to do cross market and to come up with ways that they can get a better response response, but we know said data shows if you shop one independent business you are more likely to shop at another. so those partnerships pay off to make an incredible difference and it is why our members are doing better. >> and john you have comments? >> yes. i think to put it to one word would be relevant. how to be relevant to your community. not just reading camps but tapping into local

technology culture to tap into the restaurant scene those are clever and there are a lot of examples across the country of the independents tap begin trying to be relevant in their community. for instance, we are a bookstore in maplewood new jersey all about special needs and too deeply service that particular need for code not only with the great selection of books but education opportunities coming employment opportunities. this is how we have to think it is broader than just the mandate to sell books. the book's center has made friday mornings of place to

be for the for preschoolers. it is where every friday morning and new pitcher book is read to a growing audience then they do activities after words you can go on and on with that. but to take that back is how to be relevant and connected >> i will now move to a slightly different area. so the data as suggest the shift between physical formats have change. and i asked mike to the us so how has that merchandising mix changed and how does it change in the future? had resold the things we used to sell and what does

that mean going for word? >> we are little different because he already competes with thousands of different categories within our department we had to become more curated we don't have the space we had five years ago is specially around 2009 or 2010 in books were starting to get traction and of retailers are looking at books to figure out of this is a category they want to be and so we had to be more relative so we have gone after more hardcover and trade paper going back to the relevance it is what our consumers recognize when they're walking into our stores. movie tie-ins we really go

after those very hard. when we get the placement within the retailers the more than double the of market share and that is the good thing because we can garner that type of market share. one of the obvious is massmarket. we have cut back with the selection and probably has been the hardest hit for us in died in see that happening when refer started to talk about e-book sets out the of low-price point but that was the hardest hit and we perpetuated a little bit of that because as we look at that space, it was the loser so we probably made that bigger than it should be but it has plateaued and we give it the

right promotion but the obvious winner in our market was kids. we have much bigger kids departments we probably do 66 percent more business today than five years ago with his children's books because that is, mom and a soccer bombs as we call them that have families and young kids in there is always another new generation of children coming behind them to buy those books. that israel we help the retailers to win. that is where we see it going. i don't think that will change.

we have kept it is stable with a nice selection we're not deep been major authors. we will put more focus on young adults and children and continue down that path of. >> does anybody else want to talk about merchandising and its effect? >> our abacus numbers show that if you get to somewhere in that 15 or 20% of the inventory mix you have a profitable plan. a store that is selling that is still a bookstore ended is important for it to be because that is what your

customers are expecting so within the 58 or 20% range they do well and clearly still continue to slow canfield like a bookstore. but the overall thing about independent bookstores is you are all different. the mix of product is different. what may work in joyce's store is not necessarily going to work on the west side of manhattan. it is hard to generalize about what works in one place will necessarily work somewhere else. more often than not but it means less likely to work somewhere else and that is the charm that they are all

different. >> one of the things joyce said to me that i thought was interesting she said the closer to the book that the object is the more likely it is to work in a bookstore. so now i will move to the other realm of merchandising and here i was curious about integrating the e-book what about people who have tried things are trying things and have made intergrading pretend mortar with e-and to what are some with this most exciting new ideas? we have seen things like cards and other things and

king to the deaths of? >> it is the conversation we just had because so much of the conversation is what space denis e-books leave and occupied? so when we look at that average data mostly canadian because that is where i am from public at 10% of store sales where 25 percent of digital, we now talk to retailers to make a deliberate decisions. i cannot stop every harlequin romance series may be i delivery do not want to do that deliberately but to

start putting up sandage if you are interested it is a way to get the romance that you want that helps to free up space and anything that it touches it is is 15. those are the places but those areas and travel books they don't get touched so we see people start to double down like sean rush of

fiction where to have a big comprehensive collection is hard sodomite engage someone with a new voice? >> what i want to hear about is the discovery and the balance. and i was wondering if you could share? >> we just came through a couple specifically related to kids with there is an uptake of children's reading for example, so to do a big

campaign with we just are introduced series an introductory offers through indigo to list them all kids' category that is 45% in one month and it was interesting for them but the immediacy and of moving through was effective. so we said trials like that that was interesting and we have limited success to bring things like digital and bundling together we're in the italian market of all places have the structures like the biggest publisher with the second-largest retailer you can do it with

all of it together. they took the top 100 books and bundled together to see how people glading gauge. and we found when somebody bought a book in print been digitally they read faster and also a shockingly valuable customer. >> and that is what amazon has discovered. >> if you are fighting for more repeople stein you can occupy more of their time with reading. >> exactly what we want to do a. >> i have some thoughts.

