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From the press release of a survey conducted by the Book Industry Study Group:

E-book consumers are increasing their purchase of books — both print and e-book formats — online and especially through in-app purchasing, and decreasing their use of brick-and-mortar stores, according to the Book Industry Study Group (BISG)’s closely watched Consumer Attitudes Toward E-Book Reading survey. The first installment in Volume Three of the survey reveals that more than half of e-book readers increased their use of apps to purchase books and more than one-third increased their use of general retail websites such as Amazon.com. The gains for these digital vendors come at the expense of brick and mortar bookstores, even independents. More than a third of e-book buyers decreased their spending at national chains and 29% said they are buying less from their local indie.

“The e-book market is developing very quickly, with consumer attitudes and behavior changing over the course of months, rather than years,” said Angela Bole, BISG’s Deputy Executive Director. “One of the strengths of this study is its ability to monitor ‘Power Buyers.’ They are predictors of where the market is moving, providing us with an ideal opportunity to look at what’s coming next.”

The BISG study, which is conducted by Bowker Market Research, follows Power Buyers (those who acquire e-books at least weekly) closely for their ability to act as predictors of overall consumer behavior. The latest installment of Consumer Attitudes Toward E-Book Reading shows a rosy outlook for publishing, with nearly three-quarters of e-book Power Buyers purchasing more titles overall. Further, nearly half of Power Buyers had more total spending on books in all formats.

Findings also show that while dedicated e-readers remain the dominant e-reading platform, especially among Power Buyers, multi-function tablet devices and smartphones are gaining in popularity. Consumer Attitudes Toward E-Book Readingresults show:

  • Almost 17% of respondents indicated that tablets were the devices most used to read e-books — up from 13% in the previous survey.
  • Respondents who preferred smartphones jumped from 5.3% to 9.2%.
  • Dedicated e-readers were preferred by 60.9% of all respondents, down from 71.6% in the previous survey.

Since November 2009, Consumer Attitudes Toward E-Book Reading has been tracking the habits and preferences of book consumers who say they have acquired an e-book or a dedicated e-reading device within the past 18 months. Volume Three is sponsored by Baker & Taylor, Barnes & Noble, and Harlequin.

1 COMMENT

  1. There is a lot of e-books about, and on ebay you see DVD’s with hundreds of ebooks all in one DVD, personally I still prefer the hard back, but I love the morning papers that are delivered daily on Kindle
    Just like when we had papers, milk, eggs and bread delivered daily at our doorstep in the UK, mind you we can still get this but its just much more costly then going to the shops and getting them yourself & so to have the daily paper in you kindle daily – it really is a treat!

    Michelle
    http://www.bestbuycafe.com

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