Every month, I review a set of market share reports prepared by one of our internal analysts. While the data behind these reports are not perfect, I do believe they represent the best view of the book publishing market currently available. As a result, even though it’s been almost two years since I posted a high-level summary of the data, I thought it would provide you with some insight into our industry.

Once a quarter, we pull all our Nashville-based employes together (about 400) for an all-company team meeting. Our goal is three-fold: to report on the previous quarter’s results, recognize outstanding performance, and preview our “coming attractions.”

We held this quarter’s meeting yesterday at The Donelson Fellowship, a church near our corporate headquarters. Rob Morgan, the pastor, and his gracious staff, have served as our hosts now for more than five years. Their facility is perfect for our size, with state-of-the-art audio-visual equipment.

Three years ago, we consolidated our twenty-one publishing imprints under one umbrella brand: “Thomas Nelson.” We believed then (as we believe now) so many imprints only served to dilute our brand, creating needless complexity and infrastructure for everyone.

At the time, we decided that we would go with our singular house logo on the spine. Believing that “less is more,” we took a page out of Apple and Nike’s playbook. No text. Not even a ® symbol to indicate a registered trademark. Just the house. Nothing more.

Last Friday, I spoke at the Music City Media Mixer, a luncheon sponsored by George Uribe and Ebie McFarland. I spoke on the topic of “The Importance of Building an Author Platform.” While my talk focused primarily on authors, the principles I shared apply to anyone trying to sell anything in today’s environment.

Building an author platform has never been more important. This is because of three realities author’s face today:

The International Christian Retail Show (ICRS) is going on this week in Denver. As long as I have been involved in the book industry, trade shows have been fertile ground for rumors. Usually, each trade show sports one BIG rumor and a lot of little ones. Despite the fact that most turn out to be false, they keep everyone entertained and make long days on the floor bearable.

Though we are not attending ICRS this year, evidently this year’s rumor is about Thomas Nelson. Supposedly, we are being sold or have already been sold. I hate to spoil anyone’s fun, but this is patently false. We are not being shopped or in discussions with potential buyers. As the company’s CEO, I should know.

Several years ago, I wanted to encourage our employees to blog. As a traditional book publishing company, I felt that we needed to experience new media if we were going to transition successfully to it. I still feel this way.

Initially, some people expressed interest. Others were reluctant. So, in order to encourage blogging, we created a simple set of guidelines to help our bloggers know what we expected. However, I noticed this week that these never made the transition to my new blog, which I launched a few months ago. So I thought I wold re-post them here.

Yesterday, I shared a major obstacle that I faced in my career. At the time, I thought it was insurmountable. I couldn’t see a way out. But then, amazingly, everything turned, and the situation worked to my advantage.

So often, this has been my experience. I could share with you one story after another. You probably could, too. The problem is that we forget that obstacles are a necessary part of achieving our vision.

In my experience, vision consists of five components:

In August of 2000, I received a big break in my career. However, as is so often the case, it came disguised as a seemingly insurmountable obstacle.

I had just become the publisher of Nelson Books, one of the two trade book imprints at Thomas Nelson at that time. I had inherited a division with a lot of financial problems. Based on almost every metric available, we were dead last compared to the company’s thirteen other publishing groups.

A while back, I received an email from one of our authors, notifying us that he had hired a new literary agent. My first thought was, You’ve got to be kidding! Of all the agents out there, why would you pick THAT one!

Don’t get me wrong. I have nothing against agents. Not only was I a literary agent for six years, I have been represented by an agent on all of the books I have personally published. And, of course, as a publisher, I deal with agents on a daily basis.

In 30 years of book publishing I have heard it all. In the spring of 1987, I received a book proposal from a man who was predicting that the Rapture would happen before November (the 40-year anniversary of the founding of Israel).

