In 1999, after he had published "The Alchemist", Paulo Coelho was failing in Russia. That year he sold only about 1,000 books, and his Russian publisher dropped him. But after he found another, Coelho took a radical step. On his own Web site, launched in 1996, he posted a digital Russian copy of "The Alchemist."
With no additional promotion, print sales picked up immediately. Within a year he sold 10,000 copies; the next year around 100,000. By 2002 he was selling a total of a million copies of multiple titles. Today, Coelho's sales in Russian are over 10 million and growing. "I'm convinced it was putting it up for free on the Internet that made the difference," he said in an interview at this year's World Economic Forum in Davos.
Here's the full story.
4 comments:
The fundamental question is that of the freedom of choice on which we already agree. It is important to observe that it was Coelho himself who distributed the ebooks, and since he held the copyright, he was very well entitled to do so. It would be another story if somebody else were doing it without informing him; that would be piracy and that would be wrong.
Yep! It's about the freedom of choice. What caught my attention here is that such a method could be used to increase readership and improve sales. Innovative indeed!
@Wanderer: How presumptuous do you think I am? ;-)
Well if I were to put myself in Coelho's exalted shoes, i.e. it were my first book and I was just starting out on my literary career, I would decide in favour of the distribution.
But on second thoughts, it is because he is so market-oriented and sells so much that he is not a candidate for the Nobel. All Nobel laureates are unique, each one is a separate genre by himself. They cannot even be compared amongst themselves! This is also true of Paulo (though his narrative sometimes gets emotional and maudlin). It is very easy in literature to go on complicating things (even with a grander vision and perspective in mind) but it is very difficult to simplify things to utter beauty as Coelho does. But he sells so well (he is far more successful than most Nobel laureates) that people on the Nobel committee won't take it seriously if it is suggested that he be awarded the Nobel for his distinguished work.
hello!
I'm a big fan of Paulo Coelho! You will love this! He's the first best-selling author to be distributing for free his works on his blog:
http://www.paulocoelhoblog.com
Have a nice day!
Aart
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