[laughter] i think michael hit on something that we believe is true but digital and print is not either/or but either a and and i happen to believe very strongly that probably are live all of us live on a contagion of between doing everything in the digital world and reading fits their. so the idea how to make bundling work is critical and one in this is where my question comes in and we have not found the way to scratch the itch but we would love to test some things so come see us in the booth because i do believe what michael says is true to move to faster and i also

think it will not be one plus one or one physical book equals the price of two books those economics will not work but somewhere day have worked for everybody and validate for one player to boldly be the one that figures that out. >> it is very clear we're done with those bundling experience. is there anybody else who would like to talk about integrating e books? >> it is hardly a secret we have struggled to get our customers to buy a digital content from us we have a partnership with my friend

sitting to my left we worked hard to make the reading experience but it has been s struggle because it is hard to convince our customers to think of us as a place to buy digital content they think of all the extraordinary things that choice was talking about but they don't necessarily think of us as the place to sell digital content but you are 100 percent right to we need to be smarter as an industry to figure out whether bundling is an option or if it will in fact, work. at the heart of what we do is curate content the format should be less important to demonstrate our expertise and knowledge and passion

passion, the obvious observation as of now we have not figured out how to do that. >> i would certainly agree that these places where we start to cross that boundary around prince and digital to combing goal together is the opportunity with this great phenomenon we had on the digital side if i know you're interested in a book by a particular author i can drop the sample into your library that is adjacent in mass quantities but the fondling stuff right now is very simple. that when you walk through it i already own it. but could i give you a different related book to

introduce you to a new author or opens a new category for the unexpected that you may not have found yourself? could reduce that to create additional value for the bookseller? >> gant in categories where we don't necessarily have all the books base in the of world in the store so we maximize our opportunities. interesting thinking. now moving directly to innovation and. i have asked each panelist lining is in terms of the retail business whether driving costs out of the supply chain and retail analytics.

i am not sure there is a more passionate industry which is the industry of books. i asked so what's turns you on? what is cool toward new or exciting or marketing? so we will start with new approaches to retail to ask john and mike. >> so when i think of innovation i don't have to go very far from home. i would say without innovation talk about print on demand this dog eats the

dog food i make that point but when i think about the independent bookstores and what is possible a great untapped saying to me each one of you could be a publisher it is in a local market so my question is why aren't you publishing? and those that are to say i got that. but it just seems that is a great untapped opportunities to view lives in a place with local newspapers. their treasure troves of content that you could help carry because of your knowledge of what is happening with the local market.

it just seems to me that is as huge opportunity out there to publish yourself or to be a venue for those that walk in your store that they want to publish. obviously have tools to help with that i would have a publishing arm to that for sure. >> from our perspective we are just a distributor so what we've tried to do was to be indispensable. we look at online selling and the e-books that they

would not put up with those inefficiencies so we needed to be smarter to partner with them. we put a lot of money into distribution systems, replenishment, poin t-of-sale through business analytics to determine what should be in our stores and we are not as good as you. i cannot have 10,000 planetarium's but they can do some carrying. we invested a long time ago also the returns so again so to give the books back to use in another manner so there is no duplication for retailers so the one that has taken as the of far this

is the use of data so there is a lot of arts in the business so it in that schaede retail environment you recognize that buyer immediately they have a passion it is not just batteries and tore the paper they like box so views they analytics fight the battle within their own organization why we want them located so it self-serving helps us keep the space within the retailers but also act as a good steward of the product. >> we will move on to the second part what is the most innovative programs tries

specifically? >> i think three years ago may be in this room a be a challenge to our colleagues to figure out how do we work together to reinvent this business model that has not changed in 50 years we're doing things in 2010 the way of 1960 and it does not pass the giggle test if there is anything that we do the same today where he did 50 years ago. we told our friends how do we reinvent the business to make us more profitable?

