# Forbes article on what triggers Amazon sales/Dumb advice for indie authors (MERGED)



## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

I just saw this interesting article posted on Passive Voice: http://www.forbes.com/sites/suwcharmananderson/2013/02/20/half-of-amazon-book-sales-are-planned-purchases/

Here are the central data:

"McCabe's statistics show that only a piddling 10 percent of Amazon book choices are made because of its 'bought this/also bought' recommendation engine. Bestseller and top 100 lists influence 17 percent of book choices, with 12 percent down to promotions, deals, or low prices. Only 3 percent came through browsing categories. Planned search by author or topic, however, makes up a whopping 48 percent of all book choices."

As the article points out, these data make building off-Amazon awareness of our books sound particularly important. Thoughts?


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## MH Sargent (Apr 8, 2010)

Becca, thanks for posting this. Here is a key statement, I think:

Rather than hoping to gain traction within that 10 percent of people who pay attention to Amazon's recommendations, or trying to crowbar your title into bestseller or top 100 lists, you should be focusing on building an independent fan base. No one can search for your books if they don't know you exist.


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## jackz4000 (May 15, 2011)

I assume WOM goes with the 48%?


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

jackz4000 said:


> I assume WOM goes with the 48%?


Sorry, having a slow-brain day. What's WOM?


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## hydrapublications (Jul 24, 2011)

Bingo! That statement is the key for sure

*Rather than hoping to gain traction within that 10 percent of people who pay attention to Amazon's recommendations, or trying to crowbar your title into bestseller or top 100 lists, you should be focusing on building an independent fan base. No one can search for your books if they don't know you exist.*


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## 41413 (Apr 4, 2011)

Does it say how this data was gathered? Did he get these numbers from Amazon, or was it self-reported by the users, or...? I don't see it (but I'm also really bad at finding things).


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## Guest (Feb 21, 2013)

I feel...vindicated.  

I've been saying this sort of thing forever. Your Amazon product page is not where the decision to buy is made. It is where people go after they have already made the decision.


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## vrabinec (May 19, 2011)

Yeah, I'm sure word of mouth is the biggest driver, because that's what causes the landslide sales like Wool and 50 Shades, but that only comes AFTER there's an initial group of readers who read the thing and give it their blessing. So, it would be interesting to see those percentages within the first year of the books life, because after that year, it's most likely gonna be WOM.


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## Quiss (Aug 21, 2012)

Only 3 percent from browsing categories? Weird.

I suppose I'm one of the 3 percent. I tend to think "Hmmm, I need something new to read. Let's see what I can find in _____ category."  Once there I look through the top 100 or so. 

Only 3 percent? Seems really low.


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## vrabinec (May 19, 2011)

I agree, Chris, I browse, BUT, I usually start with the top 100, and I almost always find something there that interests me. So, I'd say I fall into one of those top 100 guys. And now to go back to scheming as to how to get people who usually just browse the top 100 to notice MINE.


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## Victoria Champion (Jun 6, 2012)

Becca Mills said:


> Sorry, having a slow-brain day. What's WOM?


word-of-mouth


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## Victoria Champion (Jun 6, 2012)

Maybe I'm not a statistically average user, but Amazon's recommendation engine is how I find 99% of the books I buy and read.


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## Kay Bratt (Dec 28, 2011)

I have _always_ bought my books from browsing the alsobots of books I've read and loved. But I don't mind being in the minority.

But as an author, that's great insight into the habits of the majority of book buyers.


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## Jnassise (Mar 22, 2010)

I read 4-6 books per week and I almost NEVER browse for anything.  I go to Amazon with a particular title or author in mind, buy what I came for, and then leave.  This make perfect sense to me.

(I say almost never because I will look at the books in the bestseller list near mine to see who is kicking my butt that particular week.   )


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## Guest (Feb 21, 2013)

Quiss said:


> Only 3 percent? Seems really low.


It seems low to you because we always assume that we are the norm. (OK, I never assume I am the norm. I admit to being abnormal). So when confronted with statistics that tell us we aren't part of the norm, the tendency is to assume there is something wrong with the statistic, instead of celebrating our originality.


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## Fantasma (Aug 25, 2012)

How many customers does Amazon have? *LOTS*. And 10% of them prefer to shop in a way they can find us? This is fabulous news.


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## vrabinec (May 19, 2011)

Victoria Champion said:


> Maybe I'm not a statistically average user, but Amazon's recommendation engine is how I find 99% of the books I buy and read.


How about before you were an author? Has your process changed?


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## jimkukral (Oct 31, 2011)

Becca Mills said:


> I just saw this interesting article posted on Passive Voice: http://www.forbes.com/sites/suwcharmananderson/2013/02/20/half-of-amazon-book-sales-are-planned-purchases/
> 
> Here are the central data:
> 
> "McCabe's statistics show that only a piddling 10 percent of Amazon book choices are made because of its 'bought this/also bought' recommendation engine. Bestseller and top 100 lists influence 17 percent of book choices, with 12 percent down to promotions, deals, or low prices. Only 3 percent came through browsing categories. Planned search by author or topic, however, makes up a whopping 48 percent of all book choices."


"Planned search" to me means someone came looking for a book on poker, typed in poker, and found books. That's browsing/searching.


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## 41413 (Apr 4, 2011)

Fantasma said:


> How many customers does Amazon have? *LOTS*. And 10% of them prefer to shop in a way they can find us? This is fabulous news.


I like the cut of your jib.


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

Fantasma said:


> How many customers does Amazon have? *LOTS*. And 10% of them prefer to shop in a way they can find us? This is fabulous news.


Which technically then drives them to become part of the half that seek us oiut if what they found appealed to them in the first place.


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## Adam Pepper (May 28, 2011)

When you are trying to build and grow your own audience, those 48% who are already going to buy someone else's book aren't much use to you.  The 10% who are open to something new are.


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## AJCooper (Sep 9, 2012)

I agree with this. When I see it, sometimes I get disappointed because I think this means that only my friends & family are buying the book (because they're the only people who would search my name). Then I remember my UK, Canada, and Estonian sales, and realize I don't know anyone in those countries... ergo, it's not my mom buying it over and over again. Ah well. Too busy to obsess about it anyway.


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## 41413 (Apr 4, 2011)

AJCooper said:


> I agree with this. When I see it, sometimes I get disappointed because I think this means that only my friends & family are buying the book (because they're the only people who would search my name). Then I remember my UK, Canada, and Estonian sales, and realize I don't know anyone in those countries... ergo, it's not my mom buying it over and over again. Ah well. Too busy to obsess about it anyway.


I am charmed by the thought of your mother traveling all over the world to open new bank accounts and buy your book again. Now that's love.


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## vrabinec (May 19, 2011)

Bards and Sages (Julie) said:


> It seems low to you because we always assume that we are the norm. (OK, I never assume I am the norm. I admit to being abnormal). So when confronted with statistics that tell us we aren't part of the norm, the tendency is to assume there is something wrong with the statistic, instead of celebrating our originality.


Yeah, I found this out back in the days of brick and mortar, when there weren't any e-books. I'd go to the book store and browse the shelves. I got into a conversation one time at my frat house and almost every brother there said he never went to the book store except to go buy a specific book someone like me or one of the other few guys at the frat who browsed had recommended. It was weird.


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## gljones (Nov 6, 2012)

I can't back it up but the Forbes article "Feels" right to me.
Before I became a KDP author, it never even occurred to me to go browse amazon looking for books.


