Lauren: Hey everyone. Welcome back to kind of a special episode of Publish & Prosper. This is...

Matt: Why is it special?

Lauren: The last episode that we're recording –

Matt: Oh.

Lauren: – in this room.

Matt: Yeah. In this...

Lauren: In this –

Matt: Room. Studio. Office. Location.

Lauren: Yup.

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: Yeah. It's not the last episode you will all see that was recorded in this room. Because we do have a few more in the works that we've already recorded. But.

Matt: But will they come after this one?

Lauren: Yes.

Matt: Oh.

Lauren: Yeah. We’ve –

Matt: Well that's confusing.

Lauren: I know. It's – I like to –

Matt: As long as you have a –

Lauren: – to keep myself –

Matt: – handle on it, I don't care.

Lauren: I got it.

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: I got it, don't worry.

Matt: I definitely don't.

Lauren: But this is not – this is not the last episode that you'll see that looks like this. But this is the last time that you and I are sitting in this room, in this office building, recording in this studio. But exciting new things coming soon.

Matt: Yep.

Lauren: So.

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: We got to get one last good episode in here. And I think this is gonna be a good one.

Matt: Yeah I agree.

[1:20] – Episode Topic Intro

Lauren: Because today we are talking about the rising significance and importance of backlist books. And how much the backlist and back catalog in the publishing industry is kind of taking over the frontlist. And the backlist is almost becoming the new frontlist.

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: In a lot of different ways.

Matt: Yeah. Literally, in many cases. Backlist titles are moving back to frontlists through repackaging. You know, some other publisher acquisition buys the back catalog... You know, new cover on it, new interest, puts it back onto the frontlist, things like that. Which I think is really cool.

Lauren: Yeah. Yeah. There's, there's been a lot of this... So we will talk through some of that, maybe explain why and also explain some, some ways that, whether you're an author, publisher, content creator, whatever, you can kind of use this trend to your advantage, a little bit. A lot of bit, maybe.

Matt: Why don't you explain to everybody how the industry classifies a backlist versus frontlist title?

Lauren: That is also very important. So definitely. Backlist titles are usually books that are released more than twelve months ago, and or a book that is not the author's most recent release. So in some cases – it's not super common for an author to put out more than one book in a year in traditional publishing.

Matt: Traditional, yeah.

Lauren: In indie publishing it is a little bit more common, in which case then the definition would be just any books that are not your most recent release. But in publishing, in the traditional publishing industry, they usually view that as any book that is more than twelve months old. And then the frontlist are those new release titles that are actively being promoted in the market, and sometimes even like the upcoming release titles as well.

Matt: Yeah, yeah, I think they generally report on a one year sales cycle.

Lauren: Yeah.

Matt: For a new title, roughly.

Lauren: Yeah.

Matt: So. Okay.

Lauren: Yeah.

Matt: Sounds fun.

Lauren: Let's dive in.

[3:31] – Examining the Rising Trend of Backlist Book Popularity

Lauren: So I did actually kind of look this up because we... We've talked about this in past episodes. We actually talked about this in the episode that we did at the beginning of the year about Heated Rivalry and, and kind of the, the rising popularity of backlist. And it's something that I think that we've seen anecdotally, or that we, we feel like we've seen a lot of. So I did actually want to confirm whether or not we were totally making this up.

Matt: So, did you plan this episode solely so you could talk about Heated Rivalry again?

Lauren: I actually planned this episode so that I could talk about my newest obsession, which is Off Campus.

Matt: Oh gosh. Okay.

Lauren: But it's always nice to remember that Heated Rivalry exists. And it was wonderful.

Matt: Alright.

Lauren: Yeah. It's fine. But – So I did pull some numbers from Circana, BookScan, which we've referenced in the past for US print book sales. They primarily are reporting on traditional publishing book sales.

Matt: Yes, but that's because they get almost all of their data from just major retailers.

Lauren: Right.

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: Right. So, you know, these numbers are mostly focused on that, but they have reported that in... I think it was in 2025, backlist sales made up about 70% of print book sales in the US. Which is a lot. And I mean, I definitely... you know, I mean, even my first thought when I saw that was like well yeah, obviously. Because there are more backlist titles than frontlist titles, so that makes sense. You know, if every year all the year, the previous year's books get added to that, that grouping. But I think what's, what's more telling is seeing how that has changed over the last ten years. And it actually has. As far back as 2015, it was a lot closer to a 60/40 split.

Matt: Right.

Lauren: Than now the 70/30 split that it is. So it has definitely increased significantly.

Matt: Yeah. And when you're talking about, you know, publishing frontlist versus backlist and the revenues associated with them, that 10% growth over a ten year period. Right? Cause these numbers from 2025. That represents a significant amount of money.

Lauren: Yeah.

Matt: Right? So yeah, the general thought would be when you first hear this topic or like you said, oh, of course, backlist brings in more money because they're more backlist titles. However, if you saw the numbers on the actual amount of backlist titles that sell, you would almost think well, wait a second... Frontlist should be generating more revenue, right? Because each year there are new frontlist titles that we think generate, you know, billions of dollars and some of them, you know, cumulatively do. But backlist titles overall steadily continue to bring in the bulk of the revenue. I think what we don't realize is even the smaller portion of backlist titles that continually sell every year and move units. Even at small numbers, those things add up massively. And even without the marketing help and the sales help the frontlist titles get, you know, that's just a big number.

Lauren: Right.

