In the literary world, the growth of bookish communities on social media platforms has begun a new era of consumption, reshaping the dynamic between the publishing landscape and physical shelves of bookshops.
Book social media plays such an important role in publishing right now. Its created a viral sensation we haven’t seen in this publishing landscape before – Olivia Roach
In an evolving era of social media, the publishing industry is seeing a transformation in its Gen-Z demographic. The traditional methods of book marketing, publishing and promotion are now shifting for a new younger reading community, emerging from online networks the industry is feeding into for the fashion.
Platforms such as Youtube and Instagram have had well established communities since 2014 and yet the TikTok boom during the pandemic has brought higher rates of commercial success to the industry than ever seen before. The connection of TikTok and literature lovers has started an unprecedented era of book virality when a single 10-second video created some of the highest grossing and viral books of this decade.
To date #booktok on the platform has gathered more that 212B views.
The increase of bookish creators on the platforms has proven the power of word-to-mouth advertising being able to convince viewers to buy huge volumes of novels. The marketing strategies of publishing houses appearing on the platforms aim to collaborate with influencers producing content to persuade more readers with a viral recommendation to buy books.
Olivia Roach of CanonGate independent publishing, noted that the most viral books leaned towards the romance, fantasy and Young adult (YA) genres. BookTok has changed a large demographic of people who weren’t keen on reading to becoming keen readers. Most of these genre consumers are between the ages of 14 to 21 who have active social media accounts.
As noted by Roach, ‘what is particularly unique about it is that it’s not only prioritising new releases that are just coming out but its also going into authors who have quite a wealth of books behind them with a backlist and spotlighting particular authors so then people go buy and read all their books.’
Authors such as Sarah J Maas and Collen Hoover have had viral books including ‘It Ends With Us’ and the ‘ACOTAR series‘ and due them having an extensive back list of publications, have remained a constant name on bookish social media.
According to NPD market research, Hoover wrote three out of the 10 top best-selling books of 2023 to date and has sold over 20 million copies. Hoover’s use of social media sharing updates about her books and her life across her 3 million followers on bookish platforms has helped her grow a dedicated audience who buy every book she publishes.
The Publishers Association in their consumer survey last year examined the impact of book social media and its trends that have allowed viral videos to make their way from the digital domain to the shelves in shops.
Dan Conway, Chief Executive of The Publishers Association said ‘Publishers are fully embracing this trend and it is really interesting that this is a digital phenomenon which is being felt directly on the high street.’
The report also highlighted the industry’s growth in publishing income increased by 4% with a total £6.9B which is the highest level ever recorded.
A recent example of the power of book social media was the release of the book titled Fourth Wing by Rebecca Yarros which has spent 31 weeks at the top of The New York Times Best Sellers list and won the Goodreads’ Choice award for ‘Best Romantasy’ with 400 000 votes.
Its sequel when published sold out on Amazon in 12 hours after being released and
An employee at Blackwell’s Newcastle said ‘we had to stop advertising we had the book in stock to stop us from selling out too quickly’.
The transition of the physical impact of Booktok was seen post pandemic with many bookshops starting to sell and promote titles that have gone viral on the platforms. The virality of books has meant that bookshops are selling the titles to increase sales and attract the newer and expanding demographic including sellers in the North East.
Bookseller Gavin Hetherington said that in Waterstones Metro Centre, he noticed that following the pandemic the physical influence of BookTok began with table displays of viral books from the platform, to new advertising models and highlighted the books they were selling the most of were titles from social media.
Listen to hear what Hetherington and Roach had to say about the differences they noticed in shops and in the industry.
Book Trope: A specific plot line, characteristic or that is recognisable to readers which they will gravitate me towards if a book has it. It varies amongst genres however the most popular books on social media tend to have similar tropes.
To hear more about the impact of the pandemic on the book community, tune into the ReadsbetweenTheTyne podcast.
From an author’s perspective, there is growing pressure to write books to fit the new market in order to get the virality needed for their publications to get sales. The growth in competition in the fantasy, romance and YA genres grown through bookish social media has led to emerging authors gaining traction and success in shorter periods of time without backlists because of the publicity the platforms offer.
Additionally, many authors have gone down the self-publishing route as they are able to navigate and market their books online, creating demand for their titles without the assistance and support of big publishing houses.
Roach says that authors are having to grow their social media presence to enter the bookish space, no longer just having to write but also build a public persona to promote released and upcoming titles. Needing to constantly be releasing books to hopefully claim the bestseller title. This is not a requirement however the frequency of this is growing.
Author V.E Schwab during a panel in Newcastle said ‘If you want to be in publishing you always need another book. If the book you are writing does well you need another book. If the book you are writing does not do well you, need another book.’
Watch this video to hear how authors feel about the changing publishing industry.
bookshops- Bow Books
For independent booksellers and book readers social media only benefits them.
Many local North-East indie bookshops have been selling popular titles from bookish platfoms and sales collectively are increasing.
Reader Annie Baigent says ‘Booktok and other social mediums has removed the shame of reading particular genres and tropes, popularising more accessible literature. If I want to read a book I have been recommended on BookTok, I will often go to my local bookshop to see if they stock it. Most of the time they do.’
BookTok fan Eabha Rainey says ‘BookTok is what helped me discover a passion for reading. The recommendations on the app help filter out all the noise from publishers that are constantly releasing new books and bookshops feel less overwhelming. BookTok is full of creators around the same age as me and helps me find a book to read that many people enjoyed.’
Challenges and opportunities both present themselves in the new and emerging dynamic of the online book community and the physical publishing and selling world.
Overall it is safe to say Booktok has cemented its place within the publishing industry being one of the biggest outlets for book recommendations. Retailers are paying attention to the trends and tropes on the platforms publications reaching an all time sales high and allowing all parties to enjoy books being more accessible.
In the future we may see other genres such as non-fiction and crime, diversifying the popular tropes and promisingly the popularity for literature will only grow.