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## AJCooper (Sep 9, 2012)

smreine said:


> I am charmed by the thought of your mother traveling all over the world to open new bank accounts and buy your book again. Now that's love.


LOL. Until I find out. Then it's abuse.


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## Pnjw (Apr 24, 2011)

MH Sargent said:


> Becca, thanks for posting this. Here is a key statement, I think:
> 
> Rather than hoping to gain traction within that 10 percent of people who pay attention to Amazon's recommendations, or trying to crowbar your title into bestseller or top 100 lists, you should be focusing on building an independent fan base. No one can search for your books if they don't know you exist.


While I definitely agree we should be building a direct fan base, my experience is that it has been much easier to build that fan base by cultivating people already on Amazon and B&N who are ready to buy as opposed to clawing readers from blogs, Twitter, or Facebook. Or even Goodreads, Safari, and LibraryThing. The trick is to find a way to keep them once you get their attention. Then word of mouth starts to happen. Just my opinion.

I buy books a variety of ways. From direct links on Facebook to browsing categories, lists, and also boughts. I think I buy more off of also boughts than anything else. And like Smreine, I'm wondering where the statistics came from.


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## MJWare (Jun 25, 2010)

Becca Mills said:


> "...with 12 percent down to promotions, deals, or low prices."


That number seems low to me. I've known several authors who have had promotional pushes, all of them saw a BIG sales increase. If course, I'm sure those promotions also helped their also-boughts and placement on the Bestseller list, etc. So it could be.



vrabinec said:


> Yeah, I found this out back in the days of brick and mortar, when there weren't any e-books. I'd go to the book store and browse the shelves. I got into a conversation one time at my frat house and almost every brother there said he never went to the book store except to go buy a specific book someone like me or one of the other few guys at the frat who browsed had recommended. It was weird.


That makes you the type of customer it's key for authors to reach. I also think a lot of these "avid readers" have turned to blogging.


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## scottmarlowe (Apr 22, 2010)

I've tried finding my book by general browsing, filter down by category, rating, price, etc... I've never found it.

Unless someone is searching for a specific author or clicking through on the "also bought's", it's just dumb luck that they find a specific book.


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## Quiss (Aug 21, 2012)

AJCooper said:


> UK, Canada, and Estonian sales,


ES = Spain (Espania)


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## Terrence OBrien (Oct 21, 2010)

1. Study methodology. Where do the stats come from? Sampling method? Sample size? Margin of error?

2. Planned search is fine. But I suspect tha Amazon algorithms determine the order of the solution set presentation.


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## AJCooper (Sep 9, 2012)

Quiss said:


> ES = Spain (Espania)


Oh, I know. It was a 35% sale. I looked it up on Shelfari and the reader was from Estonia. I know, I'm a StalkerAuthor.

No sales in Hispania, unfortunately.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

I've been poking around, trying to answer the question of where these data come from. McCabe (the presenter of the data) is a high-up in Enders Analysis. Here's that company's self-description:



> Claire Enders founded Enders Analysis in 1997 to provide senior corporate managers with an alternative perspective on 3G and the internet from the uniformly optimistic industry and City research before the bubble burst.
> 
> Today, Enders Analysis offers its subscribers research generated by a programme covering the major commercial, regulatory and strategic issues in mobile and fixed line telecoms, TV and the Internet, as well as the major content businesses such as music, publishing and advertising. Our focus is on the European markets but we assess all key trends and regulatory issues in our sectors in major markets such as the US or Japan.
> 
> ...


That said, the data McCabe was presenting doesn't seem to be available as a research report on the Enders website, unless the report doesn't have "Amazon" in the title. I'll search a bit more and see if I find something.


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## vrabinec (May 19, 2011)

Quiss said:


> ES = Spain (Espania)


I had no clue. Didn't feel like looking it up, so whenever I saw es, my mind always just filled in "extrasensory".


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## Speaker-To-Animals (Feb 21, 2012)

Let's rephrase the article.



> Research shows that 6.1 billion dollars of merchandise is sold by Amazon each year based only on bought and also bought recommendations. If you include their top 100 and Amazon bestseller list, 16.5 billion dollars is sold on Amazon each year based entirely on choices based on their storefront's ability to connect customers with merchandise they might be interested in, but didn't come to the site intending to buy.


Amazon sells 61 billion dollars worth of goods a year. Obviously a lot of that is intentional. I buy a book because I see it on sale and remember that guy's on KB. That's a random purchase driven by their storefront. I then buy everything else he's written because it's so good (enjoy the money Hugh) and those are planned purchases from a single author.


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## Victoria Champion (Jun 6, 2012)

vrabinec said:


> How about before you were an author? Has your process changed?


Being an author hasn't changed my book discovery method.

I've only been a self-published author for less than a year, and a reader since age two.

As a toddler and small child, I used to read cereal boxes, the newspaper, and books in my parents' library (mostly Reader's Digest) and science books.

As a child I belonged to the Science Fiction Bookclub mail order service and I also went to libraries regularly (both public and school).

As an adult, prior to Amazon, I browsed bookstores and bought books based on cover art and blurb and also acquired books from recommendations by friends.

After discovering Amazon, I never go into brick and mortar bookstores to buy books. It's a shame, and I miss the experience. However, they simply don't have all the information I now require to make my decision about purchasing a book. I browse books on Amazon based on interest (I'll do a search for zombies or epistemology, for instance), click on a book, then follow the rabbit hole Amazon provides with the widgets on the product pages, opening book product pages in a new tab by clicking on books with interesting covers or titles, and ultimately adding books to my Wishlist after reading blurb, sample, and reviews. Then I make all my purchases from the Wishlist.

Occasionally, about 1% of the time, I will buy a book from a KB author or another book I saw advertised in social media.

Throughout all this variance, the number one thread is once I find an author I love, I will buy just about their entire catalogue.


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## Ben Mathew (Jan 27, 2013)

Goes against my personal experience too. I'm probably outside the norm, but I've discovered the majority of the books I've bought through Amazon topic searches and also-boughts.

I'm guessing heavy users/narrow niches rely more searches. For example, I've bought a bunch of ebooks on self-publishing. There's no way I'll ever hear of one of those books from my circle, because no one I personally know is self-publishing.

Other sources through which I hear about books: 

1. Online mentions in blogs, comments, forums, etc. (maybe one every couple of weeks, I'll hear about a book this way)
2. Book review on New York Times that shows up on its homepage. (maybe once every few weeks)
3. Recommendation from friends/family (maybe once every few months).


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

I couldn't find any more info on the Enders website, so I dropped them an email asking about the source of the data. I also asked if they're continuing to track these "book-choosing methods" (the data appear to be from May 2012). I'll update the thread if they respond substantively.


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## Victoria Champion (Jun 6, 2012)

jimkukral said:


> "Planned search" to me means someone came looking for a book on poker, typed in poker, and found books. That's browsing/searching.


Okay then I do fit into the statistic. That's exactly how I shop on Amazon.


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

Katie Elle said:


> I then buy everything else he's written because it's so good (enjoy the money Hugh) and those are planned purchases from a single author.


LOL

Right, the other percentages drive the half that are planned.

You essentially have two modes: "I'm looking" and "I know what I want" . . . and they are roughly half and half. Seems reasonable to me. I have authors I buy (I'm reading book 3033948932759 of David Weber's Honor Harrington right now) and I have times when I am looking for new (and at present that mostly means KB authors.)


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## Atunah (Nov 20, 2008)

I never look at the also-boughts. Why? They don't do anything in helping me find books. Why do I care what else others bought, I want to know what else they "liked". 

