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According to a survey by GroupM Next (@groupmnext), 43% of US shoppers have used their mobile phone to engage in "showrooming" (#showrooming) the practice of using a mobile device to research products while in a store, including comparing prices online.

"Consumers have shifted their path to purchase to include the store as a step, but not necessarily the final step; and this will likely continue to increase over time," Chris Copeland, CEO of GroupM Next, says.

The study suggests that if bricks-&-mortar stores could stay within 5% of the price available via the Web (e.g., 5% of $17 is 85-cents), almost half of "potential showroomers" say they would finalize their purchase in stores.

Interacting with a member of staff in stores can also make a difference. Consumers who spoke to an associate are 12.5% more likely to purchase from a bricks-&-mortar outlet.

Read this in full.

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Jim Milliot of Publishers Weekly (@PublishersWkly) reports that “unit sales of print books fell just over 9% in 2012 at outlets tracked by Nielsen BookScan, roughly the same percentage decline posted between 2010 and 2011."

Read this in full.

Contact Somersault (@smrsault) to help you strategically publish and market pbooks, ebooks, and audiobooks.

Learn about SomersaultSocial, our Web-based author online marketing education modules.

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The Globe and Mail’s (@globeandmail) John Barber (@JohnBarber14) thinks “the true dinosaurs of the new age are authors.”

Once happily enclosed in the “stables” of publishers willing to nurture and develop their talent, even if they never wrote a major bestseller, droves of so-called “mid-list” authors now find themselves roaming among the ever-present throng of wannabes flogging unpublished work in an indifferent market. And that throng is most likely to produce tomorrow’s bestsellers, even if they begin life as obscure, self-published digital texts that, only after they find a following, are taken up and heavily marketed to mainstream prominence by major publishing houses.

Many mid-list authors have fallen victim to increasingly sophisticated, widely available sales data, according to agents and publishers. Publishers can now assess every author’s lifelong sales thanks to such services as Nielsen Bookscan in the United States and BookNet Canada.

And once reduced to pure numbers, those track records determine the fate of proven writers looking for cash advances to begin their next books. “Everybody knows the numbers now,” Toronto literary agent Denise Bukowski said in an interview. “You can’t lie about the numbers.” Retailers don’t order books from authors whose previous work sold indifferently, she added, so publishers respond by cutting them loose.

Read this in full.

Contact Somersault (@smrsault) to help you strategically publish and market pbooks, ebooks, and audiobooks.

Learn about SomersaultSocial, our Web-based author online marketing education modules.

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Author Mark Sullivan (@MarkSullivanBks) shares his learning experiences writing novels with James Patterson. Sullivan says, “I thought I knew what I was doing when it came to commercial fiction. Working with Patterson, however, I discovered quickly that I didn’t.”

Characters, especially heroes and villains, were to be thought about carefully. They had to be human, above all, and then we had to subject them to terrible ordeals that took them to the brink of their capacities and beyond….

Exposition was severely limited. The old adage—show, not tell—was critical, and the element of surprise was paramount….

The sum of this advice was to sacrifice all for the story and the characters. Outlines were trusted navigational charts, yet we were free to sail in other directions as the novel evolved. But if you were going to change something, it had to be a terrific change….

Read this in full.

Also see our previous blogpost, “James Patterson Explains Why His Books Sell Like Crazy.”

Contact Somersault (@smrsault) to help you strategically publish and market pbooks, ebooks, and audiobooks.

Learn about SomersaultSocial, our Web-based author online marketing education modules.

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This article in The New York Times (@NYTNational) says, “As librarians across the nation struggle with the task of redefining their roles and responsibilities in a digital age, many public libraries are seeing an opportunity to fill the void created by the loss of traditional bookstores. They are increasingly adapting their collections and services based on the demands of library patrons, whom they now call customers.”

“A library has limited shelf space, so you almost have to think of it as a store, and stock it with the things that people want,” said Jason Kuhl, the executive director of the Arlington Heights Memorial Library. Renovations will turn part of the library’s first floor into an area resembling a bookshop that officials are calling the Marketplace, with cozy seating, vending machines and, above all, an abundance of best sellers....

