of a recent bestseller;
• Kelly Gallagher, VP Publisher Services, Bowker's PubTrack, will examine the impact of ebooks on US consumers revealing what might be in store for the UK book industry.

For booking forms, full details of prices, and venue details click on the appropriate link below:

Companies subscribing to Books & Consumers: click here

BML retainer clients: click here

All others: click here

Alternatively, contact BML for further details (tel: 0207 832 1784).

New research conducted by BML for the Publishing Training Centre shows that most publishers experience problems with staff recruitment, with books publishing considered far less exciting than other industries among potential recruits

The study aims to assist UK publishers in developing approaches for more effective recruitment, development and retention of staff. Using surveys of publishers, publishing course directors, students and recruitment agencies, the research found, e.g., that:

• Low pay, and the perceived difficulty in finding a job, are the main things that make book publishing students think twice about a career in the industry. Among non-publishing students, a lack of interest in the industry, and the view that the work may be boring/monotonous, are at least as important detractions.
• The functions which causes the greatest recruitment problem for publishers are digital publishing, sales, editorial and production/design.
• Nearly one in five (18%) of non-publishing students are considering working in the newspaper/magazine/book publishing sector after leaving university. Only education/teaching (31%) and health sector/medicine (24%) are more widely considered among the industries explored.
• Publishing students seem keenest on working in the adult fiction sector (63%) and children’s books (56%), followed by adult non-fiction (44%) and academic (38%). School/ELT (25%) and professional publishing (21%) have much less appeal.

For more information and free access to the full report click here 

The first issue looked at the book buying habits of the 3.8m working mums, who were responsible for 10% of books bought in the last year, and have seen their purchases increase over the last 3 years. Subscribers will receive approximately 6 reports per year and each one will profile a different demographic group including, for example, teenage boys, mothers at home, fathers, younger men: no kids, retired men, upmarket males and downmarket females.

For more information about a subscription to Books & Consumers, contact BML on 0207 832 1784.

BML conducted a survey for Lovereading.co.uk to examine how reading choices are made, how people find information about the latest books, the reasons for buying online, and awareness and experience of ebooks & downloading.

The survey of just over 1300 Lovereading.co.uk members revealed that:

• For these heavy book buying respondents, author familiarity had the most widespread influence (90%) on reading choice, with series familiarity also a strong influence (63%).
• Recommendations from family and friends (66%) and from newspapers/magazines (59%) were also important influences, while extracts were considered more useful than website recommendations and reviews (53% vs. 43%).
• Blurbs influenced the reading choices of 62% of respondents.
• Cover design was the least influential factor examined (27%).
• Most respondents were aware that you could download a book, but had not actually done so (65%), while 19% claimed to have downloaded a book. Of these, the majority (53%) read their downloads on a laptop or computer rather than a dedicated e-book device (22%), iPhone (7%) or other mobile (3%).
• When it comes to paying for book downloads bought via the internet, most expected to sometimes pay and sometimes get them for free, while more expected to always pay if downloading in a bookshop.
• When asked what they expect to pay for ebooks, most of the respondents (c85%) thought that a downloaded book should cost less than a physical book, regardless of whether it was bought online or in a bookshop.

Take advantage of BML's questionnaire design and analysis expertise to survey your customers, email contacts and website users. Contact us on 0207 832 1784 or email steve@bookmarketing.co.uk for further information and prices.

Books & Consumers subscribers can now discover more about their book buyers by adding to their subscription access to additional lifestyle variables.

Variables available are:

•           Newspapers & magazines read

•           Number of books read in a month

•           Attendance at reading groups

•           Attitudes to reading

•           Source of new book information

•           Activities while commuting

•           General shopping attitudes

Contact steve@bookmarketing.co.uk for further information and prices.

A "special relationship"?

US & GB consumer book markets compared

• 57% of British consumers purchased one or more books last year, compared to only 50% of Americans;
• Mystery and Romance books accounted for a whopping 57% of all fiction books purchased by Americans last year, versus just 31% in Britain;
• Men were less important to the adult fiction market in the U.S. (29% of purchases) than in Britain (40%) in 2008;
• While the leading GB channel continues to be retail bookstore chains (34%), the internet is now the #1 channel for books in the U.S.

BML has teamed up with the US information and business intelligence agency RR Bowker to publish a new report comparing consumer book buying habits on either side of the Atlantic.

The report entitled A Special Relationship? A Comparison of Consumer Book Buying Habits & Trends in the United States & Great Britain, brings together data from Bowker’s PubTrack Consumer survey in the US, and BML’s Books & Consumers survey in the UK. It explores:

• Growth in the consumer book markets in the US and Britain
• The popularity of different genres of books among US and British consumers
• Trends in formats purchased, including the share of US purchases taken by ebooks
• The key book buying demographics in the two populations
• The relative importance of bookshops, the internet, supermarkets and direct mail
• Purchase motivations and reasons in each location.

The report was published in October 2009, in pdf format, priced at £150+VAT for the UK book trade. 50% discount for BML clients. For further information, contact Steve Bohme on 0207 832 1784 or email.

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