When I compare books with another reader on goodreads it compares our star ratings and gives me a percentage of matches. So if I find a person that gives me over 80% same likes, I follow them and then when they read and like something, there is a higher chance I might like it too. 

So also boughts do nothing. There is many reasons people buy books. But if it was also likes? That is different. 

Now I also browse by my favorite genre. I used to love to go to the genre of my choice, sort by publication and go with 30 days. So I could see what came out in the last few days or so. Unfortunately, I can't do that anymore because in the last 6-10 months or so my favorite genre has been flooded with carp that does not belong in the genre. It took the fun out for me to find something just based on it looking interesting. Even the top 100 has been invaded by stuff that barely resembles the genre I am looking at, so even that I do less now. 

So I mostly find out about books elsewhere and then go directly to amazon and type in the title. 

I kind of miss the first 2-3 years with my Kindle where I actually could find new authors and new books all on my own on Amazon. Those days are over for me.


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## JRTomlin (Jan 18, 2011)

He says half of Amazon's book sales are planned. That doesn't account for the other half.

Half of Amazon's books sales is one heck of a lot of sales and I would say that they are indeed pushed in large part by the algorithms.


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## JRTomlin (Jan 18, 2011)

Deanna Chase said:


> While I definitely agree we should be building a direct fan base, my experience is that it has been much easier to build that fan base by cultivating people already on Amazon and B&N who are ready to buy as opposed to clawing readers from blogs, Twitter, or Facebook. Or even Goodreads, Safari, and LibraryThing. The trick is to find a way to keep them once you get their attention. Then word of mouth starts to happen. Just my opinion.
> 
> I buy books a variety of ways. From direct links on Facebook to browsing categories, lists, and also boughts. I think I buy more off of also boughts than anything else. And like Smreine, I'm wondering where the statistics came from.


This.


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## Ben Mathew (Jan 27, 2013)

Victoria Champion said:


> After discovering Amazon, I never go into brick and mortar bookstores to buy books. It's a shame, and I miss the experience. *However, they simply don't have all the information I now require to make my decision about purchasing a book*. I browse books on Amazon based on interest (I'll do a search for zombies or epistemology, for instance), click on a book, then follow the rabbit hole Amazon provides with the widgets on the product pages, opening book product pages in a new tab by clicking on books with interesting covers or titles, and ultimately adding books to my Wishlist after reading blurb, sample, and reviews. Then I make all my purchases from the Wishlist.


I agree. Online is not just a way to avoid a drive to the bookstore. It offers a better experience in many ways: has what you need, easier to search, provides recommendations, shows reviews etc.


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## JumpingShip (Jun 3, 2010)

I have to say that before I had books on Amazon, but I was a reader only, I shopped by subject/genre ie, time travel or alternate history. That accounted for at least half of my purchases--I did the same thing at bookstores and libraries by checking out the genre sections. If I had read an author's first book or one by an author I liked and I didn't know if they had another, I would search for them (ie, Taylor Anderson and Noah Gordon).

I would say that WoM only accounted for maybe 10% of my searches because I got burned too many times by people telling how great a book was, only for me to hate it. (The Time Traveler's Wife). It has to have a premise or something that would attract me if I saw it on the shelf.


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## JRTomlin (Jan 18, 2011)

I wonder if I am really that unusual a reader, because most of the time when I go to Amazon to buy a book, I don't know what I am going to buy. I may check if an author I like has anything new out and then I check what is new in my favorite genres. 

I am not at all sure that I believe what they're saying. But then Amazon has a HUGE client base so that 50% might be the many readers who buy 2 or 3 books a year and probably do know that they want the newest Patterson novel or whatever. They aren't the readers who I am likely to sell to.

Part of this is knowing who your likely purchaser is.


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## Kailei Wiseman (Feb 16, 2013)

I'm new to this community but I already love it. I just wanted to say thank you to everyone here. It's great to know there are like-minded people out there. 

Anyway, as for how I read books, I'm traditional. I love the physical copies of books. Which is funny considering my intention to e-publish. I've read one book on Kindle (The Perks of Being a Wallflower, one of my absolute favorites). I think it's because I naturally move slowly with social changes. I didn't have a Facebook until 3 years after "everyone" had one. This might only be specific to technological social changes but I feel I would have to do some reflection on that to come up with a definitive answer.

It's something about seeing the physical form in front of me. When I edit, for example, I print out the pages. Am I alone in that?

Basically this post has nothing to do with the OP but I think I'll reply anyway. Truly, my intention was just to say hi to everyone. So... hi.


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## Victoria Champion (Jun 6, 2012)

MaryMcDonald said:


> I would say that WoM only accounted for maybe 10% of my searches because I got burned too many times by people telling how great a book was, only for me to hate it. (The Time Traveler's Wife). It has to have a premise or something that would attract me if I saw it on the shelf.


This is interesting. Simply because a story has a specific element in it, that does not mean it fits our needs as a fan of a specific ambiance or setting. For instance (using films as an example) -- most people still don't realize that Twilight is in the _romance_ category at Netflix. It is not a horror story about vampires. That's why so many vampire fans are so anti-Twilight. I would recommend Dr. Who to a time travel fan before I recommended the Time Traveler's Wife.


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

Victoria Champion said:


> ...Twilight is in the _romance_ category at Netflix. It is not a horror story about vampires.


It's a horror story about what happens when someone writes about vampires who shouldn't.


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## Victoria Champion (Jun 6, 2012)

Kailei Hutzenbuhler said:


> I'm new to this community but I already love it. I just wanted to say thank you to everyone here. It's great to know there are like-minded people out there.
> 
> Anyway, as for how I read books, I'm traditional. I love the physical copies of books. Which is funny considering my intention to e-publish. I've read one book on Kindle (The Perks of Being a Wallflower, one of my absolute favorites). I think it's because I naturally move slowly with social changes. I didn't have a Facebook until 3 years after "everyone" had one. This might only be specific to technological social changes but I feel I would have to do some reflection on that to come up with a definitive answer.
> 
> ...


 Hi.  I know one editor, Rebecca Blain, prints out the manuscript. Not sure if it's still a common practice. I don't do it.


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

Victoria Champion said:


> Hi.  I know one editor, Rebecca Blain, prints out the manuscript. Not sure if it's still a common practice. I don't do it.


Holly Lisle revises like this. I don't know for sure that she still does today, but as of the last time I checked (a few years back) she still did.


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## A.A (Mar 30, 2012)

That's amazing data if accurate.

If only 3% buy through browsing through categories - oh my! I've _briefly_ been at the top of my categories (and those categories are not wildly popular ones) and the sales at that level I could very comfortably live on.
If the other 97% are buying through other ways... what?? Are the numbers skewed because of the breakout books (such as Hunger Games, 50 Shades etc) being the big word-of-mouth books?


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## Soothesayer (Oct 19, 2012)

So in other words, they're saying "write more books" to gain more sales? Promoting is a waste of time for long-term writers?

Boy what a revelation that is (heh).


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

Kailei Hutzenbuhler said:


> I'm new to this community but I already love it. I just wanted to say thank you to everyone here. It's great to know there are like-minded people out there.
> 
> Anyway, as for how I read books, I'm traditional. I love the physical copies of books. Which is funny considering my intention to e-publish. I've read one book on Kindle (The Perks of Being a Wallflower, one of my absolute favorites). I think it's because I naturally move slowly with social changes. I didn't have a Facebook until 3 years after "everyone" had one. This might only be specific to technological social changes but I feel I would have to do some reflection on that to come up with a definitive answer.
> 
> ...


Welcome, Kailei! 