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: I mean, even just thinking about it in the context of like, some of the biggest new release sales from the last few years have been any new Sarah J Maas book. Or when the last Fourth Wing book came out. Not the last one, but the most recent one came out.

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: That was... I think they sold, it was like over a million units in, in like the first few weeks?

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: But – And like yes, that's a huge, massive number of new release sales. But every single time that happens, it also creates a spike in backlist sales.

Matt: That’s right.

Lauren: Because all of their other books then also see a spike –

Matt: For that same author –

Lauren: Yes.

Matt: – or that series, or – Yeah.

Lauren: Yeah.

Matt: Yeah. I think to relate this to a lot of indie authors that might be listening... What we see with indie authors a lot, especially if they, they publish multiple titles per year, or you just have more than a few titles in your catalog, is that every time you publish something new, you go at it really hard with your marketing for... You know, the average is around three months, that we see. And then you just kind of take your foot off the gas. And most indie authors that we see, meet, talk to, watch, they don't really promote their backlists, their older titles, even if it's in a series that they're continually creating new content for. And this data should tell you that you should be doing the opposite, really. Or maybe not the opposite, but at least keeping your foot on the gas for the rest of your titles as well, because they'll continue to drip revenue down for you if you put some focus and attention on them.

Lauren: Absolutely. I think that if, if you're writing standalone books, your backlist is still a great opportunity to promote you as an author. And if you are writing books that are in any way connected as a series, then it is a huge oversight to not be continually promoting your backlist and then increasing that when you have a new release coming out in that series. We did do an episode on that a while back, I will make sure it's linked in the show notes, on... specifically on backlist book marketing. But we'll talk a little bit at the end of this episode too, about some ideas for that. But if you want to dive deeper into that, definitely go check the show notes for the backlist book marketing episode.

Matt: Yeah. And there was definitely a pretty decent amount of talk about backlist at US Book Show, too.

Lauren: Yes. Yeah. The, the lunchtime session that was like, probably an over, over an hour long session with a variety of different experts from the industry. One huge section of that was Keith Riegert interviewing Markus Dohle, who was formerly the CEO of Random House, back before they merged with Penguin there. And they spent, like, a significant amount of that interview talking about backlist and, and the importance of backlist in the industry, and kind of how that's changed over time, why they think that's true. But like, it was like a, like a significant amount of that. Which I thought was very telling, honestly, that they felt, that they put so much focus. It was like that and AI were the two biggest focuses of that whole conversation.

Matt: Yeah. I think there's reasons for that.

Lauren: Yeah.

Matt: Which we'll probably get into.

Lauren: Definitely some, some really interesting things they had to say about it. I also just, just kind of think it's, in general, interesting to, to watch and see what titles rise to popularity, specifically within that. When I was doing research for this episode, I found a roundup from BookRiot from December of 2025 that was just a top ten list of the bestselling backlist titles for the year. Also using data from BookScan. And a lot of them were kind of like the modern classics that you would expect to see on that list. Fahrenheit 451, Animal Farm, Brave New World, stuff like that. But there were two new additions to that top ten. That obviously are not new, but I thought they were really interesting. They also were not – neither one of them were romantasy. Which...

Matt: Have you read either of these? Cause I haven't.

Lauren: So I have not read – So the two additions were Red Rising by Pierce Brown, which is the first in a series that I have not read. And I don't – I meant to look this up, and I totally forgot to, I'm sorry. I don't know if there was a new book released in that series last year. I am curious about why that, that suddenly... Because that book was first published in January of 2014. And then the other one was The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller, which I have read. Beautiful book. Highly, highly recommend it, especially if you've recently gone to see The Odyssey. And that one was initially published in September of 2011 and has seen some really interesting spikes throughout the year - or throughout the years since then. It kind of had a pretty quiet publication initially. And then she published a second book a few years later called Circe that did very well. And that kind of brought attention back to The Song of Achilles, and made that kind of come back. And I do know that they published a beautiful hardcover edition of Song of Achilles last year. But I don't think that's enough to have moved the needle so much that it would make the top ten highest selling backlist titles. So that's also kind of an interesting – but that one is also one that has had a massive TikTok resurgence and attention drawn to it. So.

Matt: Which has been a huge driver for a lot of backlist titles.

Lauren: Yes.

Matt: Even a lot of obscure, strange ones.

Lauren: Yes. Yes. Which has been really interesting.

Matt: So do we, do we consider a backlist title frontlist again if it's been rereleased with, let's say, special edition hardcover or something like that?

Lauren: That's a great question. I don't know if the publishers do consider it that way. I don't know if I would. I think it's more of a... if the, the publishers see a rise in popularity in a backlist title, instead of just reprinting the old version of it, they'll give people a reason to purchase the new version of it by making a hardcover special edition, or doing something that they've added bonus content from the author in there, or something. So, a repackage.

Matt: I feel like if they spend money on marketing and sales, then it qualifies as frontlist.

Lauren: Sure.

Matt: But that's my opinion. I don't know if that's actually true, like, in-house. You know what I mean?

Lauren: Which is probably an unofficial indicator of the difference between them. And that's kind of a very important big difference between them.

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: Inside the industry.

Matt: Most backlist titles they don't spend money on promoting.

Lauren: Right.

Matt: Or, you know, that's the whole point, is once it goes through that one year sales cycle, it drops and it goes to the backlist, where they don't really put any effort into it. For the most part. So.

Lauren: Right.

Matt: They just sit there and quietly drive revenue.