Today’s libraries are reinventing themselves as vibrant town squares, showcasing the latest best sellers, lending Kindles loaded with ebooks, and offering grass-roots technology training centers. Faced with the need to compete for shrinking municipal finances, libraries are determined to prove they can respond as quickly to the needs of the taxpayers as the police and fire department can.

While print books, both fiction and nonfiction, still make up the bulk of most library collections — ebooks amount to less than 2% of many collections in part because some publishers limit their availability at libraries — building renovation plans rarely include expanding shelf space for print products. Instead, many libraries are culling their collections and adapting floor plans to accommodate technology training programs, as well as mini-conference rooms that offer private, quiet spaces frequently requested by self-employed consultants meeting with clients, as well as teenagers needing space to huddle over group projects....

Read this in full.

A report by the Pew Internet & American Life Project (@pewinternet) says that 13% of 16-year-olds and older have visited library websites or otherwise accessed library services by mobile device; double from an earlier survey in 2009. Those who are most likely to have connected to a library site include parents of minor children, women, and those with at least some college education.

Read this in full.

Contact Somersault (@smrsault) to help you strategically publish and market pbooks, ebooks, and audiobooks.

Learn about SomersaultSocial, our Web-based author online marketing education modules.

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Christine D. Johnson, editor of Christian Retailing (@ChristianRetail), summarizes the year in Christian publishing: “Fiction marks a first-printing milestone; heavenly nonfiction still tops.”

Nonfiction titles including new release To Heaven and Back by Dr. Mary C. Neal (WaterBrook Press) and 2010 title Heaven Is for Real by Todd Burpo (Thomas Nelson) continued their heavenly sales in 2012.

Jesus Calling by missionary Sarah Young remained strong on best-seller lists, leading the way for her new devotional title, Jesus Today (both Nelson).

Thomas Nelson drew media attention in a different way upon choosing to pull David Barton’s The Jefferson Lies from publication after it reached The New York Times best-seller status. The decision was made after alleged historical inaccuracies came to light.

Pastor Rick Warren tailored his top book for a generation of readers who were too young to read it when it was first published. In November, Zondervan released The Purpose Driven Life: What on Earth Am I Here For?, celebrating the 10th anniversary of the original release.

New nonfiction imprints added by publishers this year include Tyndale Momentum (@TyndaleMomentum) (Tyndale House Publishers), Passio (Charisma House Book Group), Jericho Books (Hachette Book Group), Convergent Books (Crown Publishing Group), and Praxis and Crescendo (InterVarsity Press).

Read this in full.

Contact Somersault (@smrsault) to help you strategically publish and market pbooks, ebooks, and audiobooks.

Learn about SomersaultSocial, our Web-based author online marketing education modules.

Add our Facebook page (http://facebook.com/SomersaultGroup) & Twitter stream (http://twitter.com/smrsault) to your Flipboard account on your iPad, iPhone, or Android. 

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And be sure to bookmark and use daily the SomersaultNOW online dashboard.

Google is working on a range of projects seeking to extend the role of its search engine beyond PCs and mobile phones, in an indication as to how digital media use may evolve. This will probably have implications for book publishers, as well.

Google is currently assessing the possibility of creating screens that could be built into kitchen walls, dining tables, and equivalent surfaces, offering features like voice- or touch-activated interaction.

Google Glass, the eyewear frames hosting a small screen, have been displayed in prototype form and mark another step in this direction. The firm is considering similar ideas for items such as watches.

Read this in full.

Also see our previous blogsposts,

·         “Behind the Google Goggles, Virtual Reality”

·         “A Day Made of Glass”

·         “The Future of Screen Technology”

·         “The Internet of Things”

·         “NY Times Builds Interactive Wall Mirror”

Contact Somersault (@smrsault) to help you strategically publish and market pbooks, ebooks, and audiobooks.

Learn about SomersaultSocial, our Web-based author online marketing education modules.

Add our Facebook page (http://facebook.com/SomersaultGroup) & Twitter stream (http://twitter.com/smrsault) to your Flipboard account on your iPad, iPhone, or Android. 

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And be sure to bookmark and use daily the SomersaultNOW online dashboard.

