Here’s an extract of an interesting article in the press today that both affirms audiobook user habits gender-specifically and Writesideleft’s choice of a male narrator, specifically.
©Matthew Moore, The Times ( 9th April 2018)
“Encouraging young men to read books for pleasure has long been a challenge for publishers. The solution, it seems, is to allow them to listen instead.
Men in their twenties and thirties are driving a boom in audiobooks, according to research to be published this week.
Male commuters who may not have picked up a paperback since leaving university are increasingly listening to audiobooks on the way to work as it is seen as more relaxing than reading.
Audiobook sales have doubled in the past five years and rose by 17 per cent last year, according to Nielsen Book, the publishing research and data service. They now account for 5 per cent of UK consumer book spending and 7 per cent of fiction sales by value.
Downloads of audiobooks are particularly high among males aged 25-44 and those living in commuter-heavy urban regions such as London and the northwest, the Nielsen UK Books & Consumers survey found. “Listening to audiobooks seems to appeal to young men more than reading a book. It fits in much better with their lifestyle,” said Andre Breedt, managing director of Nielsen Book Research International, who will present the findings at The London Book Fair.
Many of these customers were not previously big readers, meaning the audiobook boom is not cannibalising sales of physical books and ebooks.
Mr Breedt said that podcasts were a “bridge” to audiobooks for young men who have got into the habit of listening to speech content on their phones. He added: “When you ask people, especially younger people, why they listen to audiobooks, ‘it helps to relax’ is the No 1 reason. You can commute at the same time, you can do the dishes.”
Non-fiction including history, autobiography, business and popular psychology are notably popular with male listeners, with crime and thriller fiction, humour and horror also doing well.”