[14:51] – How Changes in Marketing and Discoverability Strategies Boost Backlist Titles

Lauren: Which is, which is why I think... I think this is kind of why we're seeing this. Which, maybe I'm getting a little bit ahead of myself, but. We can, we can probably move on to that, to why? Why are backlist books more popular than they ever have been? And I think a lot of it is because in the past... you know, maybe, maybe more than a decade. Or at least in the pre-COVID times, before things like BookTok really took off and stuff like that. A lot of book marketing was 1. focused on frontlist. And 2. very much influenced by people that were, that were focusing on those new releases. So not even in terms of like the marketing dollars that the publisher were putting into it, but also like bookstores. Bookstores would put out displays that were new release titles on display.

Matt: Right.

Lauren: It wasn't themed tables like As Seen on TikTok.

Matt: Right.

Lauren: You know, you walk into Barnes & Noble now and you see the whole, the whole front of the store is...

Matt: Every table's broken up by genre –

Lauren: Yes.

Matt: But then there's, there's several that always have something like, oh, latest trend on BookTok, or...

Lauren: Yes.

Matt: You know, something like that, yeah.

Lauren: Yeah.

Matt: Or if you loved Heated Rivalry, every book on this table will make you smile.

Lauren: Yes.

Matt: I literally saw one like that at Barnes & Noble not too long ago.

Lauren: Yeah, I have some feedback for them about that particular strategy, but that's okay.

Matt: You keep that to yourself.

Lauren: Okay, I will. I will. It’s fine. But I think that is kind of a big, a big motivating factor here. Is that the way that books are being promoted has, has changed. And this is kind of a response to that. Because now there are so many more... like, creators, whether it's on BookTok or other types of creators, that are promoting books as they read them, as they come across them.

Matt: Right.

Lauren: Not because they're being influenced by a marketing budget from a publisher, or because a publicist is asking them to, or because a sales rep is asking them to, but because they're constantly looking for their next new to them book.

Matt: Right. I think they’re also many of them that – and this is very similar to what you just said. Because there's so many book influencers out there now, they're often digging deeper to find something new to bring – new, again, air quotes – to bring to their audience. Because they know 50 other book influencers out there are talking about something that just hit frontlist. Or are talking about a backlist title that's connected to a frontlist title.

Lauren: Yup.

Matt: So you have a lot of, you know, again, book influencers out there who are going beyond that, because they want to be different. They want to break through the noise. So they're digging through the crates, as you would say if you were into like, records and vinyl. They're trying to find even older stuff on these backlists that might have a dotted line to something, a connection on the frontlist, or at least be genre-specific to whatever's hot right now, so that their content on TikTok or wherever looks different than the other book influencers. And I think that has something to do with the resurgence of some of these backlist titles as well. It's just that desire and need to be different than the other 150,000 book influencers that are on there today talking about books.

Lauren: Absolutely. I completely agree with that. There are so many times that I have been on TikTok, and I will see somebody – which also makes me absolutely insane, when somebody starts describing the book first and you have to get to the end of the video before they tell you what the title of the book is. I've, I no longer engage with those videos. I skip them if they don't tell me right away with the book they're talking about is. Because there have been so many times where I've watched a video, where somebody has described a book and I've been like, okay, okay, alright, yeah yeah yeah. And I get to the end of it and it's the same book that fifteen other people have already tried to pitch to me, that I've already decided is not for me. And now I've wasted time watching yet another person try to bait and switch me with the same title that I already decided I didn't want. And so, to have –

Matt: But they got their sixty seconds of engagement out of you. Watch time.

Lauren: Well, not anymore they don't. But, but true, yes. But yeah, I think that is absolutely very, very true, that people are looking for ways to differentiate themselves. I also think that kind of as a part of that – and this is one of the things that Keith Riegert and Markus Dohle were talking about in their interview about this. That the AI and other, like, algorithm and discoverability tools that are so essential to book promotion these days, are kind of fine-tuning and changing that discoverability, and giving people new opportunities to dig into older titles. Because maybe something... Like, we see this all the time where, you know, a book will be marketed as a rom com and it turns out it's not a rom com. And if you had dug into it a little deeper, you would have realized some of the BISAC categories or some of the keywords that were included in there, it is more of a heavy topic. Or it is more like, dealing with these issues that a niche audience would be very like, happy to find this and would be very into this kind of content. But because it was mismarketed and mislabeled, the people that did read it didn't like it, because it wasn't what they expected it to be.

Matt: Yeah, metadata’s always had a problem.

Lauren: Yes.

Matt: And I think now, with a lot of the AI tools that we have and, you know, publishers being able to very inexpensively go back through and have all of the metadata from their backlist titles reviewed and or updated to either fit more current sort of genre styles and reading habits. Or actually correct, like you said, mislabeled, mistagged, miscategorized titles, and reintroduce that content back into the market. I think that's really – Until now you've never really been able to do that at scale, like inexpensively. Like, you could pay a bunch of interns to sit around and do that. There were some tools or pieces of software that would help with it. But I think nothing like we have right now, that we've had in the last couple of years, be able to very inexpensively, like, do a massive metadata and catalog review for things like that. Yeah.

Lauren: Yeah. I mean, even things like – I know, I know you don't like this, but you gotta, you gotta admit that it's effective – trope marketing. It, it works because of this. It works because of... if you are looking specifically for a book that deals with enemies to lovers, or second chance childhood romance, or whatever. You know, like... there are things that when they were sorting them into genres ten years ago, these would just kinda be catch all in one category.