what is that creativity to figure out and remove those inefficiencies with the way we work together? we are not there yet we have probably scratched the surface but as you know, there have been dozens and dozens of things publishers have done to help figure out how to reinvent the business like rapid replenishment to eliminate the complicated ridiculous compared in san requirements and not just as charity of bookstores. >> and the machinery. >> the could news is there is innovation out there.

we have a long way to go but we have a long way to go but we have made some progress. >> what is exciting? >> i would it underscore what he said it is a partnership we have seen in those programs, long and how that works in our stores. with occupancy cost and margins thinned as we look at how we care eight our selection teleplays a role the terms of sale from the publishers of a bite to see them explore a guaranteed virgins those programs that have been tried along the

way have been very beneficial from our stores. and it takes more books to sell more books so what oren teicher said to continue the dialogue to do something about its we have a long way to go. there is much more to keep us in business and healthy. >> can i just cannot resist saying we want to make books of all publishers equally available all the time. [applause] >> all books are available. [laughter] >> believe it or not to that

is the time we had. think you for joining us. have a great show. thank you very much. [applause] least, silence

your electronic devices for the audience and for our friends at home. today's panel is called connecting authors and readers. we'll be discussing how publishers, writers, the media and booksellers help readers discover new books and authors. without further ado, i'll introduce our panel and then let them tell you a little bit about what they do. to my right is tarin rhodeer,

the associate director of -- [inaudible] she manages a boston-based team. her best selling authors include paul tuft, temple grandin and justin torres. she was previously based in washington, d.c. at island press, and she has an mfa in greater writing from the university of northern maryland. next to her is susan call. susan is the events and programs director at politics & prose. she's the author of four novels including acceptance. her fifth novel will be published in july by sarah cryington weeks finish cryington books. next to her is the social media director for the washington independent review of books, a web site run by a dedicated team of volunteers that publishes new reviews every weekday and covers all things book-related. please check it out at

www.wirobooks.com. she also works as a copy editor for the hill newspaper and can be found reading and cheering on various sports teams at night. last but not heath is beth ann patrick. her book reviews appeared in publications such as the washington post, people and o magazine. she's blogged about books for places like publishers weekly, aol and barnes & noble.com. beth ann is an active social media presence, you can find her @the book maven on twitter. she's the author of two nonfiction books from national geographic and is currently working on a novel. now i'm going to ask the panelists to take a minute to sort of very briefly explain what it is they do, tell you what their job title is and sort of explain how they connect authors to readers quickly. and succinctly. >> succinctly. i'm always succinct. a publicist's job. when i was trying to find my way

in publishing, when i was trying to find my way in publishing, i sort of didn't know what i wanted to do, and then i realized there was this role where i could be working with authors and journalists and talking about books all the time, and i was, like, oh, i want to do that. i want to talk about their books all the time, i want to get their books out there on the, you know, to readers. i want to connect their book withs to the real people who are buying the books. so publicity was the really perfect place for me. i get to do a all that, i get to work with the authors before their books come out, try and figure out how is the best way to roll out their book. talk to media and, of course, i love journalists of all colors and stripes. >> [inaudible] [laughter] >> read a lot and send these authors around the country and figure out how to get their book out there. >> and like taryn, i think i always dreamed of having a job that would be, have something to do with books. be careful what you wish for, now i have a job where my desk is just buried in advance copies of books, and there is just more

out there than we're able to fit into the bookstore or our programs department at politics & prose which is a great problem to have. my job is overseeing everything programs related at the store which means classes, trips, trying to fined ways to -- find ways to use authors who we can't fit into our events program, trying to even grow our events program beyond what you see in the store where we have just a complete calendar with events seven days a week. so we're looking for ways to expand that, and that's what i do. >> i'm katie, i'm the social media director for the washington independent review of books. we were founded in 2011 as a site dedicated to writing book reviews and features. we're all volunteers, so i'm just a volunteer. i do this for fun. really everyone says there that it's a labor of love. i post on twitter and facebook

