Ingramspark's deal? A good thing or not?

The Second Moon

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Read this

So, Ingramspark is offering to allow authors to upload their books for free if you type in a promo code. You get the deal and then you can upload up to ten books. Normally it costs 50 USD to upload a book (if you want a print book) but they give you a free ISBN.

I thought this sounded like a good deal until I realized that ISBNs cost a lot of money. Over 100 USD. I would rather pay 50$ to upload my book then have to buy a ISBN.

But what do you think. Should I do the promocode or not?

(I might have read the info wrong on their website but that's what I'm getting from it)
 

Woollybear

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This sounds like an algebra problem.

ISBN costs are very high when you only buy a few. But they drop (per number) when you buy a 10 pack, 100 pack, 500 pack.

I bought a ten pack, not realizing I would need an ISBN for each version of a single novel--so I've already used three of the ten, on the novel in my sig.

For you, it depends how many books you (and maybe your sister if you want to save money on them by combining forces) are planning to put out there into the world. If you are planning to write and publish one or two books and then do something else with your life, it might not make sense to buy a ton of ISBNs. But if you're planning to write, say, fifteen or so books, or if you plan to keep writing whether you get another job down the road or not, and if self publishing looks like a good route to you, then you might as well get a bulk purchase of ISBNs. In that case, the Ingram Spark offer is a good one.

FWIW they do run promotions fairly regularly. I put Aerovoyant on IS with a promo like the one you linked. In other words, if you miss this promotion, another one will probably be along before too long.
 

The Second Moon

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@ Woollybear - Thanks. I do plan to self-publish a lot of books so maybe I should buy ISBN in bulk and do the promocode? Grr. This is a difficult decision.
 

sandree

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I would say go for it. You will have to buy the ISBNs anyway. Ingram Spark is on my to do list. Maybe today is the day to get it done!
 

Woollybear

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I started an account with them and then got sidetracked before I uploaded the title ... and about a week later they sent me a promo through email. they really wanted the book in their catalog I guess. Makes sense--it is their business to sell books. I've only sold about three copies through them--most sales are still through Amazon but a few people don't want to buy through Amazon.
 

sandree

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I started an account but I’m stuck trying to figure out if I have to have my cover adjusted or if I can just use the one I have. And I think I need to use a separate ISBN number. Is that right? Woolybear, did you do paperback only? Did you keep it the same size as on Amazon?
 

Woollybear

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Yes, I only did paperback (so that I could run the free promos on the e-copy, on Amazon).

So, for Ingram Spark (for the paperback), I used a new ISBN. Yes, the cover was a slightly different size, mostly because their paper is a different weight so the spine changes, but there were other specifications too. The cover artist I used took care of all this. It was probably part of the reason why I didn't get my Ingram Spark account set up in one sitting, but that ended up being a good thing since they sent me the free promo code after a week ... and they begged me to log back on and please try again. :) Which I did, so the upload was free in the end, paperback only, and three copies sold is three copies sold after all.
 
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ChaseJxyz

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@Woolly: A really common marketing tactic is "retargeting," to get the user to convert to a [whatever]. It's why you get those "Hey! You have this thing in your cart, you should buy it!" emails, or a product you looked at on [site] is now in an ad on your Facebook. They usually have some sort of coupon/discount, because it's possible you saw the price and then ran away, so maybe this slightly lower price might change your mind? So it's entirely possible that they really did want you to convert and were willing to eat the cost of that discount (plus whatever cost/commission the software that facilitates the retargeting is)
 

sandree

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Thanks, Wooly. That is the same process I’m in as well. It’s a little more involved than I expected it to be.