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Bits and bobs
Jan. 19th, 2015 02:12 pm Still learning more about book pricing. It's a learning curve that never ends.
There are some interesting differences between what Amazon can sell a book for (or not sell as the case may be) and what you can get in a bookshop.
Here's two classic examples.
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This book is a minimum (inc postage) of £4.24 and the next cheapest copy is a pound more. However, if you look inside it (which you can't do on Amazon), you discover that it has no pictures and looks totally boring. You won't be able to get more than £1.50 for it in a bookshop.
However, good quality children's pop up books will sell in the shop for more than the second-hand Amazon price. In the shop, we can display pop-up books to full effect - on Amazon, you only see the cover.
There's also a lot to learn about older books - the ones that are too old to have any chance of Amazon showing the contents.
Amazon prices are almost entirely driven by algorithms (and ABE is starting to go that way, though prices there generally reflect the experience of actual human booksellers). Thus, an Amazon price is generally inaccurate (and usually far too high) if there are less than 30 copies for sale. This means that you have to get really familiar with what your customers are buying and what they are willing to pay for it and use that knowledge as your guide, in addition to seeing what online prices are.
There are some interesting differences between what Amazon can sell a book for (or not sell as the case may be) and what you can get in a bookshop.
Here's two classic examples.
This book is a minimum (inc postage) of £4.24 and the next cheapest copy is a pound more. However, if you look inside it (which you can't do on Amazon), you discover that it has no pictures and looks totally boring. You won't be able to get more than £1.50 for it in a bookshop.
However, good quality children's pop up books will sell in the shop for more than the second-hand Amazon price. In the shop, we can display pop-up books to full effect - on Amazon, you only see the cover.
There's also a lot to learn about older books - the ones that are too old to have any chance of Amazon showing the contents.
Amazon prices are almost entirely driven by algorithms (and ABE is starting to go that way, though prices there generally reflect the experience of actual human booksellers). Thus, an Amazon price is generally inaccurate (and usually far too high) if there are less than 30 copies for sale. This means that you have to get really familiar with what your customers are buying and what they are willing to pay for it and use that knowledge as your guide, in addition to seeing what online prices are.
