Chamblin's, Barnes and Noble respond to influence from a popular app
TikTok is more than just a way to kill a few minutes — or hours — during a break from work. It has evolved into a vessel for finding a community and, as a result, for advertising and marketing.
One of the biggest market-based communities on TikTok is one you might have even seen creeping into the real world recently: BookTok.
BookTok, a sub-community on the video app TikTok, focuses on books and literature through related videos and hashtags. Creators make videos reviewing, listing or making jokes about the books they read, ranging in genre.
Shannon DeVito, director of books at Barnes and Noble, said many of the people who frequent BookTok range from teenagers to the “right-under 40 audience,” with a common theme of romance, mystery, thriller, fantasy and young adult books as primary topics.
“It’s a lot of the escapist genres,” DeVito said. “When we take inventory across the board, we’re ordering on a lot more backlist titles.”
Backlist titles are ones that have been out longer than a year. DeVito said the popularity of BookTok really started with some older books “that blew up in the summer of 2020,” namely “The Song of Achilles” and “They Both Die At The End.”
Since then, authors like Colleen Hoover — whose “It Ends With Us,” was published in 2016 and spent 45 weeks on The New York Times bestsellers list from 2021 into 2022 — have seen huge bumps in sales as a result of the platform.
This free marketing from creators to followers has not only built a community for authors and readers but has taken steps offline to start influencing the book-selling industry so even sellers have store accounts on the app now.
'#TikTokMadeMeBuyIt: TikTok becomes a shopping phenomenon, helping certain products go viral
What's the deal with WitchTok? We spoke to creators bringing magic to TikTok.
Back by popular demand
A local favorite in Jacksonville, Chamblin’s Bookmine started seeing the BookTok trends impacting books requested at both stores in 2020, said Cari Hamoui, manager at Chamblin's Uptown.
“I was seeing much younger people (middle and high school age) come in with their friends and buy books,” she said. “It was enough for me to notice and think ‘What’s going on?’”
@chamblinsbooks Take a stroll with us through the Bookmine. • • #books #bookstore #booklovers #booktok #bookworm #indiebookstore #chamblinbookmine #shopsmall #shoplocal #jacksonville #bookshelf ♬ Okinawa Pier - FloFilz
Hamoui said surges in buying young adult fiction became more obvious at the store “and not just teenagers,” she said, “but adults buying it and becoming full-on obsessed with these fantasy series, particularly one by Sarah J. Maas.”
Chamblin’s had to change how it orders books “astronomically” as a result of what was being made popular online, Hamoui said.
“We deal with a lot of used books, but with the TikTok influencing the market, the demand for newer books and recently released books has changed a lot,” she said. “We’ve had to start ordering newer titles. We have to keep ordering these same titles that people want to get from TikTok. It’s influencing the market and consumer choices when it comes to books.”
Chamblin’s, which logged into its own TikTok account and started creating videos to promote the store, also became the backdrop for some of local BookToker Justin Baumann’s videos.
Creator keeps it local on BookTok
“Chamblin’s is the best filming location,” Baumann said. “People loved used bookstores on BookTok, and Chamblin’s is such a quintessential, over-stuffed find-a-hidden gem bookstore. I don’t think I’ve ever had a video where I filmed there do bad.”
Baumann, 28, of Jacksonville, or @justinsbooknook on TikTok and Instagram, said he started creating content for BookTok about a year ago as a way to log the books he was reading. Since then, he has garnered a following of almost 11,000 people and attracted attention from some publishers who will send him free books in return for TikTok reviews.
“I wanted to pick up reading again and wanted to kind of make a diary of it, blog-style,” Baumann said. “I started talking about the books I was reading in a very unprofessional way, and it kind of gained steam. I found some decent success roasting authors I didn’t like, and that really took off.”
Baumann’s videos average 2,000-5,000 views during weekdays and anywhere from 10,000-30,000 views on weekends, he said, which is all highly variable due to TikTok’s algorithms which reward people for posting more frequently.
“I would say BookTok heavily influences noncreators [to purchase books],” Baumann said. “There were two books I’ve done that had over 100,000 views, and I could tell from my comments section that people purchase books that I promoted. I like it because I promote queer books and books that don’t get as much attention.”
@justinsbooknook I always seem to have books just lying on the floor, but at least the main shelf is mostly put together #bookshelf #booktok #justinsbooknook #reader #tbr #booklover #menwhoread #bookstack #bookish #homelibrary ♬ hot girl bookshelf - Mattaniah
Baumann said while he doesn’t think he’ll make BookTok a full-time career, he said he would like to see local bookstores interacting with and promoting BookTokers more as the content creators are doing for the stores.
“Why don’t you have your local BookTok person come and curate that table?” He said. “I don’t feel fairly compensated for my time. That’s currently a thing that’s happening with the bigger BookTokers is that they should be legitimized through the bookstores and publishers.”
Magic of BookTok reacting, not influencing
Barnes and Noble, for example, doesn’t want to get involved with any direct advertising on TikTok, DeVito said.
“We have our own TikTok channel and a lot of our stores have their own TikTok channel,” she said. “We’re just engaging and being part of the conversation. We’re not really pushing anything.”
As soon as someone tries to monetize something or make it feel like an ad, she said, that’s “when the magic of BookTok dies.”
“It’s building an online community that we’ve had in our stores,” DeVito said. “The last thing I want is to be the uncool uncle in the media conversation.”
@bntowncenterjax These books need your help! #bn #bntowncenterjax #booktok #books #bookstore #fyp #bookclub #bnbuzz #ya ♬ Hero not hoarder - Merrowchild
For now, it’s enough to stock up on books that are made popular in a more organic way, she said.
Similarly, Chamblin’s looks at customer demand and responds rather than trying to drive it, Hamoui said.
Many Barnes and Nobles, which create their own display tables and end caps based on their markets, put out “As Seen on BookTok” labels to help audiences find what they're looking for or discover something new based on what they’ve already seen.
“We also created a page online for titles you see trending and titles that are on the app with specific hashtags,” DeVito said. “It is really heartening to see the younger audiences discovering reading as a really nice version of escape or rediscovering reading.”
This article originally appeared on Florida Times-Union: BookTok community on TikTok driving book sales to new heights