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: And now when you're able to assign these, like, universally recognized keywords. Or at least universally recognized to your target audience. Now these books are showing up when your audience is looking for them.

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: When in the past they didn't.

Matt: That's true.

[22:36] – How Changes in Reader Behavior Boosts Backlist Titles

Lauren: I also think that the way that people are searching and finding books in general is, is probably influencing this.

Matt: Yes.

Lauren: I mean, we've talked about this in in other episodes recently where, yes, print is still very much alive and, and on the rise and healthy and well, but we've also seen an increase in audiobooks and ebooks in the last few years.

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: Which means that these older titles are more accessible to people. If you're limited to exclusively whatever print books your library and or local bookstore have in stock... they're still kind of prioritizing newer titles. But when you start adding digital libraries and digital catalogs in there as well, and there's – I could go on my phone right now while we're recording this and buy and download an ebook of a book that came out twenty years ago.

Matt: Yeah, but the inverse is also true, right? So. A lot of where the missed financial opportunities were with backlist and back catalogs was because normally a publisher would do a run of, let's say, you know... 50,000 units. Let's just say. And those 50,000 units would, you know, the bulk of them would go out to the retailers, the stores, some of them would go to online retailers. Then what was left would sit in the warehouse and those would get fulfilled as people ordered them through other means. Or when a retailer or bookstore, you know, ran out and needed a few more copies, those would come from the warehouse. And then once those copies were gone, most of the time, if the sales trajectory was slow or down ramping or you know, decreasing, they wouldn't fulfill another order. They don't want to do another offset run like we've talked about 100 times. And so that title would basically go out of print. Yes it’d still be available in ebook, if it was made available in ebook. Or audiobook, if it was made available on audiobook. But if they didn't want to make the investment in another run, it would go out of print. Now with print-on-demand, and how easy it is to do that, they switch it over to print-on-demand, and so it's always available. And slowly taking those other back catalogs that have been out of print for a while and switching them over to print-on-demand has made them a lot more accessible to those who only want print.

Lauren: Right.

Matt: Or to bookstores or things like that, where you have a BookToker that, for whatever reason, stumbled across some book on... whatever, medieval woodworking, and somehow made it popular. And every warehouse that had those in stock fifteen, twenty years ago is empty, but the publisher is now able to quickly flip that switch and turn it over to print-on-demand. And now it's available again for people who want to print copies of it. So the inverse is true of what you said, whether it's going, you know, digital and opening that up to more readers and channels. Or taking those, those titles that were out of print and now making them available again through print-on-demand.

Lauren: Right.

Matt: So. Yeah.

Lauren: Which is also, I mean, this that was like the two minute summary of the the episode that we did earlier this year about Heated Rivalry and how they –

Matt: Yup.

Lauren: – kinda dropped the ball on having a six week window of time where there were no print titles available, because they had to wait for the for the new print run to come in. And if they had switch to POD to cover that gap in the meantime, there wouldn't have been that drought in the market. But when we see these books that have these, these viral moments, whether it's Heated Rivalry, or Song of Achilles, or... Off Campus was just the – an Amazon Prime series that the books were, it’s a series by Elle Kennedy, that is like a thirteen book series or something like that. You know, if there is this viral moment where all of a sudden everyone wants to read this book... Yes, a lot of people can get the print copies initially, and buy through what's left of that inventory. And then yes, people are going to try to go get the digital copies of them if they can't get the print copies.

Matt: Right.

Lauren: But those do eventually become less accessible too. You know? I mean, I know I'm in two different library systems with my Libby app, and both of them have like four month holds each on like twenty-five copies of Heated Rivalry. So if that was something that you were like, I wanted, I wanted to get this and now I don't – I don't want to give Amazon money, so I'm not going to buy the Kindle edition, but I can't get the digital edition from my library. And I'm not an audiobook person, and I can't buy the print version. There is eventually a point where a book has gone so viral that it's hard to get a copy of. If you don't have the print-on-demand alternative for those, those print books while they're not in stock.

Matt: Yeah. Which touches on the next reason why we think backlist books are becoming more popular than ever, and that is that people are approaching their reading the same way they do streaming.

Lauren: Yes.

Matt: Right?

Lauren: Yup.

Matt: So binging... they'll come across one thing and see, oh, this author wrote six other things. Or...you know? I do it, you do it. I think anybody who reads, for the most part, or enjoys reading, ends up doing that. But it's, I think, even more common these days with accompanying TV shows that come along with them, or complimentary movies that go with them. I think they all kind of go hand in hand and drive more reading, which drives more backlist consumption. And again, the fact that a lot of these studios – you even mentioned Amazon and some of these others – they're looking at backlist catalogs, they're acquiring backlist catalogs. So they can have more content, so they can make more TV series, or more movies, or things like that. So.

Lauren: Yeah.

Matt: I think that's another big thing.

Lauren: Absolutely it is. I mean, there's, there's a we've seen so many really, really big projects come out in the last year that are very clearly based on books.

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: And almost never books that are like, frontlist titles.

Matt: Right.

Lauren: They're usually books that have been out for a while. I mean, what was a big... Project Hail Mary. That book came out probably five years ago. I mean, yes, the movie probably was optioned right away and took some time to be produced. But still, like...

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: You know? That, that was – that brought a spike back to Andy Weir's catalog. Anyone who didn't know that he also wrote The Martian probably picked up The Martian.

Matt: Which was self-published.

Lauren: Which was self-published.