I find hard copy more effective for proofreading, but I've found that proofing on a Kindle is also surprisingly effective, maybe because the lines are so short (?).


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## nico (Jan 17, 2013)

Anya said:


> If only 3% buy through browsing through categories - oh my! I've _briefly_ been at the top of my categories (and those categories are not wildly popular ones) and the sales at that level I could very comfortably live on.
> If the other 97% are buying through other ways... what?? Are the numbers skewed because of the breakout books (such as Hunger Games, 50 Shades etc) being the big word-of-mouth books?


Depends what your categories are. The breakout books sell massive numbers, so if say 90% of those sales are direct customers, then that can skew the data big time. Maybe this explains the 48%...they're mostly the big names and the smaller authors all fight over the other half of the pie.


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## BenEBrewer (Nov 5, 2012)

Why is everyone so unwilling to believe a report that is based on statistical fact?  

There are even people here on this thread researching to find out if the facts are correct!?!?!?! 

Claire Enders, who owns the digital analyst company 'Ender Analysis' is simply the one of, if not the finest media analyst in the world.

Enders Analysis played a key role in the Leveson Enquiry into Media practices in the UK, through their research and ability to automate research audits into major media players all over the world.

When Claire Enders and her CEO's talk about statistics and numbers, I stand up and listen, as do many others.


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

BenEBrewer said:


> Why is everyone so unwilling to believe a report that is based on statistical fact?


Because there are three kinds of lies.


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## MT Berlyn (Mar 27, 2012)

Kailei Hutzenbuhler said:


> It's something about seeing the physical form in front of me. When I edit, for example, I print out the pages. Am I alone in that?
> 
> Basically this post has nothing to do with the OP but I think I'll reply anyway. Truly, my intention was just to say hi to everyone. So... hi.


Welcome 

I print out a manuscript copy for editing purposes as well. I can move around with it, take notes on the margins, etc. I find I absorb the material better when it is tangible paper in front of me. In fact, I'm going to print a copy of the Forbes article right now.


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## 41413 (Apr 4, 2011)

BenEBrewer said:


> Why is everyone so unwilling to believe a report that is based on statistical fact?
> 
> There are even people here on this thread researching to find out if the facts are correct!?!?!?!
> 
> ...


Oh my goodness, I didn't realize this survey was put out CLAIRE ENDERS! Cl[sup]air[sub]e[/sub][/sup] En[sup]der[sub]s[/sub][/sup]?! _Ohmygosh_. I can't believe anyone DREAMED of questioning the methods used to collect the data, or the way the data has been interpreted, like they were trying to THINK for themselves when we could just let *~CLAIRE ENDERS~* do it for us!



Kailei Hutzenbuhler said:


> I'm new to this community but I already love it. I just wanted to say thank you to everyone here. It's great to know there are like-minded people out there.
> 
> Anyway, as for how I read books, I'm traditional. I love the physical copies of books. Which is funny considering my intention to e-publish. I've read one book on Kindle (The Perks of Being a Wallflower, one of my absolute favorites). I think it's because I naturally move slowly with social changes. I didn't have a Facebook until 3 years after "everyone" had one. This might only be specific to technological social changes but I feel I would have to do some reflection on that to come up with a definitive answer.
> 
> ...


Welcome to the board! I used to print out my manuscripts, too, but I decided to take mercy on the poor forests and do the last check on my Kindle instead.  Nice to have you with us!


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## BenEBrewer (Nov 5, 2012)

> Oh my goodness, I didn't realize this survey was put out CLAIRE ENDERS! Claire Enders?! Ohmygosh. I can't believe anyone DREAMED of questioning the methods used to collect the data, or the way the data has been interpreted, like they were trying to THINK for themselves when we could just let ~CLAIRE ENDERS~ do it for us!


I was stating the fact that the facts presented were the result of one of the best analyst companies in the world


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## 41413 (Apr 4, 2011)

What in the world are you talking about? I'm a cuddly armadillo. The knife in my avatar is only deployed for dicing keto-friendly vegetables.

_Posted edited, but amusing part of post retained for posterity. --Betsy_


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## Ann in Arlington (Oct 27, 2008)

lots of people being inappropriate, from my very brief reading.  Admin team will review and re-open if warranted.


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## Robert Bidinotto (Mar 3, 2011)

In my never-ending effort to master rhetorical subtlety, I offer my latest blog:

http://www.bidinotto.com/2013/02/dumb-advice-from-forbes-to-indie-authors/


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

I think you've got a good take on the article, Robert. Thanks for sharing.


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## JRTomlin (Jan 18, 2011)

Very good analysis.


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## B. Justin Shier (Apr 1, 2011)

"All those who drink of this remedy recover in a short time, except those whom it does not help, who die. Therefore, it is obvious that it fails only in incurable cases."

--Galen


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## Susan Kaye Quinn (Aug 8, 2011)

> As every bestselling Amazon author learns, a huge percentage of his or her sales come from Amazon's internal promotional methods. Usually, one's own external promotions merely kickstart the process of pushing the book under an Amazon spotlight. Once under that glaring spotlight, even an obscure author, with few prior sales and zero social media presence, can see his sales suddenly spike overnight, to the point where 99% of them are Amazon-generated. This sort of thing happens a lot.


Yes. Yes, it does.

Which just begs the question: why do people such as the Forbes author insist on a worldview that's so contrary to the facts?


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## jackz4000 (May 15, 2011)

Excellent analysis Robert.    I don't know where that article got it's data, but we all know it didn't come from Amazon and no one knows better what their placement does for sales. 

They decide whether a book is in a big lit-up display in front of the register or way in the back in the dark stockroom.


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## JRTomlin (Jan 18, 2011)

jackz4000 said:


> Excellent analysis Robert.  I don't know where that article got it's data, but we all know it didn't come from Amazon and no one knows better what their placement does for sales.
> 
> They decide whether a book is in a big lit-up display in front of the register or way in the back in the dark stockroom.


I think the data is pretty reasonable. It was the analysis that was totally wrong. She analyze it as though the 52% of Amazon buyers who DON'T preplan their purchases don't exist.

Basically, she was out to try to prove a pre-existing opinion: that life sucks if you're an indie and (hopefully in her opinion) no one will ever find or buy your book.


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## Joe_Nobody (Oct 23, 2012)

I don't care what the Forbes writer says...You can't beat The Mighty Zom for marketing.

What the survey doesn't take into consideration, for example, is emails. 

I just published a new book on Feb 10th. Amazon just sent out emails to previous readers announcing "The new book by Joe Nobody."

Without any other marketing, the sales have been strong.

I don't buy the article's analysis...I just don't buy it.

I spend money on outside marketing in order to kickstart the Amazon machine. Nothing I've found is better.


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## Robert Bidinotto (Mar 3, 2011)

I was unaware that there had been a previous post on this topic. I hope I've done nothing to violate any rule.


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## Betsy the Quilter (Oct 27, 2008)

Folks,


we're still discussing the other thread, which I expect to be reopened this evening (US Pacific Time).  At that time, I'll merge this thread with that one.  I've locked it because some of the points that made the prior thread go sideways are already appearing in this one.

Robert, don't worry, I know you weren't aware of the other thread.  If it hadn't blown up, we would have simply merged this one.  

Betsy


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## Betsy the Quilter (Oct 27, 2008)

OK, folks,

I've run the thread through our rudeness filters and borrowed smreine's knife to do some manual pruning of posts no longer appicable as they referred to matter no longer here.

