One of the biggest business stories of the year was the Amazon versus Hachette dust-up. The short version of the story: ecommerce 10,000 pound gorilla and book publisher Hachette had a major contract dispute over digital royalties. Both companies ended up taking quite a few lumps before the conflict was resolved earlier in the fall. It is probably safe to say that as more and more revenue for traditional media companies begins to come from digital sources, we will see more conflicts like this. In particular, many publishers who rely on Amazon to sell their products online will come into conflict with Amazon. Hachette, coming off their recent title fight with Amazon is already building a plan for round 2. Specifically- Hachette is looking to sell books on Twitter.
Hachette and Twitter: A Match Made in Heaven?
Twitter is coming off quite the year themselves. This year, many investors began to question Twitter’s long-term business strategy and soured on the social media giant’s prospects. In response, Twitter has launched a number of initiatives including the addition of a “buy button.” Twitter has made no secret of it’s plans to make the service a storefront for ecommerce- making it a more attractive prospect for advertisers. Hachette’s utilization of Twitter’s buy button would make it one of the largest businesses yet to utilize the service.
The Future of Ecommerce and Regular Commerce Too
The last 15 years have been a roller coaster for retail, publishing, and many other industries that have been disrupted by the technological revolution of the Internet. Trends from self-publishing to mass-closings of big box bookstores like Borders have made the future of publishing in particular a murky one. It is with this in mind that Hachette’s new attempt to ditch Amazon for Twitter looks particularly intriguing. Is this the future of ecommerce? Or just a bump in the road in a world that is constantly changing?
To learn how other book brands have thrived in recent years, check out or recent article: “Brave New World: How Book Brands Are Thriving on Social.”