Matt: Originally.

Lauren: Also great, great book and great movie. I think a lot of people didn't know that he had a book in between those two. There is another book that came out in between those two.

Matt: I didn't know that.

Lauren: It’s called Artemis. I haven't read it. But...

Matt: It’s not really my genre. So.

Lauren: I - it's - yeah.

Matt: I mean, I'm aware of him and his stuff, but not my genre.

Lauren: It's also not my genre, but I love – The Martian’s one of my, like, favorite rewatch movies, because it's such a good, like, comfort watch. And Project Hail Mary was great. Really, really great. I do actually still need to read the book on that one, but the movie was great. But not normally my genre. That's like an out – like, I'm reaching out of my, out of my comfort zone for that. For sure. But there have been, I mean, you know, we've talked about Heated Rivalry, we've talked about the Off Campus series. We've, in past episodes I've referenced The Summer I Turned Pretty, which was a pretty massive hit. The show’s over now, but it was, you know, three seasons, three summers in a row. That was based on a book series that was originally published in 2009.

Matt: When was Game of Thrones published?

Lauren: Like the 90s.

Matt: Right.

Lauren: Like way, way before the show.

Matt: I don’t know why I just thought of that. Yeah.

Lauren: Yeah. But, but yeah, you're right.

Matt: Also not my genre. But I ended up watching all of that.

Lauren: Yeah.

Matt: I mean, you know, and then went back and was like, oh, there's a ton of these books, like, okay.

Lauren: They're still making them today.

Matt: I'm very disconnected from what's on TV these days.

Lauren: So am I, which is making it hard to have this –

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: – conversation. But there is more – I think that there is more TV content and movie content than you realize that are based on books. And especially, I mean, it's also hard for us a little bit, because we are a little more entrenched in the publishing industry.

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: And like, there are so many of these – my, my sister and her book club, like six months ago, read a book that I don't remember what the name of the book was, but she was describing it to me and I was like, oh that sounds just like the movie Mickey 17. And she was like what, what movie is that? And I was like, oh, you know, it was a movie that came out like a year or two ago. Robert Pattinson played the main character in it. And we wound up looking it up, and it was – that movie was the adaptation of the book that she had read.

Matt: Oh.

Lauren: They had slightly different titles. She had no idea that it had been made into a movie. I had no idea that it was based on a book. They’re, there's so – and we are both people that are like, actively consuming media in a variety of different ways. And I think that happens a lot. And I think that we're seeing more and more, as that happens, people go, okay, I really liked this. I'm going to look into it more. And find out, oh yeah, it's based on a book. I'm gonna read the book. Or maybe I'm not gonna read the book, but what else has this author written? I really like this. I'm gonna go do that.

[32:19] – How Adaptations Inspire Back Catalog Acquisitions

Matt: Yeah. And that... that transition from written to screen has been driving so much acquisition –

Lauren: Yes.

Matt: – right now, you know? And even in the last ten years. Even, you know, I think most people in the industry have heard a lot of the big acquisitions and things that have happened. When Wattpad got acquired, you know, so much content on Wattpad wasn't even, you know, fully formed books or like, novellas. Like, you're talking about accounts that had like a paragraph or two in them, like snippets of content or ideas. But, you know, Wattpad was bought specifically for content, right? And you have all these media companies that are making catalog acquisitions specifically for that. They need to make content. Whether that's TV, movie, you know, anime and manga, stuff like that. There's a lot of acquisitions happening right now of catalogs, back catalogs, and a lot of money being paid for that stuff. One of the things that you, you research when I asked you to look this up was, back in March at London Book Fair we got the news that Seven Seas Entertainment was acquired. Primarily for their, their back catalog, but obviously they had a pretty decent sized frontlist too. But it was mostly manga and anime, if not all. And that was an $80 million acquisition. And it was for content. You know what I mean? Like, they were purchased by a larger company that has, that's based in Tokyo, but that has a U.S. subsidiary. But they were purchased for that content. And so, you know, a lot of that content will now get repackaged and released into other areas of the world as books, but it will also get turned into, more than likely, you know. TV shows, with the onset and popularity of anime and manga in the States, and possibly even movies. There's a lot of acquisitions like that happening. When you look at the top five publishing companies in the world, they're all owned by media companies.

Lauren: Right.

Matt: With, you know, heavy backing from, you know, VC or PE. But there's a reason for that, you know what I mean? And there's... these, these studios can only come up with so much original content. Which I would argue we've not seen many movies or TV shows lately that are original content that weren't pulled from books. A lot of which have been indie published or self-published lately. So.

Lauren: Yeah.

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: I mean we've, we've seen that more and more in media, whether it's... We’re repackaging older movies and rereleasing them, or creating updated versions of them. A movie – I'm generally resistant to this, but I will admit that I am really excited for Practical Magic 2 coming out later this year. Which for the record, is based on a book. The first one is an adaptation of a book. A lot of people don't know that. Practical Magic by Alice Hoffman. The second one is coming out later this year. I guarantee you we’ll see a spike in book sales on that first book –

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: – when that movie comes out, especially now that reading is more popular. Because it's – we're seeing this connection of the, the women that are my age, that were younger when that first movie came out and were not the target demographic for that book at that age, that are now 30-something year olds that are very into reading because of BookTok and other things. And now this movie is going to come out that's going to spark nostalgia and make people go back and look at it and say, oh, I never did read this book. And it's fall, it's witchy season, I'm going to get this book and, and this is gonna be my perfect little fall read. And then I'm going to go watch the movie.

