Print Makes A Comeback In 2011 Says Marketing Guru. You Agree?

We've been hearing from everyone and everyone's cousin that print is dead.

Exhibit A (New York Times):

"Amazon.com, one of the nation's largest booksellers, announced...sales of books for its e-reader, the Kindle, outnumbered sales of hardcover books."

Exhibit B (AP):

"Barnes & Noble Inc.'s fiscal fourth-quarter loss widened as it invested in electronic book technology. The loss for the three months ended May totaled $32 million, or 58 cents per share. That compares with a loss of $2.7 million, or 5 cents per share, last year."

Exhibit C (Wall Street Journal):

"As digital books continue to gain market share, one of the country's oldest mass paperback publishers is abandoning its traditional print books and making its titles available in digital format and print-on-demand only. The decision to go digital could be a sign of things to come for other small publishers facing declining sales in their traditional print business."

Even our own bloggers are jostling to get in a kidney punch at print.

But somehow that old dinosaur known as print books is still kicking, thanks to people like Joe Pulizzi.

In his article, Pulizzi outlines seven reasons print books will make a comeback in 2011.

Among the reasons, Pulizzi states, "The print vehicle is still the best medium on the planet for thinking outside the box and asking yourself tough questions based on what you read," says Pulizzi. "It's lean back versus lean forward. If you want to challenge your customers (like Harvard Business Review does), print is a viable option."

And, what once would've seemed ridiculous is now a reality: "What excites marketers and media buyers is what IS NOT being done." Pulizzi continues: "They want to do something different...something new. It's hard to believe, but I've heard many marketers talk about leveraging print as something new in their marketing mix. Unbelievable."

This is the book climate as we know it today.

But we want to hear from you. What's your opinion?