to try to grow our audience, but people know that we exist and to try to connect with readers through social media. >> i'm beth ann patrick, and currently i'm the books editor at washingtonian magazine which is a wonderful dream job. i wish it could be a full-time job, but i wish it could take up 20 pages of the magazine someday when there's so much book advertising that will happen. but in the meantime, i do other things, and one of those is to maintain an active social media presence and through friday reads to connect a lot of different people with books that everyone else is reading. it's something that i'm passionate about. i'm working on a book proposal right now for a nonfiction book about women and reading, because i'm so passionate about it. and i will continue to look for new ways to work in this world. i've done a little bit of everything, and i find that we've got so much to discuss and discover today that i'm not sure how we'll get through it, but really happy to see you all

here. thank you for coming out. >> thank you all very much. so as you've seen just from the brief descriptions, we've got a good variety of people in the industry. one of the things we don't have someone representing here the advertising world, but there is some advertising in book publishing. i just want to tell a quick anecdote. my first job in book publishing i thought, you know, i don't know what i'm doing, but i fancied myself possibly an ad man, a madman. and i thought, well, all you need to do is come up with a good tagline, and you could sell a book like that. so i said to myself what's simple, straightforward, to the point, and i came up with buy this book, it won't kill you. [laughter] and i announced it at a meeting -- >> don draper. >> it was rejected without discussion. there ended my advertising career. [laughter] but i use that as an illustration of sort of probably not a good way to sell books. [laughter] i sort of open to the panel,

maybe we can start with bethanne because she's an author, she's done a book on the social media side, the old school media side, you know, what are some of the more effect ebays you've -- effective ways you've found to get readers to pick up a book? >> it really is true that word of mouth is still the most effective way to get books out, you know, at all. and so what i would say in my experience is that anything that helps replicate or expand on that word of mouth, and that's why i think social media has been so fantastic. katie can say some more on this, i'm sure. but that's the thing about the best social media experience is it feels like you're talking to someone in a meaningful way. and we can, you know, dissect whether or not, you know, certain things are meaningful or not. but that's what happens. and so i really feel that social media has made it much easier to get information about books. i don't know -- out on the web.

i don't know, though, if that translates into sales. it translates into buzz about the book, it translates into people knowing about the book. a lot of them may still borrow it from a library, get it from a friend. so trying to decide about book sales is a much tougher thing. >> yeah. i would agree with that, that it's hard to say if it does turn into sales, but social media's been great because it's free. so you can, you know, reach a huge audience and pay nothing for it. you can reach people on facebook, on twitter, you can go to lesser-known sites, google plus, instagram. you don't have to pay a dime, and if you want to, you can promote it on facebook. we've been doing that recently. and that you do have to pay for, but the expenses for doing that is really cheap. so that's the great thing for the independents since we're a nonprofit, we're also only digital. we don't have a publication that we can hand out to people. we have to use every resource we can on the internet to get the word out, and social media's the

perfect way to do that. >> susan, you come from sort of the bookseller perspective but also an author. i mean, what sort of even anecdotally have you heard from friends, readers, you know, besides -- maybe not friends, but people who have picked up your book who you've met at a book signing or people in the store. are there things that have been effective? what have you seen will drive -- what drives people into the store aside from the fact that it's a fabulous store and they love books? >> driving people to the store, i think social media definitely drives people to our events program, and it's a little bit cyclical because when people are scheduled for an event, then if you're coming -- through town, they wind up on diane rehm or some other capacity. often that will drive "the washington post" to profile the author. so, you know, the buzz because sometimes generate actual

publicity that turns people into the store. so it does, the social media does work in that respect i'd say, yeah. >> i can add word of mouth is so important, and that's why i'm always telling my authors, you know, don't be shy. you have to be your own best publicist. make a list of everybody that you would invite to your wedding, and then tell them all about your book and tell them however you want to tell them. if you want to send them e-mail, twitter, facebook, but please don't think they're going to think you're bragging because this is the best way to get the word out. i personally, and that's why the line for social media with the publicists, all my fiends talk about my kids, my life, but i think people who follow me know i'm selective. i'm talking about my best things, and i hope that word of mouth is spreading the news. but in terms of -- because, of course, people really care about something that their friend tells them to read more than something that a review arer that they don't know tells them