It’s no secret that book sales have suffered in the current recession. According to the Book Industry Study Group, units sales for 2008 were 3.03 billion, down 1.5%, from 3.13 billion copies in 2007. If you look at the dollar comparison, book sales were actually up 1%, but this was driven by higher retail prices.

Today is the first day of our 2010 fiscal year at Thomas Nelson. It is our 212th year in business. It is a day full of new beginnings and possibilities. As I thought about that today, I thought it might be good to take a quick look at the past as we prepare for the future.

Thomas Nelson’s Gaelic ancestors had a popular proverb: “Cuimhnich air na daoine o’n d’thainig thu.” It means, “Remember the people from whom you have come.” This is a wise and powerful saying. It is often forgotten in our modern world that places such a high value on everything new and shiny. But remembering our ancestors often provides a treasure-trove of resources for meeting the challenges of today.

Our company began in Scotland with the birth of Thomas Neilson [sic] in 1780. Though his parents were farmers, he developed an interest in printing, the most high-tech industry of the 18th century. As a result, his parents sent him to London to become an apprentice in a print shop on Paternoster Row, which was kind of the Silicon Valley of the Day.

Today I announced a few changes in our leadership structure. These changes are designed to better leverage my strengths and also make our team more nimble and competitive in the current economy.

I began yesterday with a breakfast meeting with a couple of other publishing CEOs. We got together to see if we could coordinate a large-scale promotion that would benefit our entire industry.

I can’t say more at this point, because we are in the early stages of discussion. Nevertheless, I was encouraged by the fact that there seems to be a growing realization that we might be able to make the pie bigger for all of us, rather than just continuing to steal market share from one another.

The first-ever Christian Book Expo (i.e., “CBE”) began yesterday in Dallas Texas. I’ve decided that I will post my daily activities, so that you who can’t attend can follow along vicariously. In case you missed it, I blogged about the details of this book festival a month ago.

Yesterday morning started out early with the GPA Invitational Golf Tournament. This is an annual event designed to raise funds for the Global Publishing Alliance (i.e., “GPA”). We played at the beautiful Tour 18 golf course in Flower Mound, Texas, just outside of Dallas.

I played in a foursome with Max Lucado. The tournament was a scramble format, and the weather could not have been better. Our score was not that great, but we had a blast. Hanging out with Max is always such a treat.

Last week I “unboxed” the Amazon Kindle 2 in a short video on my blog. I also shared my first impressions. I have now used the device for about a week, so I thought I would share my thoughts in a little more depth.

I still don’t think this is the device that will dramatically change the game for publishing. However, I do believe it is another step in the right direction. I also believe I have more clarity on what is still missing and where e-books are going. I plan to discuss these topics in future posts.

Part 1: Start with Great Content

This is the beginning of a series of posts I am calling, “Book Marketing 101: What Works and What Doesn’t.” I have wanted to write this series for a long time. There are so many opinions when it comes to marketing books. I certainly don’t have the last word on this topic, but I do have some experience.

I have been involved in the book publishing industry for 30 years. My career has included working at three different publishers, serving as a marketing director, marketing VP, acquisitions editor, editor-in-chief, publisher, chief operating officer, and now, of course, chief executive officer. I was also a literary agent for six years and have written four books, including one that was on the New York Times bestsellers list for 28 weeks. I am currently writing a new book called, The How of Wow.

Today, was a very difficult day at Thomas Nelson. We informed fifty-four of our friends and co-workers (about 10% of our workforce) that we have eliminated their jobs, effective this Friday. This will affect nearly every department in our company.

This was the second round of reductions this year. Unfortunately, this one was no less painful. We did the first round after significantly cutting our SKU count. However, this second round was purely a result of the slowdown in the economy.

The debate about the future of book publishing is largely focused on two questions: First, how will books be sold (bricks and mortar vs. the Internet)? And, second, how will the content be delivered (traditional bound books vs. digital)? Both of these issues are, of course, being driven by the new realities made possible via the Internet.