Every Business Will Be A Publisher
We’ve long been singing the praises of independent publishing for more than just authors. Nonprofits and businesses can both benefit from publishing. Not just because of the potential for income, but because of the marketing and sales opportunities that come from publishing as well.
Mike Shatzkin, a long-time publishing industry consultant thinks that the very idea of a publishing “industry” will fall by the wayside. Instead of a cluster of business publishers who choose which books get published and which don’t, Shatzkin predicts that it will be the businesses themselves who are publishing.
Soon — in the next 5 or 10 years — every university (perhaps most departments within a university), every law firm and accounting firm and consulting firm, certainly every content creator in other media, as well as most manufacturers and retailers will become book publishers too.
Why not? Without the requirement of an organization to reach the public through bookstores and without the requirements of capital or knowledge to create printed books, any organization that is routinely reaching people interested in a common topic — whether or not they are creating content around that topic now, but especially if they do — will find it constructive to publish, and well within their reach and means to do so.
This is an audacious vision, but one that Side x Side believes is the future as well. The opportunity is there. It’s just a matter of time before the businesses and brands start embracing it.