to read. however, that said, traditional media is still a very, very important way to get people into the store. i think, you know, reviews in "the new york times," reviews in "the new york times" book review, interviews on national public radio are key. that's sort of a book-buying audience, a audience that really cares about it, and i've seen that really move the needle on sales in terms of books. >> and those reviews in washingtonian make a huge difference. >> a huge difference. they should be 20 pages. [laughter] >> but it's true what you say, that does put a lot of pressure on the author, especially an author who does not like to go around bragging. and i remember my first publicist said tell every single person you know you wrote a book whereas my first time out i was thinking i've just written a book, and i hope no one notices. [laughter] i've now learned that's not really the right strategy. >> that's good. very good. [laughter] i'm going to sort of put you on the spot, taryn brings up a good

point, and i had it on my list of things to talk about. if i had to make you pick a thing, i get authors coming to me all the time saying, you know, what is the thing i should do, and i don't actually believe there is necessarily a thing to do. but if you had to pick one thing, what is still the best way to sell a book? if you could only get one thing, an npr interview, a review in the new york time, you know, what would you all -- i want to go down the line. if you had to pick one with thing, what would be the thing that you think would sell the most books? >> the number one thing the author should do is be nice to your publicist. [laughter] >> that aside -- [laughter] >> oh. >> a medium, what would -- i mean, our reviews still the driving force behind books? >> no. >> more than anything else? >> i've been told it's npr, that radio is the gold standard. >> now -- >> that's what my publicists have always -- >> and do we think that's because reviews are harder to come by? >> well, there's less review

space, and so people will listen to npr more than they will sit down and read a book review. however, i would say the one thing -- and i don't know if this is what you're thinking of, gene, but the one thing an author can do to sell books is to have a really good, and i'll use the word robust, e-mail list that that author can use to send out news. i'm appearing here, i'm going to be on npr, i'm selling books at this place. there's a sale on my e-book. a really good e-mail list like that that they can send things out, and they know that it's people who will pay attention and then tell two friends and so on and so forth. >> i absolutely, i couldn't agree more. i'm actually sort of really curious more about the media stuff. i realize you can't control it, but if you could pick a thing to get, now you've stepped across the aisle, and you are now on the traditional, old school -- >> right. >> -- mainstream, whatever you want to call it, you are now that person reviewing books. how important is the book review? is it diminished?

is it more important because there's less of them? >> you know, i wish i could say it's more important because there's less of them, and that's simply not true. it really depends on where it is. it does matter, i think, in magazines that like washingtonian that care about books, because you know that what we've chosen is something that we've chosen very much for our audience. we're not just throwing anything against the wall to see what sticks. and not that i'm saying that theree%e publications like that, but -- >> no. [laughter] >> you just know that we're really carefully vetting the books and bringing you the best of what's out there. that's what i think people need today. we don't have time, any of us, to read about every single book. we have to have things. another buzz word, we need to have thinged curated for us. and so i do think reviews are still important. i do think radio interviews are important, but it's all about, you know, making sure that whatever you're consuming is the best of what -- so i don't know

if that's, i'm answering. >> yeah. there's no right or wrong answer to the question, i just was always sort of curious. again, people ask me, then you try to figure it out. one thing i tell my clients often is, you know, i mean, to me you want to get print coverage of your book because the people who are reading print coverage, technically, they are readers. [laughter] but i also feel like, and our friends from c-span aside, i also sometimes feel radio is a much better vehicle. tv we know how many eyeballs are watching you. everyone wants to be on tv because it's fancy. but i would sort of put it at the bottom of the list in some ways. the best thing about tv to me is other people see it, other media see it. media follow the tv. so i was just sort of curious about that. to move on to sort of a different piece, there's no question to me that the reading world is sort of becoming -- reading is becoming more segmented. we are living in a sort of

right-now moment, you know? twitter is, it's beyond exploded. i mean, it's here, it's not going anywhere. it's 140 characters. it's the antithesis of a book. [laughter] you know, do you guys think, is it harder to sell a long form product, the book, in sort of a short attention span world? i mean, i just sort of look at it, again, talking about tv sound bites versus a long interview. less tv shows are doing long interviews. it's two minutes, five minutes on cnn as opposed to, there's less of the 30 minutes of charlie roses. i'm curious how you find that sort of working -- and i don't mean it in a derogatory way, sort of like an old school, long format world? we were working in an old school, long format thing in a short attention span world. >> i can, i mean, sometimes, you know, i'll be working with an author, and they'll have had a book 15, 20 years ago, and they'll be telling me about the 20-minute interview they had on

