Reaching book buyers on social media

.@BookNet_Canada shares insights into how book buyers, booksellers, and publishers use social media.
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In a recent Tech Forum session, we hosted a panel of five social media marketing professionals from a wide range of publishers in the Canadian book market. The biggest takeaway? Social media is an essential way for publishers to start conversations and engage with communities of readers online.

As we’ve explored in our #BookTok mini-series, social media trends can make a huge impact on the sales and library circulation of titles in the Canadian book market.

But what social media platforms are Canadian book buyers using? And are Canadian publishers and booksellers there to connect with them?

We’ve got answers thanks to the latest data from our Canadian Book Consumer survey, The State of Publishing in Canada 2021, and The State of Independent Bookselling in Canada 2020.

Canadian book buyers

Year after year in the Canadian Book Consumer survey, we find that Canadian book buyers take part in a wide variety of social media platforms and communities.

We're currently in the process of collecting data for the 2022 edition of the Canadian Book Consumer Study coming out next year, but here’s some data in advance. So far in 2022, the top three most popular social media platforms used by Canadian book buyers were:

• Facebook — 68% of Canadian book buyers;

• YouTube — 63% of Canadian book buyers; and

• Instagram — 45% of Canadian book buyers.

The next three most popular were Twitter, LinkedIn, and Pinterest at 31%, 30%, and 30% respectively. You can also find Canadian book buyers on TikTok (22%), Reddit (21%), Goodreads (16%), and Snapchat (15%). As of the third quarter of 2022, only 6% of Canadian book buyers didn't participate in any social media.

How has this changed over the years? The graph below shows the top 10 social media platforms used by Canadian book buyers from 2020 to the third quarter of 2022. Overall, the number of social media users increased among Canadian book buyers, up 57% from 2020 to 2022 so far. While the most popular platforms have remained consistent, many other social media platforms have seen big increases over the last three years. The three platforms with the biggest uptake by Canadian book buyers between 2020 and 2022 were:

• Reddit — 40% increase in use by Canadian book buyers;

• Goodreads — 33% increase in use by Canadian book buyers;

• TikTok* — 29% increase in use by Canadian book buyers (*added in 2021).

*Added in 2021.

Canadian publishers

Canadian publishers find themselves on a lot of the same social media platforms.

In our recent study The State of Publishing in Canada 2021, nearly 80 Canadian publishers of all sizes shared the way that they used social media platforms over the last year. The top three social media platforms Canadian publishers used the most in 2021 were:

• Facebook — 99% of Canadian publishers;

• Twitter — 90% of Canadian publishers; and

• Instagram — 85% of Canadian publishers.

The graph below shows the frequency of use of social media platforms by Canadian publishers last year. Looking more closely, Facebook remained the top social media platform that publishers used — 32% used it every day and 47% did so at least once per week. Twitter was the platform that publishers used most at least once per month (18%), while YouTube was mostly used less often than once a month (23%) but it was used at least once a season (19%). Overall, the platforms that publishers used the least were Snapchat (3%), Tumblr (6%), and Reddit (11%).

Canadian indie booksellers

The presence of Canadian indie bookstores on social media is similar to Canadian publishers.

We discovered the ways that over 50 Canadian indie booksellers engaged with their audience on social media in last year’s study The State of Independent Bookselling in Canada 2020. According to this study, the top three social media platforms most used by Canadian indie bookstores in 2020 were:

• Facebook — 98% of Canadian indie booksellers;

• Instagram — 91% of Canadian indie booksellers; and

• Twitter — 64% of Canadian indie booksellers.

The frequency of use of social media platforms by Canadian indie bookstores in 2020 is broken down in the graph below. Here, Facebook and Instagram were tied as the social media platforms used the most by Canadian indie booksellers every day (52%). Facebook was also the top social media platform used at least once per week (31%) and at least once per month (13%) in 2020. YouTube was mostly used less often than once per month at 16%. And the platforms used least overall were Snapchat (0%), TikTok (5%), and Tumblr (7%).

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Until next time!