A good cooperative relationship is of great significance.
For publishing houses, it is obviously an important way to survive and develop by exploring and maintaining the market through bookstores. For some bestsellers, bookstores will certainly rush to purchase, but compared with hundreds of thousands of books every year, bookstores snap up fewer books. It is no exaggeration to say that how the bookstore sells books and whether the payment is timely has a decisive influence on publishing houses, especially small and medium-sized publishing houses. Conversely, the variety and quality of books published by publishing houses are also fundamentally related to whether bookstores can operate better and make profits.
There is no doubt that bookstores and publishers share the same view on the great significance of a good cooperative relationship between clubs and stores. According to Li Ping, head of the category management section of the Commercial Press, this is a "matter of life and death". However, Tang Nianhua, deputy manager of the Marketing Planning Center of Jiangsu Xinhua Bookstore Group Book Company, believes that through market development and marketing, social stores can establish a "* * *" behavior model, establish a long-term, stable and mutually beneficial strategic partnership, and establish a low-cost, high-speed, multi-variety and efficient supply chain, which can not only realize the "* * *" benefit model, but also enhance their core competitiveness.
Who is leading is controversial.
However, the two sides obviously have different views on how to establish and maintain this good relationship.
Although publishers attach great importance to the cooperation between community stores, they often plan marketing activities and ask bookstores to cooperate. Many activities are also very successful, but the effect is not ideal. Publishing houses have racked their brains to plan various forms of activities and create as many opportunities for social shop cooperation as possible, but they always feel that they have not really grasped the key to social shop cooperation.
Some publishers said that they were very confused about the cooperation between social shops and did a lot of work but could not get good results. Some publishers feel that the cooperation between social shops is complicated and cumbersome, and they don't know which thread to start with, so they are in a hurry. Of course, there are also publishing houses that are handy in this respect, but after all, they are a minority. Generally speaking, the publishing house is still in the initial exploration stage in the cooperation between social shops.
Bookstores, on the other hand, believe that most marketing activities are dominated by publishing houses and a few are dominated by bookstores. In contrast, the marketing activities planned by the publishing house can only be aimed at the books of a publishing house, and the coverage of the activities is narrow and the influence is biased. The activities planned by bookstores usually promote a variety of books from many publishers in the same category, which are large in scale, powerful and effective. Moreover, in the process of holding activities, it is easier to master the resource mobilization, control and conversion costs of this system.
Mo Hai, manager of the purchasing center of Shenzhen Distribution Group, believes that who will lead the marketing planning activities should actually be determined by the characteristics of the products. For example, the promotion of books that have not yet been listed or have just been listed can be led by publishing houses and coordinated by bookstores. For books that have been on the market for some time, it is best to give priority to bookstores. Obviously, after the book is listed, it is the bookstore that clearly grasps the market reaction and trend. Bookstore-led activities should be carried out on the premise of clearly grasping the pulse of the market, which will achieve twice the result with half the effort.
Wen Li, general manager of the distribution of People's Posts and Telecommunications Publishing House, pointed out that the current cooperation between social shops is unilateral, wishful and homogeneous, and cooperation should be based on the needs and interaction of both parties. Liu Jingli, the planning department of CITIC Publishing House, believes that the key to the cooperation between the two parties lies in the products, and it is useless to have a good relationship and profound friendship. In modern society, winning is very important.
Differentiated marketing is very important
Bookstores pointed out that the activities organized by publishing houses are usually oriented to all parts of the country, and they often fly to Chengdu or other big cities immediately after finishing the activities in Shenzhen, which is not conducive to saving resources and improving the publicity effect. Therefore, it is suggested that publishers pay attention to differentiated management. The so-called differentiated management has two meanings: one is to pay attention to choosing the right time period when holding activities, and the other is to pay attention to the differentiated choice of publicity targets.
For example, summer vacation and winter vacation are essentially the most suitable time periods for publishing cultural and educational books. If we must promote tourism books, social science books or literature books during this period, we may not achieve the best results. However, before the Golden Week of May 1 and 11, there will be unexpected gains by launching relevant publicity activities for the way, place and related culture of tourism. In addition, it is unwise for publishing houses to hold activities during reading festivals and reading months in various places. Because this kind of reading festival and reading month are generally sponsored by the local government or related organizations, the whole activity may be as many as hundreds, and the activities of bookstores can only account for a small part of them. It is a great burden for bookstores to hold activities in crowded places, because the resources and energy of bookstores are limited, and reluctantly holding activities will only lead to a waste of resources. Therefore, under normal circumstances, responsible bookstores can only decline similar cooperation requests from publishers. In this regard, Mo Hai believes that publishers should understand that over-concentrated publicity is harmful to the whole industry, even to readers and the media.
The above is to choose the right time to hold activities, and the differentiated choice of publicity objects means that publishers should flexibly use the propaganda ability of local media and bookstore salesmen to effectively combine the two kinds of propaganda.
At present, when it comes to marketing, everyone's concept is direct marketing to readers, but in fact, the marketing of bookstores by publishing houses is also a very important aspect. A bookstore salesman who knows the products of the publishing house like the back of his hand will automatically promote the publishing house to the marketing center of the bookstore, the staff of the store and the local news media. Not long ago, Zhou Dedong, a famous horror writer, and the publishers of his early works planned to hold a signing ceremony in Tianjin. Based on the bookstore salesman's understanding of the publishing house's products, Tianjin Book Building released news in local major media one week before the signing ceremony, which made the signing ceremony in Zhou Dedong unexpectedly hot. Thus, the close cooperation between publishers and booksellers is important for product marketing and promotion.
In particular, the details can't be ignored.
As the marketing staff of a publishing house said, the cooperation between communities and stores is a complex project. The marketing activities jointly carried out by shops and clubs include not only the activities themselves, but also many related details, such as the reception of personnel and accommodation arrangements, which can not be ignored. Famous writers go to bookstores to hold activities, or the leaders of publishing houses personally participate in activities. Naturally, bookstores should arrange the reception and accompaniment of leaders of the same status in advance, which is also the requirement of traditional etiquette in China. Ignoring these details is likely to hurt the cooperative relationship between the two sides.
For another example, the two sides cooperate to carry out activities, and once the plan is determined, it must be strictly implemented according to the plan. If the situation must change, they should also discuss with their partners in advance and try to find a solution as much as possible instead of making their own decisions. In foreign countries, the schedule of similar activities will be very strict. Out of respect for the partner, the other party should try to follow the schedule.
In addition, good information communication is also very important. Bookstores suggest that publishers should transmit the latest publishing information to bookstores at any time through the Internet, member publications and other forms, so as to facilitate bookstores to cooperate with the needs of publishers in time for publicity.