kolkata: Publishing houses in the city are seeing good sales through online sites, with the help of social media book marketing.
The market was pushed inside as people were unable to exit during the two consecutive closures due to the spread of the coronavirus in the city. Meanwhile, already booming online shopping has helped boost publishers’ sales.
Since then, online sales have become a separate department within publishers, which now have a dedicated team to advertise books online on social media sites like Facebook and Twitter.
People have become accustomed to ordering online, said Publishers and Booksellers Guild chairman Sudhangshu Dey. Dey said that at a recent pop-up book fair organized by the Guild, he met an elderly couple who were happy that the book sale was organized in their locality because they could barely physically go out to buy books. in shops.
There were cases where young people ordered books online for the elderly. This movement constraint ensured high sales online but according to Dey, sales remained high even after the lockdown was lifted and people could physically go to stores.
Dey said his publishing house sent parcels of books to buyers living in Dum Dum, Basirhat, Barasaat and even Bardhaman and out of state in Bengaluru. Fiction book sales remain high, with genres such as thriller, crime and horror topping the list.
Debajyoti Datta of Shishu Sahitya Sansad Private Limited agrees that the online sale is satisfactory. Total online sales represent five to seven percent of net sales.
According to Raju Barman of Rupa&Co, online sales dropped slightly after the International Book Fair as more people started physically going to stores to buy books.
During the pandemic, few new books were released by the publishing house. After gaining confidence from increased sales, they began publishing 12-15 books per month.