On July 28, 2023, Sophia Stewart reported in Publishers Weekly about a new start up publishing house, Bindery.
The goal is to have micro-imprints where an influencer, in concert with their fans/followers, chooses one book that will get published by the publishing house that year. The success of that book, ostensibly driven by the influencer's authentic enthusiasm (a.k.a. promotion), is then shared 50% for the author, 25% for the publishing house, and 25% for the influencer.
From my perspective, this changes the game in a few ways:
Seems that the way publishers interacted with influencers in the past was to try to get the influencer themselves to write a book. But they're not necessarily good at being authors. (No shade, it's a different skill set).
And previously, when influencers got behind a book they didn't write and the book succeeded, the influencer didn't share in that success in any material way.
Since no one's been able to harness the viral enthusiasm of book influencers on social platforms like TikTok (even folks who've had their books succeed in that way aren't exactly sure how it happened, and no one has the formula to do it on demand) this is new attempt to leverage that influence and set a book up for the kind of viral success #booktok has become famous for.
However this shakes out, it will be fascinating to follow!
Illustrate, Translate, and Write On,
Lee