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: A hundred percent.

Matt: Acquiring these back catalogs is a great way for media companies and other organizations to add revenue immediately to their bottom line. But again, increase the, the content schedule for movies and TV and adaptations or sequels or trilogies or things like that. Where, you know, maybe the previous IP holder, you know, didn't have the money or time or resources to put into it, but somebody else comes in with an infusion of cash or capital, and they're able to do that. And we're seeing a lot of that right now. Again, Media Do acquiring Seven Seas is just one of many that have happened. But it was one of the more, I think, larger ones that has happened this year, if not one of the largest. And it's one of the ones we saw where it was strictly for that catalog, essentially.

Lauren: Yeah.

Matt: You know? They just wanted that content. A lot of times when there's an acquisition in publishing, it's for more than just the catalog. It's for maybe, you know, some platform abilities or functionality or some software that's proprietary or, you know, some other thing, but. We're seeing a lot more where it’s strictly just catalog purchases. Or even just, not even outright acquisitions, investments of capital. The other one that I had you look up was KKR, who own Simon & Schuster, acquired them years ago in a really big, massive sale that everybody took note of. They just acquired a large stake, you know, 50, 51% stake, in Thomson Reuters print business. I mean that's a direct play on not just, you know, acquiring some more revenue for the bottom line. It's – that's a lot of back catalog stuff. That's a lot of backlist stuff. So. Especially when you talk about print and Thomson Reuters, it's not a ton of frontlist. It's, it's a lot of backlist. So. Obviously there are other facets of that acquisition that are, that are interesting. But again, you're talking about a major, you know, investment firm, media company, media conglomerate, coming in and purchasing more content and IP and back catalog stuff. And that's, that's really interesting. And again, indie publishers, indie authors should take note. There's a huge thirst for content in the media world right now. So make sure you're paying attention to what's going on. If you're offered a contract with a, with an imprint or a publisher, make sure you're paying very close attention to, to what happens to those media rights. To the IP for digital, for TV, for film, for anything like that. Because that's, that's what a lot of people are after right now. So.

Lauren: Yes. Yes, it is.

Matt: And this really points out the fact that, you know, like I said, back catalog is such a large revenue driver, whether it's through the actual titles themselves, just acting as a drip irrigation system for passive and sometimes active revenue. Or as a farm for new content for, for TV, for movie, for podcasts, for audio, for whatever that might be. Media is, is very much interested in getting their hands on catalogs.

Lauren: Well, and I think it's also, for – whether you're an indie author who is just you yourself and your, your few titles, or one of the big five publishers. It is also what keeps the lights on, and what gives you the opportunity to take gambles on new frontlist titles.

Matt: That’s right.

Lauren: If you're, if you're an indie author and the success of your author brand hinges exclusively on you hitting your sales numbers for your next book... then that's not stable. That's not sustainable. And that's one bad marketing job away from everything falling down like a house of cards.

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: So it's all in the backlist. It's in the – as long as you are keeping up a steady enough stream of revenue from that backlist that you are then able to say, I'm going to put out this new title, and hopefully it'll move the needle even further. But even if it doesn't, I'm still going to be okay based on what's going on in the past.

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: That's, that's a big deal. And that's what allows us to, to – whether it's indie authors that are trying something new with their brand or branching out into a new genre. Or the traditional publishers that are taking a gamble on a debut author that they can afford to do that, because they have some really solid backlist or back catalog authors that are consistent sellers.

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: That's – we need that. That's an essential part of keeping any industry, and especially the publishing industry, moving forward.

Matt: Yeah, definitely.

[41:02] – How Indie Authors and Publishers Benefit from Backlist Trends

Matt: So how can indie authors and publishers sort of make the most of what we're talking about in their backlists, if they have one?

Lauren: Well, they can start by using Lulu.

Matt: That's a great idea.

Lauren: It's a great idea, right? I mean, I guess they could use another print-on-demand company, but why would they do that if they were listening to this podcast?

Matt: Buyer beware.

Lauren: Yeah. No, we – you know, we touched on this in this episode and in other episodes, that if you are trying to promote your backlist or your back catalog and you are not ready to invest in a complete offset print run for an older title, just switch it to POD.

Matt: Yeah, I mean, honestly, at this point investing in offset for backlist is stupid. I'll just say it.

Lauren: Yeah?

Matt: I don't care. Yeah, it just doesn't make any sense.

Lauren: Unless you have the proof of concept.

Matt: Even then, it just – we've talked about the math already.

Lauren: Yeah.

Matt: Especially if you're selling direct, or... Like, there is no reason at all to, to run offset for backlist titles. That's just dumb. It's not smart math, it’s not smart business. I would... that just seems silly to me. So. Backlist stuff, you should be selling direct wherever possible. You should be continuing to promote your author brand and driving people back to your, you know, site to buy these backlist titles direct. And they should be on, you know, automated print-on-demand drip feeds. Like, you shouldn't have to lift a finger for fulfilling backlist titles. Or, you know, I'd be running evergreen campaigns on some of my backlist stuff, especially if it's generating at least, you know, a couple units or more per month. Why not?

Lauren: Yeah, absolutely. I mean, you should be doing that anyway. For sure. But one of the other things that you should do, kind of hand-in-hand with that is, is make sure that your backlist is discoverable.

Matt: Right, yeah.

Lauren: Whether or not you are running – which I, again, I'm gonna say you should be running some kind of passive, low lift, whatever, low budget evergreen campaign.