A reminder that we expect civil discourse here.  Some mild sarcasm or snarkiness is acceptable.  Sarcasm is a time-honored conversational ploy. I use it regularly. 

Name calling (and calling someone rude is name calling) is not allowed here.  If you think someone is being rude, either ignore the rudeness (it IS possible) or report the post.  Address the points being made, please.  You can have strong feelings; you can question things.  Just do so civilly.  I'd like to keep this thread open.  I also want to go soak my sore ankle in the condo's hot tub...

Betsy
KB Moderator


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

Betsy the Quilter said:


> I'd like to keep this thread open. I also want to go soak my sore ankle in the condo's hot tub...


So demanding!


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## Patty Jansen (Apr 5, 2011)

Whatever, as long as you remember that the comfortable rug you're standing on is Amazon's and they *will* pull it out from under you without notice, no matter how effectionately you call them "zon". Even for that single reason, it pays to take control of your own readership.


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## Anne Frasier (Oct 22, 2009)

Fantasma said:


> How many customers does Amazon have? *LOTS*. And 10% of them prefer to shop in a way they can find us? This is fabulous news.


so agree.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

Rather weirdly, the _Forbes _post seems to be reacting to a single Powerpoint slide from McCabe's conference presentation. For all we know, McCabe's presentation, viewed in its entirety, went into the data-gathering and number-crunching behind the stats mentioned on that one slide. But if so, we don't have access to that info. Beats me why the _Forbes _writer didn't reach out to McCabe for more information and some comments.

As to the tiff up-thread: Wanting to know how data are gathered and how they've been analyzed is *never* unreasonable. In fact, it defines reason. No matter how reputable the researcher who did the work, it's never a good idea to accept polished data hook, line, and sinker without asking how the raw numbers were gathered and how they were analyzed and worked into the finished product. That's why every scholarly paper gets subjected to peer-review, no matter how reputable the authors. That's why statistical work is laid out like breadcrumbs for others to follow. Any researcher can have a blind-spot; every researcher can -- and has -- make mistakes. To suggest that a particular company is so famous, so highly thought of, that querying their data-gathering is not just unnecessary but is somehow wrong-headed or foolish? Nope, sorry. Not buying it.


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## WHDean (Nov 2, 2011)

Robert Bidinotto said:


> In my never-ending effort to master rhetorical subtlety, I offer my latest blog:
> 
> http://www.bidinotto.com/2013/02/dumb-advice-from-forbes-to-indie-authors/


Let me say first, Robert, that your frankness is a refreshing next to the usual snowflake cant that passes for argument in the indieverse.

Anyway, I think you're part right and part wrong. Your experience is one example, so it doesn't weigh much one way or the other. But you're right that there's a problem with the statistics.

The problem is that the power curve throws off the analysis of how people find books. Consider that the vast majority of the books sold are bestsellers. _Fifty Shades_, for example, was supposed to account for one in four books sold on Amazon for awhile. The people buying those books all went to Amazon to find James's books and buy them. They weren't _discovering _ James on Amazon. That means a sizable chuck (if not all) of that 48% is due to outliers like James whose buyers were going to Amazon to buy books they'd learned about elsewhere.

But once you remove these books from the analysis-which could be done by subtracting bestsellers from the data-an entirely different picture is likely to emerge. The channels represented by the other 52%-especially top 100 lists and Amazon promotions-are likely to represent 80%-90% of the books sold. In other words, most of the non-bestsellers are being discovered and sold through Amazon's internal activities. After all, where else do people learn about these books?

At any rate, I don't have the time to go much deeper into it, but the prima facie case is there for the real problem with the numbers.


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## Betsy the Quilter (Oct 27, 2008)

Mathew Reuther said:


> So demanding!


So far, I've achieved one of my evening's goals.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

WHDean said:


> The problem is that the power curve throws off the analysis of how people find books. Consider that the vast majority of the books sold are bestsellers. _Fifty Shades_, for example, was supposed to account for one in four books sold on Amazon for awhile. The people buying those books all went to Amazon to find James's books and buy them. They weren't _discovering _ James on Amazon. That means a sizable chuck (if not all) of that 48% is due to outliers like James whose buyers were going to Amazon to buy books they'd learned about elsewhere.
> 
> But once you remove these books from the analysis-which could be done by subtracting bestsellers from the data-an entirely different picture is likely to emerge. The channels represented by the other 52%-especially top 100 lists and Amazon promotions-are likely to represent 80%-90% of the books sold. In other words, most of the non-bestsellers are being discovered and sold through Amazon's internal activities. After all, where else do people learn about these books?


And Enders might've done with the data just what you're suggesting, WH. Fact is, we have no idea what they did or didn't do. If they write back to me and let me know how they arrived at these numbers, I'll certainly let everyone know.


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## JRTomlin (Jan 18, 2011)

Becca Mills said:


> Rather weirdly, the _Forbes _post seems to be reacting to a single Powerpoint slide from McCabe's conference presentation. For all we know, McCabe's presentation, viewed in its entirety, went into the data-gathering and number-crunching behind the stats mentioned on that one slide. But if so, we don't have access to that info. Beats me why the _Forbes _writer didn't reach out to McCabe for more information and some comments.
> 
> As to the tiff up-thread: Wanting to know how data are gathered and how they've been analyzed is *never* unreasonable. In fact, it defines reason. No matter how reputable the researcher who did the work, it's never a good idea to accept polished data hook, line, and sinker without asking how the raw numbers were gathered and how they were analyzed and worked into the finished product. That's why every scholarly paper gets subjected to peer-review, no matter how reputable the authors. That's why statistical work is laid out like breadcrumbs for others to follow. Any researcher can have a blind-spot; every researcher can -- and has -- make mistakes. To suggest that a particular company is so famous, so highly thought of, that querying their data-gathering is not just unnecessary but is somehow wrong-headed or foolish? Nope, sorry. Not buying it.


I don't think you can necessarily blame McCabe for the way that misinterprets the information.

I don't find the information difficult to believe (although I agree that there is NO company that is above being questioned including a number based in the UK) but the interpretation in this case really defies belief. In effect, dismissing 52% of the sampling is ridiculous. And you also have to take into consideration the size of the Amazon market. 10% it would make me a very rich lady.

As advice to authors, the article sucks.


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## Terrence OBrien (Oct 21, 2010)

In an economy like ours, everyone is standing on some rug. They can all be pulled. If we are on the rug, its because we stepped on to it. No big deal. Nobody owes us a rug.



> "Let me say first, Robert, that your frankness is a refreshing next to the usual snowflake cant that passes for argument in the indieverse."


Amazing how those snowflakes destroy the bogus arguments of the poseurs.


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## WHDean (Nov 2, 2011)

Becca Mills said:


> And Enders might've done with the data just what you're suggesting, WH. Fact is, we have no idea what they did or didn't do. If they write back to me and let me know how they arrived at these numbers, I'll certainly let everyone know.


I beg to differ. We know they relied on a survey of purchasers' self-reported buying habits, because the only other source for this data would be Amazon itself. In other words, they asked people how they bought books and they told them. That means the number represent total sales (assuming the sample was representative), so my conclusion holds.

Look, everyone knows that word of mouth sells books. Everyone knows that most books sold are bestsellers. Everyone also knows that bestsellers tend to be cultural phenomena. Thus, everyone knows that most people who buy books at Amazon went to get the specific book they'd heard about through word of mouth.

What _retailers _ care about is total sales and how they're made. This data is good for them, and it's representative of the real world. But what _indies _ sellers want and need is information about *discoverability*-i.e., how people found James in the first place. They already know she's riding a wave of cultural interest, so the conclusions the author of the Forbes piece drew on the basis of outliers like James are not useful.


