Writing, Self-Publishing, Book Marketing

For most of my adult working-life, long before becoming a book designer, I’ve worked at independent bookstores.  Most recently, for about nine years, I worked at The Book Corner — a Bloomington, Ind. institution for more than 60 years (in one form or another). Though we didn’t sell the same volume of books as the larger corporate stores, we had a pretty faithful customer-base and the best magazine selection in the whole city. Some of what I learned at The Book Corner might be helpful for self-published or print-on-demand authors.

We had our share of local authors coming into the store, trying to get us to put their books on our shelves. Margaret, the owner and manager of the store, had pretty clear-cut criteria for what would allow her to carry a local author’s self-published book.

First, the book had to be available from Ingram Book Company. More than likely, we weren’t going to order the book directly from the publisher because we’d have to pay  shipping. If we could add it to our weekly order from Ingram, as long as the total number of books exceeded a certain number, we wouldn’t have to pay for shipping. To order the book through Ingram Book Company you need an ISBN, which you can receive if you purchase through Wordclay along with one to three years of Softcover Channel Distribution.

Second, the book had to be returnable. Self-published and print-on-demand books are usually not returnable, unless the author chooses to purchases some sort of returnability like Wordclay’s Retail Return Insurance. See, if we did order books for the store, and they didn’t sell, we could return the books to Ingram (or directly to the publisher) for credit, minus a minor percentage — much better than losing the full amount of the purchase price.

Third, the book needed to have some sort of local appeal. This meant the author was well-known locally, or the subject matter of the book was locally interesting, or the author already had an established fan-base. As always, before writing a book or anything else, you have to remember your audience — it’s your first step in the marketing and promotion of your book.

Even if the book didn’t meet any of the above criteria, we would consider carrying it on commission. This meant that the author would supply us, at their own cost, with three copies of the book. We’d price it and put the book on the shelf, but would only pay the author if any copies sold, after recouping our expected 40 percent profit — we never paid any monies up front.

All this being said, I still feel it’s easier for self-published authors to work with independent bookstores rather than trying to work with larger, corporate bookstores with institutional guidelines the stores’ managers have to adhere to — they’re just not as flexible. So, aside from a well-written book, your best bet at having a bookstore carry your title is to make sure you have channel distribution and returnability.

-Jenn