"today show," and i'm like, oh, that's not going to happen anymore. basically, there's just so much more media. there's more books, and there's more media. and i think one of the ways to sort of combat this short attention span is that we have to be thinking about both the quality of the media that the author's going to have -- bless you -- the quality of the media they're going to have and the quantity. you need to have your author everywhere. say yes to doing the q and as on the blogs, say yes to the interviews even if it's at, it's not national. say yes because we really need to have you everywhere. we'd like to have this campaign look like some big national hits supported by a bunch of other stuff so that everywhere people look, they're seeing you. >> well, katie, to you, i mean, sort of -- i mean, how do you work, you know, being in a publication that is strictly online, you know, but also, again, you're in the new world, but you're dealing with the old world. i mean, how have you found it, i mean, one of the main things you've got to do are book

reviews which are, by nature, fairly long. you're not quite the new york review of books where they're incredibly long, but, you know, what other stuff do you guys do? how do you cater to in the social media world, you know, bringing someone through small means to the bigger things? >> i think that, i think that while book reviews are still important, we also branch out into features as well. and a lot of times what we'll do is we'll have a review of an author's book, and we'll also have an interview with them. so you can read the interview and read the book. you're limited to the amount of characters, but you're reaching to a community that want to read. they're not the kind of perp that's going to pass over it. if they're interested in it, they're going to follow you. if they're not, they're not. so i just feel like with social media you can reach those people who love to read and want to devour author interviews and features. and i think that's the great

thing about social media and the digital age is that you can reach a specific audience. >> i think that's a really good point. you want to reach avid readers. one thing i would say to authors is you have to be an avid reader to reach an a vid reader, you know? be someone who is out there buying books and going to events and paying attention and reading reviews as well. because if you're someone who's only reading one or two books a year and then you write a book, you don't know that much about what everyone else is reading and about how they're consuming. you'll learn a lot if you become a really good reader, really good as we -- and this has gotten some criticism, but i do think literary citizenship is something that's worth thinking about and talking about regardless of what you think of the, you know, what it should be. but i do think that authors if you want when you want authors out there like taryn does doing this, they need to know what the terrain is like.

>> that's a really good point. i mean, i have a young daughter in kindergarten, and, i mean, every day they're like read, read, read, read. somewhere between kindergarten and adulthood we sort of lose that, people telling you reading's good, reading's good. i think that's an excellent point about literary citizenship. i think it's really important. i'm curious, bethanne, katie but anyone else too, i've sort of noticed the trend seems to be online, that, you know, it's catering now. it's able to cater more to the fast-paced, you know, sound bites of the world. if you look at book coverage on, you know, like the daily beast or huffington post, i think even on the washington review of books, it's not that the book review's gone away, but you see a lot more slide shows. they're huge now. you can tell about your entire novel in five slides. am i right? >> can you put your book on pinlt rest, please? >> do you guys see that?

is there a way that we can sort of use the small world of twitter to sort of get people into the book? can you get them to expand their horizons by luring them in by a slide show? >> i mean, yeah. i think, definitely. i think that's also a way to reach the younger generation. i mean, i'm a millennial, a 20-something, and i know a lot of my friends and the people i talk to online like to get that kind of information through twitter. and i just my train of thought. but -- >> actually, if you can stand it, i have something to say, maybe it'll help you pick up the train, because i know what that's like to lose the train. [laughter] it's not being a millennial, one of the things i read recently, i happened to go to my local coffeeshop, and someone had left united rap soty magazine. and there was a piece in it about the end of brand storytelling. basically what he was saying is you can't tell the story of coke