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## Shane Murray (Aug 1, 2012)

hydrapublications said:


> Bingo! That statement is the key for sure
> 
> *Rather than hoping to gain traction within that 10 percent of people who pay attention to Amazon's recommendations, or trying to crowbar your title into bestseller or top 100 lists, you should be focusing on building an independent fan base. No one can search for your books if they don't know you exist.*


As ever, word of mouth is still the best.


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## PhoenixS (Apr 5, 2011)

Effective marketing is promoting to people likely to buy your book. I happen to think Steel Magnolia's audience is pretty huge - in the millions. I happen to know my budget is pretty tiny and that I will NEVER reach those millions on my own. So I rely on Amazon to help me reach the audience I can't. 

We sold 100,000 books in the past 3 months on Amazon. I advertise/get our books featured once or twice a month on the same handful of sites most everyone here uses. I don't tweet, use Facebook or ever go to Goodreads. Our mail list is just under 1000 subscribers. 

I do track sales, though, and I KNOW where they are coming from. I can tell that from the last email Amazon sent on our behalf, we gained 300 sales over the daily average on a single title. Sales that also generated a high number of collateral sales of other titles. And despite how much I'd love to claim that I am just a pretty awesome marketer, I know that isn't the truth behind our sales.

Frankly, I don't care what the Enders research shows (particularly if the results turn out to be self-reported). I'm growing sales via Amazon's algorithms and recommendation engine. The number of people those tools influence, for now, satisfies my growth plans for the amount of time and money we're willing to invest. Eventually I'd love to hit the tipping point where WOM derives from continued placement of our books into the Top 100. But WOM isn't what's getting -- and keeping -- them there right now.


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## Terrence OBrien (Oct 21, 2010)

> "I beg to differ. We know they relied on a survey of purchasers' self-reported buying habits, because the only other source for this data would be Amazon itself. In other words, they asked people how they bought books and they told them. That means the number represent total sales (assuming the sample was representative), so my conclusion holds."


We don't know anything. It's possible they used a survey. If so, we know nothing about the methodology or sample. We have no idea if the results are reliable.

The total sales number might be an accurate measure of the sample, but we have no idea if the results can be taken as representative of the larger population.

The cited data may be the result of rigorous statistical analysis. It can also be another self-selected sample.



> "Look, everyone knows that word of mouth sells books. Everyone knows that most books sold are bestsellers. Everyone also knows that bestsellers tend to be cultural phenomena. Thus, everyone knows that most people who buy books at Amazon went to get the specific book they'd heard about through word of mouth."


Everyone knew the world was flat.


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## WHDean (Nov 2, 2011)

Phoenix Sullivan said:


> Effective marketing is promoting to people likely to buy your book. I happen to think Steel Magnolia's audience is pretty huge - in the millions. I happen to know my budget is pretty tiny and that I will NEVER reach those millions on my own. So I rely on Amazon to help me reach the audience I can't.
> 
> We sold 100,000 books in the past 3 months on Amazon. I advertise/get our books featured once or twice a month on the same handful of sites most everyone here uses. I don't tweet, use Facebook or ever go to Goodreads. Our mail list is just under 1000 subscribers.
> 
> ...


Ah, but you're looking at the Forbes' writer's conclusion, not the Ender data. If you exclude most or all of the 48% as part of the bestseller dynamic, the rest fits with what I've gleaned from you and from others. Also boughts, promotions, and bestseller lists must account for the bulk of the non-bestsellers.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

JRTomlin said:


> I don't think you can necessarily blame McCabe for the way that misinterprets the information.
> 
> I don't find the information difficult to believe (although I agree that there is NO company that is above being questioned including a number based in the UK) but the interpretation in this case really defies belief. In effect, dismissing 52% of the sampling is ridiculous. And you also have to take into consideration the size of the Amazon market. 10% it would make me a very rich lady.
> 
> As advice to authors, the article sucks.


Re McCabe, I agree. Someone plucked one slide out of his Ppt -- nothing he can do about that.


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## Cherise (May 13, 2012)

Becca Mills said:


> To suggest that a particular company is so famous, so highly thought of, that querying their data-gathering is not just unnecessary but is somehow wrong-headed or foolish? Nope, sorry. Not buying it.


That way lies Enron.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

WHDean said:


> Ah, but you're looking at the Forbes' writer's conclusion, not the Ender data. If you exclude most or all of the 48% as part of the bestseller dynamic, the rest fits with what I've gleaned from you and from others. Also boughts, promotions, and bestseller lists must account for the bulk of the non-bestsellers.


Maybe, WH. But that 48% doesn't just represent folks who went to Amazon and searched for a particular title. It represents (according to the caption on McCabe's slide) "planned search: author or topic." So someone might've searched for "James" because they wanted to buy _Fifty Shades_, but they might've also searched for "erotica" and ended up buying some non-best-seller. Both transactions would be part of that 48%. That's why the info would be much more useful if we knew more, such as how that 48% breaks down.

Also, as a general point, there are an awful lot of ways to conduct surveys.

--> Edited to correct where I typed "title" instead of "topic," above.


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## Robert Bidinotto (Mar 3, 2011)

I think WH Dean has it exactly right: A few mega-bestsellers skew the entire pool of the 48% of people who go to Amazon to buy books. But more importantly, none of us really CARE about that 48%, because they aren't going to Amazon to search for new books, like ours. That 48% are irrelevant to we indie authors concerned about "discovery," because those customers are going there to buy what they've already "discovered" elsewhere.

So, the only real pool of readers we should care about are those in the 52%, whose choices are *not* predetermined. Since the pie chart is split almost 50/50 among people buying a predetermined book, and people wishing to DISCOVER a new book to read, then if you focus only on the 50% of true "searchers," and make a new chart in which ALL of them = 100%, you'd also have to _double_ the percentages in the remaining categories of the chart, viz.:

* 28% of the true "searchers" (not 17%) are influenced by the Amazon bestseller lists.

* 24% (not 12%) are influenced by Amazon sales, promos, and special prices.

* 20% (not 10%) are influenced by the "also boughts" and similar recommendations.

* 8% (not 4%) are influenced by staff picks.

* 6% (not 3%) are influenced by the category listings.

Kinda puts a different perspective on the _discovery_ importance of those algorithm-driven elements, eh?

P.S. In light of Becca's latest comment, which I saw after posting the preceding, there is another problem with the existing pie chart: It doesn't tell us how many of those searching on a _topic_, rather than a specific book, were guided by the Amazon search engine...which, after all, is an internal Amazon mechanism of book discovery. Those who do should properly be _added_ to the 52%. Right?


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## kurzon (Feb 26, 2011)

Surveys...  Reminds me of the survey last year which led to all those articles about how half of self-published authors earn less than $500 per year.

And I looked at a bit of the survey data and asked the people who ran it: "This figure of how much people earned in 2011 - how many of the respondents started selling in 2011?  How many started publishing in the last quarter of 2011?"

And it turned out they had made no attempt to record the data to identify people who had only been self-publishing for one to two months at the time their survey was run as compared to say, people who actually had had income for the whole year.  Or who had been publishing for more than that year.

Yeah, surveys.  Grain of salt.


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## Nick Endi Webb (Mar 25, 2012)

Cherise Kelley said:


> That way lies Enron.


My favorite comment today.