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: Not saying throw your entire marketing budget at promoting your backlist titles, but on top of that, you should absolutely make sure that your backlist is regularly optimized for discoverability. This is actually something that you should update on a semi-regular basis. Because the industry changes. So, you know, if you have a title that's ten years old and the, the keywords and metadata that you used ten years ago have evolved over time.

Matt: Even five years ago.

Lauren: Or five years ago.

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: Or three years ago. Three years ago, authors were – not that many authors were comping Heated Rivalry as a book.

Matt: That's – yeah, for sure.

Lauren: Now, every sports romance out there is comped to Heated Rivalry, even the ones that it doesn't apply to. You know? That is something that you want – especially if a book has a viral moment. Whether it was a TV show adaptation, a movie adaptation, just a book that took off on, on BookTok or something. If you have a book in your backlist that is in any way connected to that, make sure that you are updating your metadata to catch the same audience of people that are interested in that content.

Matt: Yeah, and if you haven't yet still, you know, messed around with Claude or ChatGPT or, you know, Gemini or whatever, you know, tool of choice... Bublish makes a really great AI powered sort of tool for authors, or toolkit, with a number of different pieces of functionality. But it will essentially help you do all of this as well. Some of us here in the office have messed around with it in the past. It's a, it's a pretty good toolkit for that stuff. And, you know, again, if you're not ready to, to work exclusively out of one of the main, you know, AI provider tools, then that's a good option. It's geared for authors. It will help you do exactly those things.

Lauren: It's, it's designed for this purpose. As opposed to something like ChatGPT that this is one of one of many, many, many things that AI can do.

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: The Bublish AI Author Toolkit is designed specifically to help you with metadata and, and the behind the scenes book marketing for your books.

Matt: Yup.

Lauren: And also designed – I'm pretty sure they promise that they delete the data of your... Like, they're not storing your book’s data. They're not using it to train their own AI. So you have that privacy protection, if that's a reason that you have not been interested in using –

Matt: I think –

Lauren: – some of the gen AI tools.

Matt: – Storyteller OS, Chelle Honiker’s new platform, does that too. And I think it also protects your, your IP and data. But.

Lauren: I would expect any... anybody that works in the indie publishing space would understand that that is something that would be very valuable to indie authors.

Matt: Yeah, they might understand it, doesn't mean they always –

Lauren: Well.

Matt: – fulfill on it, but.

Lauren: That's true.

Matt: And again, you can always use those tools directly too, like Claude –

Lauren: Yes.

Matt: – and ChatGPT. You just you need to make sure you're understanding, you know, how to prompt it to get the desired results that are going to be effective and helpful. So.

Lauren: Yes. And even if you're not, even if you do not want to use any of those AI tools... please, if you have to do it manually, do it manually. But please get in the habit of just regularly at least reviewing your metadata, your book descriptions, stuff like that, and seeing if there's any room for improvement anywhere in there.

Matt: Yeah, you also made a note here that, I forgot about this, episode 119 where we talked about marketing your book using, you know, some of these tools and just –

Lauren: Yes.

Matt: – what to, to watch for. So you can listen to episode 119 –

Lauren: Yeah, I'll link that in the show notes.

Matt: – for some help there too. Yeah.

Lauren: Yeah. I did also... I did reference already, earlier in this episode, the one that we did on backlist book marketing as well. So again, I will make sure that one is linked in the show notes. I'm pretty sure it is... it's episode number 59.

Matt: Wow. That’s...

Lauren: I know.

Matt: – old, but I would assume it's, a lot of it's still relevant.

Lauren: I'm sure it is. But in case you don't want to go back and listen to that one, I think some of the things that we talked about in there were making sure that you are passively promoting your backlist. And by passively promoting your backlist, I mean you’re... any new releases should have some kind of reference to your backlist titles in there. Whether it's a list of other books by this author. Whether it's the first chapter of one of your other books in there. Or referencing some, something like that in your back matter.

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: They’re a great way to get people to sign up for your newsletters. Or to take action in your welcome series, if you want to convert somebody – We've talked about this in an episode recently, I don't remember which. The idea of the transactional emails that you send out –

Matt: That’s right.

Lauren: – when you're selling direct, there are things that you can include in there to hopefully move people from the transactional emails into your marketing emails.

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: And something like, hey, here's a free download for one of my backlist titles. And I know that, that some people will balk at that a little bit. But if, if giving away a free copy of your oldest title results in more sales of your newer titles, that's worth it.

Matt: Yep.

Lauren: Absolutely –

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: – worth it. Especially if you are releasing books that are connected to each other in any way. Whether it's series or, you know, nonfiction.

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: If this idea helped you, check out this one. Whatever it is.

Matt: I think the point is that you, you need to be leveraging your backlist if you have one.

Lauren: Yes.

Matt: A lot of indie authors are not. And they do have backlists. But again, they typically go really hard with marketing the first couple of months of a launch of a new title, and then it just gets relegated to a cemetery of other titles. And, you know, some of them will even put it, you know, just leave it on Amazon or whatever so it's technically there. But, you know, if people don't know it's there, then they don't know it's there. Like, you have to bring attention to it, so. You gotta do something with it. And, and the fact that we have all this great technology and all these things available now that can really help you optimize your backlist and really turn it into a good source of passive revenue – sometimes active revenue, depending on, on the title itself. It's very easy for, you know, some of your older stuff to become some of your best-selling stuff.

Lauren: Absolutely it is.