In January 2013, 1 birth is expected to occur every 8 seconds in the United States and 1 death every 12 seconds.

See the population clock.

Also see the interactive Census Dotmap.

The US population will be considerably older and more racially and ethnically diverse by 2060, according to projections by the US Census Bureau. These projections of the nation’s population by age, sex, race and Hispanic origin, which cover the 2012-2060 period, are the first set of population projections based on the 2010 Census.

“The next half century marks key points in continuing trends — the US will become a plurality nation, where the non-Hispanic white population remains the largest single group, but no group is in the majority,” said Acting Director Thomas L. Mesenbourg.

Baby boomers, defined as persons born between 1946 and 1964, number 76.4 million in 2012 and account for about one-quarter of the population. In 2060, when the youngest of them would be 96 years old, they are projected to number around 2.4 million and represent 0.6% of the total population.

Read this in full.

Also see our previous blogposts,

·         “Insights into Fastest-Growing Population Segment in the USA”

·         “The Millennial Consumer”

·         “Boon For Ebooks? Older Americans Using Internet at Unprecedented Levels”

·         “New Website for Demographic Info”

Contact Somersault (@smrsault) to help you strategically publish and market pbooks, ebooks, and audiobooks.

Learn about SomersaultSocial, our Web-based author online marketing education modules.

Add our Facebook page (http://facebook.com/SomersaultGroup) & Twitter stream (http://twitter.com/smrsault) to your Flipboard account on your iPad, iPhone, or Android. 

Get our blogposts delivered into your email inbox.

And be sure to bookmark and use daily the SomersaultNOW online dashboard; especially the Research tab.

Contact Somersault (@smrsault) to help you strategically publish and market pbooks, ebooks, and audiobooks.

Learn about SomersaultSocial, our Web-based author online marketing education modules.

Add our Facebook page (http://facebook.com/SomersaultGroup) & Twitter stream (http://twitter.com/smrsault) to your Flipboard account on your iPad, iPhone, or Android. 

Get our blogposts delivered into your email inbox.

And be sure to bookmark and use daily the SomersaultNOW online dashboard.

The Oxford Dictionaries (@OUPAcademic) USA Word of the Year for 2012 is GIF (pronounced with either a soft or hard “G”). GIF the noun has been around for years. GIF the verb (“He GIFed the highlights of the debate”) is derived from GIF the file extension.

“The GIF, a compressed file format for images that can be used to create simple, looping animations, turned 25 this year,” notes Oxford University Press’ Katherine Martin, “but like so many other relics of the 80s, it has never been trendier.” (Listen to Studio 360’s (@Studio360show) “'Tis the Season for GIF-ing.”

Word of the Year runners-up include Eurogeddon, Higgs boson, MOOC (massive open online course), nomophobia (anxiety caused by being without one’s mobile phone), super PAC, superstorm, and YOLO (you only live once). Oxford Dictionaries also announced its British “Word of the Year”: omnishambles. Officially defined as a situation “characterized by a string of blunders and miscalculations.”

Read the USA Word of the Year announcement in full.

Read the UK Word of the Year announcement in full.

In its 23rd annual words of the year vote, the American Dialect Society (@americandialect) selected "hashtag" as the 2012 word of the year. Hashtag refers to the practice used on Twitter for marking topics or making commentary by means of a hash or number symbol (#) followed by a word or phrase (#WOTY12).

If you’re a word lover, also see our previous blogposts,

• “'Lolz', 'Ridic' and 'Mwahahaha' Added to Oxford Dictionaries Online”
• “Scrabble Champion Named”
• “The Story of English in 100 Words”
• “A Future of Fewer Words?”
• “Word Warriors' 2012 Top 10 Expressive Words”
• “Words of the Year 2011”

Contact Somersault (@smrsault) to help you strategically publish and market pbooks, ebooks, and audiobooks.

Learn about SomersaultSocial, our Web-based author online marketing education modules.

Add our Facebook page (http://facebook.com/SomersaultGroup) & Twitter stream (http://twitter.com/smrsault) to your Flipboard account on your iPad, iPhone, or Android. 

Get our blogposts delivered into your email inbox.

And be sure to bookmark and use daily the SomersaultNOW online dashboard.