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## gljones (Nov 6, 2012)

My book is in the Fantasy Adventure category, for reference purposes I went into amazon and typed in Fantasy adventure.  Any guesses how many hits I got....

wait for it


wait for it


Showing 1 - 16 of 87,511 Results

SWEET MOMMA JACKERS!!!

I think I need people coming into Amazon with some sort of hint about me, otherwise they have something close to a zero percent chance of finding it


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## B. Justin Shier (Apr 1, 2011)

Becca Mills said:


> Maybe, WH. But that 48% doesn't just represent folks who went to Amazon and searched for a particular title. It represents (according to the caption on McCabe's slide) "planned search: author or topic." So someone might've searched for "James" because they wanted to buy _Fifty Shades_, but they might've also searched for "erotica" and ended up buying some non-best-seller. Both transactions would be part of that 48%. That's why the info would be much more useful if we knew more, such as how that 48% breaks down.


This here is what we in the biz like to call a critical observation.

B.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

Just took a closer look at McCabe's slide and noticed an attribution for the data in the bottom right corner:










So, the Codex Group apparently collected this data, conducted the survey, crunched the numbers ... whatever. Don't know anything about the Codex Group myself. Their website is only a splashpage.

(Slide is copied from the _Forbes_ post.)

ETA: Thanks for shrinking that image, Betsy!

So, Codex Group is run by this fellow:


> Peter Hildick-Smith founded book market consultancy Codex-Group in 2004, to give the book publishers the tools to use book customer insight as a major competitive advantage in new book and author success. The firm's patent-pending book demand forecasting technology, Book Identity and Author Equity programs increase new book sales through pre-publication market testing using the firm's Early Read Book Preview program?an ongoing national poll of book buying preferences sampling 5,000+ book shoppers per Preview. Codex-Group is the industry leader in book audience research and pre-publication testing. Clients include Borders Group, major U.S. trade book publishers, individual authors and literary agents.


 (quoted from a Wharton alumni profile: http://www.whartonny.com/volunteer.html?current_item=854)

And here's a 45-minute webinar by Hildick-Smith on book discoverability, recorded in either August or October of last year:






Haven't listened to the whole thing, but it's interesting.


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## Ben Mathew (Jan 27, 2013)

WHDean said:


> The problem is that the power curve throws off the analysis of how people find books. Consider that the vast majority of the books sold are bestsellers. _Fifty Shades_, for example, was supposed to account for one in four books sold on Amazon for awhile. The people buying those books all went to Amazon to find James's books and buy them. They weren't _discovering _ James on Amazon. That means a sizable chuck (if not all) of that 48% is due to outliers like James whose buyers were going to Amazon to buy books they'd learned about elsewhere.
> 
> But once you remove these books from the analysis-which could be done by subtracting bestsellers from the data-an entirely different picture is likely to emerge. The channels represented by the other 52%-especially top 100 lists and Amazon promotions-are likely to represent 80%-90% of the books sold. In other words, most of the non-bestsellers are being discovered and sold through Amazon's internal activities. After all, where else do people learn about these books?


I think this is the most likely scenario.

And, as several others have mentioned, the 48% includes planned search: author or *topic*. What an awful way to smush up the data! Planned search by topic is totally using Amazon to discover books.


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## Carol (was Dara) (Feb 19, 2011)

Victoria Champion said:


> Maybe I'm not a statistically average user, but Amazon's recommendation engine is how I find 99% of the books I buy and read.


Coming into the discussion a bit late but... What she said. On the extremely rare occasion where I don't buy by Amazon recommendation, I shop by category. I don't usually go more than twenty pages deep, so I'll only see the top books in the categories.


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## Edward W. Robertson (May 18, 2010)

So.. if you're already popular enough for customers to be coming in droves to search for you by name.. Amazon's recommendations aren't important to your sales.

What incredibly useful information.


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## A.A (Mar 30, 2012)

Becca Mills said:


> As to the tiff up-thread: Wanting to know how data are gathered and how they've been analyzed is *never* unreasonable. In fact, it defines reason. No matter how reputable the researcher who did the work, it's never a good idea to accept polished data hook, line, and sinker without asking how the raw numbers were gathered and how they were analyzed and worked into the finished product. That's why every scholarly paper gets subjected to peer-review, no matter how reputable the authors. That's why statistical work is laid out like breadcrumbs for others to follow. Any researcher can have a blind-spot; every researcher can -- and has -- make mistakes. To suggest that a particular company is so famous, so highly thought of, that querying their data-gathering is not just unnecessary but is somehow wrong-headed or foolish? Nope, sorry. Not buying it.


Totally agree. I think it was my right to wonder if the numbers were skewed by the bestsellers and also to wonder if the data is accurate (I especially question survey data). Phoenix Sullivan is a pretty good 'survey sample' all on her own!


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## JRTomlin (Jan 18, 2011)

gljones said:


> My book is in the Fantasy Adventure category, for reference purposes I went into amazon and typed in Fantasy adventure. Any guesses how many hits I got....
> 
> wait for it
> 
> ...


There are very few people who are so ignorant about searches that they search on a single term. People have been using search engines for decades and know you need multiple terms to get want you want. I might search on "medieval fantasy heroine" to find the kind of story I want. Or I might search on "Scotland historical fiction".

They don't need to know about you. If you write the kind of story that some people want to read, they'll find it.


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## 41419 (Apr 4, 2011)

Phoenix Sullivan said:


> Effective marketing is promoting to people likely to buy your book. I happen to think Steel Magnolia's audience is pretty huge - in the millions. I happen to know my budget is pretty tiny and that I will NEVER reach those millions on my own. So I rely on Amazon to help me reach the audience I can't.
> 
> We sold 100,000 books in the past 3 months on Amazon. I advertise/get our books featured once or twice a month on the same handful of sites most everyone here uses. I don't tweet, use Facebook or ever go to Goodreads. Our mail list is just under 1000 subscribers.
> 
> ...


This.

And even if the numbers are accurate, the spontaneous purchases that are made via Also Boughts, Best Seller Lists, Hot New Releases etc. are much, much easier to target than those purchasing decisions made before someone comes to Amazon.

For starters, all your target customers are in one place at Amazon. How do you market to the rest? How do you find them?

Another thing you should bear in mind is that when customers are browsing on Amazon they are *primed* to buy and your book is but one click away from their Kindle. Users on Goodreads, Twitter, Facebook or wherever may not be looking to purchase anything at that moment, and are probably just having a good chat. Even if your target market are there, and you can find them, they may not be receptive to your marketing *at that moment.* Don't underestimate the importance of that.

For me, it's like comparing being on the front table at Barnes & Noble, with combing the mall, looking for readers.


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## 41419 (Apr 4, 2011)

And just a note on the data, aside from whether it's accurate or not (and whether it's reported accurately or not, given that we only have second- or third-hand sources), the way they collected that data is extremely important and can radically change any conclusions we can draw.

Here's two ways they could have asked the question:



> 1. Tell us about the last book you bought on Amazon. Was it (a) something you saw on the Best Seller list, (b) something you saw browsing your favorite genre, (c) something you saw in the Also Boughts of another book, or (d) something you had already planned to buy before you got to Amazon.


Or:



> 2. How many books do you buy week on Amazon? How many of those come from (a) Best Seller lists, (b) browsing your favorite genre, (c) Also Boughts of another book, or (d) pre-planned purchases.


Depending on *how* you ask the question, the results can be very, very different.

And then, of course, there's the whole thing about customers not being very accurate about the actual reasons they bought something (people are a lot more suggestible than they like to believe).


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## Speaker-To-Animals (Feb 21, 2012)

Think about how you shop and that will put the data in perspective. Most of the time when you're out to buy something, you know it and you buy it. Impulse purchases are always secondary.

