In an increasingly digital world, what does the future hold for book publishers and sellers? Books themselves will continue to thrive while traditional book shops face growing challenges. As for publishers, while most of the publishing industry experts at Wharton’s Future of Publishing Conference believed digital books will be good for the economics of publishing, getting to that future will call for major changes. This article conveys the thoughts of experts on the changing business models of publishers, ways in which publishers are experimenting, the potential benefits of going digital, and the areas in which eBooks are making the biggest waves.

Former Random House executive, Alberto Vitale, “Digital will complement and enhance traditional publishing” and “will make the economics of publishing a lot more attractive and compelling.” But before book publishers realize that possible future they may have to thoroughly remake every aspect of the business. Publishers will have to take on new roles, but can expect digital models to cut costs and expand reach. On the optimists’ side, Vitale expects the digital trend to lead to a doubling in size of the book publishing industry, with hardcover books continuing to be printed on paper, but becoming much more expensive and better produced. Other experts doubted much industry growth was likely and warned that the money would have to be shared among more people.

Electronic editions of professional and scholarly books are doing especially well. One expert expects that “all higher education textbooks have a good chance of being eTexts” by 2015. One promising sign comes from the Kindle book buyers, who buy more books after purchasing the reader. On the downside, electronic books are likely to be bad for bricks-and-mortar retailing. The old relationships between a publisher’s salespeople and book-sellers doesn’t apply in the online world. While bookstores may buy from known publishers, online buyers have no interest in the identity of the publisher. This also means that publishers “need to get identities and create boutique imprints to create online communities.”

The experts at the conference also underscored the need to change existing publishing business models that are still based on the need to create blockbusters. The blockbuster strategy has relied on the ability to place many copies of certain books in bookshops and places like Walmart. The best-sellers are currently almost exclusively writers with previous hit books. Internet and digital publishing opens up new paths to making best-sellers, as some recent experiments have shown. Trade book publishers have so far shown willingness to carry out experiments aimed at harnessing the new possibilities of the online world.

Among other future changes foreseen, some suggest that most of the sales and marketing infrastructure in the book business will have to go, and small groups of editors with expertise in specialized areas will work together to pull in like-minded authors and readers to their websites.