I have a minor dilemma. I think I have it figured out, but wanted to pass it by my readers to get some other opinions before taking the plunge.
I am going to publish my Greenville book through Cafe Press. In the book publishing business, the majority of books are assigned an ISBN – International Standard Book Number. This number, which is unique to each book, helps the publishing industry in distributing and tracking books. It’s critical for bookstores and online book retailers for ordering and inventory purposes. Each edition (hard cover, soft cover, later editions) of a book gets its own number, so book people can tell the editions apart.
The ISBN also serves to identify the publisher of each book. Book publishers buy blocks of ISBNs to assign to the books they publish. A publisher can purchase as few as ten ISBNs or up to 1,000. (Oops, just checked the website and it appears that a publisher can now buy one ISBN at a time. Online publishing must have driven that change.) There is only one company in the United States that sells ISBNs – R. R. Bowker. To get ISBNs in other countries, over 160 other businesses have been given exclusive rights to sell ISBNs in their geographic locations.
The cost of 10 ISBNs is $275. One hundred ISBNs go for $995 and 1,000 ISBNs cost $1,750. As you can see, it behooves a publisher to purchase more ISBNs at a time because of the great cost savings, however, R. R. Bowker recommends only purchasing the amount of ISBNs a publisher plans to use within the next 5 years. Obviously, I’m not going to be publishing 1,000 books within the next 5 years, nor can I spit out 100 books in that amount of time, so my option is to buy a block of 10. (Forget one at a time. It costs $125, which is not cost-effective no matter how you slice it. Well, okay, I guess it’s cost effective if you only plan to write one tome in your lifetime, but still.)
In addition to buying ISBNs, a publisher must also purchase bar codes to have printed on the backs of books so the purchase price can be scanned by booksellers. Bowker sells each bar code for $25. By the time one starts adding up the costs associated with assigning an ISBN to a book, the whole thing looks pretty daunting for a self-publisher. As an unknown author without the distribution power of a major publisher, I’m realistic about my chances for success in this venture. Lots of really fine books languish in obscurity through lack of distribution. Because I’m publishing Greenville as a print-on-demand book through Cafe Press, how likely is it that other retailers will pick it up? I read an article about Amazon not wanting to handle print-on-demand books from other suppliers because it wants writers to use its print-on-demand services, so that avenue looks to be out.
So, then, if I’ve chosen a limited venue for selling my books, is it worth the expense to purchase ISBNs, along with the requisite bar codes?
6 comments
Comments feed for this article
June 23, 2008 at 3:56 pm
Joy
Gosh Mary, I have no idea what to tell you. It sounds like an awful lot of money to me. I just wanted you to know I was behind ya.
June 23, 2008 at 5:05 pm
Andy Weissberg
Hi Mary,
I just read your blog posting and want to respond on behalf of the US ISBN Agency and RR Bowker.
The ISBN has a longstanding established legacy within the traditional publishing supply chain as an ISO-standardized identifier that all stakeholders have utilized in order to effectively discover and trade books. In 2005, the ISBN was ratified as an appropriate identifier for digital content, and most recently, the Book Industry Study Group(www.bisg.org) in collaboration with Nielsen and Bowker authored and issued a white paper which may help provide you with a strong perspective on the ISBN and other identifiers that are appropriate for digital content, such as e-books, chapters and fragments.
Like within the currently published standard, the ISBN continues to serve as an appropriate supply chain identifier for the efficient discovery and trade of books and their various manifestations. The US ISBN Agency is also launching a host of value-added discoverability solutions, including search engine optimization tools and bibliographic management solutions that are free in conjunction with an ISBN purchase. These tools will be available in the very near future and will further extend the value of the ISBN as an ISO-standarized supply chain identifier.
Many retail channels, including Amazon.com, require an ISBN for the purposes of cataloguing books and making them discoverable for trade. Most libraries leverage bibliographic databases like Books In Print which key on ISBNs as a cornerstone biblographic data set. If you intend to sell your books on retailer sites, bookstores and make them available in the library market, you need an ISBN for each product.
Search engines like Google for example, leverage ISBN numbers within their cataloguing and URL structures, which is another important point. For example, do a search on “Blue Ocean Strategy” and you’ll see how the ISBN is part of the URL string and search result.
My advice is to rationalize the cost of the ISBN as a marketing and discoverability mechanism which are critical in your quest to promote and sell your products.
As for bar codes, aside from Bowker, there are plenty of options for purchasing and customizing bar codes. Our $25.00 price point is consistent with others in the market, but I would encourage you to seek out other options that are more cost effective. Bar code purchases, even within retail POD environments, are required, whereas with e-books, they are not required.
I hope my perspectives lend credibility towards your making a decision to use the ISBN to your advantage. We will be making a formal announcement about our MYIdentifiers.com portal soon and you will find our new tools to deliver lots of value in conjunction with your ISBN purchase.
I would be happy to speak with you directly as well and can be reached at 908.219.0206.
Andy Weissberg
GM Identifier Services
RR Bowker & The US ISBN Agency
June 23, 2008 at 5:40 pm
woowooteacup
Holy smoly, Andy! I’m not sure I would have gotten such a complete reply had I emailed Bowker directly. No offense, but I have tried to email Bowker in the past through work and gotten no response. Yours makes up for it.
I was already leaning toward purchasing ISBNs, but your explanation, especially concerning the expansion of services along digital lines, solidifies my decision. It makes sense to enlist an existing standardized numbering system, like the ISBN, for tracking books online, particularly the ones that fall within the Long Tail of purchases. I was glad to see that Bowker created an option to purchase a single ISBN – costly though it may be – for those who have only one book’s worth of writing energy in them.
Thanks so much for your information. I’m going to guess that the blogosphere is not running rampant with people discussing ISBNs, but even so, your taking the time to respond is much appreciated. I’ll hang on to your number in case I have further questions.
June 23, 2008 at 6:59 pm
erin g
I would, Mary. Based on what Andy said, and also – you never know when a book will take off, so I say have it ISBNd and ready to sell!
June 23, 2008 at 7:07 pm
Andy Weissberg
My pleasure Mary – i’m glad it was helpful!
And the blogosphere is indeed buzzing on ISBNs! There are lots of questions in the market among large publishers and small publishers when it comes to value propositions for the ISBN in the digital world. I, myself, monitor these types of communications pretty closely and every inch of advocacy goes a long way. Its an unselfish task and I’m doing all I can to protect the interests of the supply chain as a whole. For small publishers, I realize its a rather daunting and in some cases costly experience to self-publish a book, let alone find success in selling. The ISBN is perhaps the best investment you can make along your journey, and the best thing you can do to maximize your discoverability is utilize our resources like Bowkerlink.com and MyIdentifiers.com to pair your ISBN and title information with critical meta data about your book, so that the world is fully aware of what you have to offer. They are free, so take advantage of them!
I welcome your call and am happy to share my voice always!
June 24, 2008 at 10:06 pm
woowooteacup
R. R. Bowker is lucky to have you, Andy. Interesting that a subject like ISBNs could light up the blogosphere, but it definitely makes sense in terms of the publishing world.
I’m going to take you up on that whole sharing thing, so expect a call from me soon.