Matt: So.

Lauren: I've, I've said this before and I will say it again: I am always looking for books that are available now. I'm always looking for something –

Matt: Right.

Lauren: – that I can read –

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: – right now. I'm never looking for something that I can read in three weeks or two months. I don't have the attention span for that.

Matt: A preorder that's two months out. It's like, ugh.

Lauren: Right.

Matt: Alright, hit me again in two months please.

Lauren: Right. Right. And like, not that I'm, not that –

Matt: Or like a month and a half, or something.

Lauren: – I'm not excited for your book.

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: I want to read it. But if you have a book available now.

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: That's even better.

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: And it doesn't mean I'm not going to read your book in two months. If anything, I'm going to wind up reading your entire back catalog while I'm waiting for that book that comes out in two months.

Matt: Yep.

Lauren: So make sure those books are available so that I can find them and read them.

[50:53] – Episode Wrap Up

Matt: You know what's available now also?

Lauren: What?

Matt: Lunch.

Lauren: Oh thank god.

Matt: Yeah, so let's wrap this up.

Lauren: Alright, let's go.

Matt: I think we've covered it all anyways.

Lauren: Alright. Well, you just, you just bought a new... new to you backlist book –

Matt: I did.

Lauren: – you were saying.

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: What'd you get?

Matt: They released another title from Seishi Yokomizo the, the old Japanese mystery writer that I've been reading. Pushkin, or Vertigo, Pushkin acquired the rights to... I don't know how many of his titles. I think he had almost seventy. But this, I think, is like the eleventh or twelfth one now they've, they've pushed out. And I love it. And clearly it was a good acquisition for them to get the rights or, you know, at least the licenses to this content. And they've just been, you know, translating them one at a time and rereleasing them into the US and the UK and other English-speaking markets. And it looks like they've been doing well, so... We didn't really talk about that. And we won't go too deep into it, because lunch is here. But you know, that's another form that we've seen, where people are acquiring catalogs in other languages or things like that, or licensing the rights to them, whatever they can do to get that content and repackage it. You know, translate it, repurpose it, whatever they need to do. So yeah, I was really excited to see that there was a new one released... just this month, I believe. Yeah.

Lauren: Good so far?

Matt: So far, so good, yeah.

Lauren: Alright.

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: I mean, if you needed any further proof of the relevance this episode, I'm pretty sure every book that Matt has recommended for the last six months has been a backlist title.

Matt: Yeah, I don't, I don't read a lot of frontlist stuff. At all. The closest thing to a frontlist book I've bought and started in a long time, was I finally broke down and bought... Gosh, what's the –

Lauren: Dungeon Crawler Carl?

Matt: Dungeon Crawler Carl.

Lauren: Which even then is still...

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: It's, it's frontlist in the sense that it's been recently traditionally published.

Matt: That's true.

Lauren: But it is... There's eight books in that series.

Matt: Yeah. Yeah.

Lauren: That's not a new series.

Matt: That’s true. Yeah, I don't, I don't... I guess I don't – Oh no no, I did buy a frontlist book, and I finished it –

Lauren: Okay?

Matt: – this week. Japanese Gothic. Yeah, that one was... odd, because it was marketed to me as horror. And I was really excited for it to come out, and I read it, and it was – it's more like, I would say, less horror and more like suspense slash fantasy. But nonetheless, it was really good.

Lauren: Interesting.

Matt: Well, it deals with like, a time portal.

Lauren: Interesting.

Matt: Yeah. It’s like.. this girl who’s a, a samurai back in like the, the 1800s, lives in this house. And it’s the same house this guy lives in, in present day. And there’s some weird time portal... like, I don’t want to give too much away.

Lauren: Okay.

Matt: It’s a really good book. Anyways, that’s the only frontlist thing I’ve bought in forever, that I can remember. Everything else I read and purchase is all backlist stuff, yeah.

Lauren: Yeah. Makes sense. And another great example of why you should make sure you're optimizing your metadata. Because sounds like that book was marketed...

Matt: Yeah. That's true.

Lauren: Kind of incorrectly.

Matt: Yeah. Well, I still found it, but.

Lauren: Right.

Matt: Nonetheless... Yeah. And for you, you read mostly frontlist stuff.

Lauren: I do read, I do read a lot of –

Matt: Well, a lot of frontlist stuff.

Lauren: I read a lot of frontlist stuff. Or I buy a lot of frontlist stuff, it tends – by the time I get to it, it might not be frontlist anymore.

Matt: That TBR pile is...

Lauren: The TBR –

Matt: A struggle.

Lauren: Yeah, yeah it's, um... it's, it's more like a TBR mountain these days.

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: But. But yeah, that's – I mean, the, the four most recent books on my nightstand right now are all books that have been released in the last two or three months. And there are a few upcoming ones that I am counting down the days, so.

Matt: Alright.

Lauren: Yeah.

Matt: Well, do all the things.

Lauren: Please do.

Matt: Like and subscribe. Leave a review.

Lauren: Leave us a comment.

Matt: Send an email.

Lauren: Podcast@lulu.com.

Matt: Lauren will answer it immediately.

Lauren: I sure will.

Matt: Or as quickly as possible.

Lauren: Yep. Got nothing better to do.

Matt: That's a lie.

Lauren: But I, while I wait for your emails, I will edit this episode and plan our next episode. Which will be out next week, and we'll be excited for you to listen to it.

Matt: Yes.

Lauren: And until then, thanks for listening.

Matt: Yep. Later.