"Don't go to the grocery store when you're hungry because you will buy stuff you don't need." Now imagine that 52% of what you bring home from the grocery are Doritos, Cookies, and Ice Cream and 48% is what's on your grocery list. You'd be broke and look like Jabba the Hut.


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## WHDean (Nov 2, 2011)

Becca Mills said:


> Maybe, WH. But that 48% doesn't just represent folks who went to Amazon and searched for a particular title. It represents (according to the caption on McCabe's slide) "planned search: author or topic." So someone might've searched for "James" because they wanted to buy _Fifty Shades_, but they might've also searched for "erotica" and ended up buying some non-best-seller. Both transactions would be part of that 48%. That's why the info would be much more useful if we knew more, such as how that 48% breaks down.
> 
> Also, as a general point, there are an awful lot of ways to conduct surveys.
> 
> --> Edited to correct where I typed "title" instead of "topic," above.


You're assuming "topic" means "genre." But that would be a major mistake on the reseachers' part. Genre and the top 100s are not independent of one another. Come to that, neither are the other categories. Topic must be the more narrow searches where people go looking for a specific book for a specific purpose, which would be mostly non-fiction (e.g., English-French dictionary). These purchases are analogous to author's name purchases because-and this is key-the _decision to buy_ arose outside Amazon.

Second, even genre searches are going to be overwhelmed by bestseller buys. Just think of that figure about one in four books sold on Amazon being James's books and you have an idea of how out of whack the numbers are.

Like I said, nothing about the numbers is fishy. If anything, I'd expect "pre-planned" to have been higher, and I think it was a few years ago. This is good news for indies. It means you don't have to be famous to get rich, or rich to get famous. You can be discovered.


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## vrabinec (May 19, 2011)

WHDean said:


> You're assuming "topic" means "genre." But that would be a major mistake on the reseachers' part. Genre and the top 100s are not independent of one another. Come to that, neither are the other categories. Topic must be the more narrow searches where people go looking for a specific book for a specific purpose, which would be mostly non-fiction (e.g., English-French dictionary). These purchases are analogous to author's name purchases because-and this is key-the _decision to buy_ arose outside Amazon.
> 
> Second, even genre searches are going to be overwhelmed by bestseller buys. Just think of that figure about one in four books sold on Amazon being James's books and you have an idea of how out of whack the numbers are.
> 
> Like I said, nothing about the numbers is fishy. If anything, I'd expect "pre-planned" to have been higher, and I think it was a few years ago. This is good news for indies. It means you don't have to be famous to get rich, or rich to get famous. You can be discovered.


Half the books I buy these days are non-fiction, and while I always know what I want in a general sense such as a book on ships circa 1900, a book on nutrinos, a book on how to write a best-seller without trying, I still end up browsing, so I'm not sure the non-fiction searches skew the data.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

WHDean said:


> You're assuming "topic" means "genre." But that would be a major mistake on the reseachers' part. Genre and the top 100s are not independent of one another. Come to that, neither are the other categories. Topic must be the more narrow searches where people go looking for a specific book for a specific purpose, which would be mostly non-fiction (e.g., English-French dictionary). These purchases are analogous to author's name purchases because-and this is key-the _decision to buy_ arose outside Amazon.
> 
> Second, even genre searches are going to be overwhelmed by bestseller buys. Just think of that figure about one in four books sold on Amazon being James's books and you have an idea of how out of whack the numbers are.
> 
> Like I said, nothing about the numbers is fishy. If anything, I'd expect "pre-planned" to have been higher, and I think it was a few years ago. This is good news for indies. It means you don't have to be famous to get rich, or rich to get famous. You can be discovered.


Yes, I see what you mean about topic searches, and JRTomlin makes a related point above (even if you don't have a very specific purchase in mind, such as a particular dictionary, you are not well served by searching on just one broad term). I don't think the Codex Group data is "fishy," but I do think we could make better use of it if it were more fine-grained and if we knew more about how it was gathered (see dgaughan's posts above).

I'll write to Peter Hildick-Smith and see if he or one of his employees would be willing to answer some questions about the data.


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## Guest (Feb 22, 2013)

I work in contract packaging. I see studies like this all the time on other products. There is nothing in this study that contradicts the dozens of other industry studies I have seen. You can all argue that every single industry study on selling to consumers is wrong because it wasn't done the way you wanted it to be done. That's fine. You can all argue that every single industry study on selling to consumers is wrong because you personally don't shop in a certain way. That's fine. I'm no more going to argue with people any more over the validity of this or any other industry survey than I will argue with a birther over the legitimacy of Obama's birth certificate. Believe, or don't believe, as you wish.

But for folks that want perspective, "Planned Search" has a very specific meaning in the industry. And I think it would be useful to know what that meaning is so you can correctly decide on how to interpret the data. Otherwise, you come across like those folks who argue that "evolution is just a theory" without knowing how the scientific community defines the word theory in the first place.

A Planned Search is not the same thing as browsing, though the physical action is similar, the thought processes are different.

If we look at in store behavior, for example, browsing would be "Hm, I wonder if Dress Barn has any new summer fashions?" and you go to Dress Barn to browse the racks. People browsing do not walk into the store with the intention of purchasing something, but are also highly susceptible to in-store marketing. They didn't intend to buy, but once they are in the store they often feel obligated to buy something. So if they come across something that catches their eye at a good price, they will buy it. People who browse tend to be highly susceptible to sales. Browsers also tend to be on a more time restricted schedule, however. Because browsing tends to be an activity done to "kill time" or otherwise entertain (like window shopping) people won't invest a lot of time in it. These are the folks who can be captured using the methods that most indies use. If you are in the top of a category being browsed, and your product appears to be a good deal, you have a chance of being purchased.

However, browsers are also easily distracted and less likely to complete the cart purchase. A phone call from their sister saying "Hey, whatcha doing?" pulls them out of the store and off to meet the sister for lunch. A screaming kid nearby will make them put down an item and go to a different aisle. In terms of online purchases, these folks are the ones most likely to leave their shopping carts full but not complete the check out. And while they were ready to buy your book before their sister called, they won't remember you and come back later. The sale is lost.

A Planned Search is "I need a new pair of shoes for my cousin's wedding." You don't know specifically which shoes you are going to buy, but you go into the store with the intention of buying a pair of shoes. During a planned search, people tend to be narrowly focused. They will browse through the shoes that are most likely to fit the event, but ignore other stimuli. People engaged in a planned search rarely grab the FIRST thing that matches the search. They tend to look for the thing that BEST fits the search. With online purchases, these are the people who will add multiple items to a wishlist, then go do additional research on the item and then come back to the store to finish the purchase.

You can make money with either group. Browsers tend to also be bargain shoppers (motivated by low price for impulse purchases). Planned Search customers tend to be VALUE shoppers (willing to spend more money on the item that best fits their needs, i.e. has the most value to them).

Where I think some of the disconnect lies is that more people go into a store to browse than to engage in a planned search, however the ratio of browsers who actually COMPLETE the shopping cart is lower than those who engage in Planned Searches. Think honestly about your own habits. How often have you walked into a store just to browse with no specific thing in mind and walked out empty-handed? Now how often have you walked into a store specifically looking for a certain item and walked out empty handed?

In short, yes, there ARE more people who browse, but these people are the _least likely_ to complete the purchase at any specific time. And when they do buy, their carts tend to be smaller than those of people who make planned purchases.


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## tensen (May 17, 2011)

The WOM figures seem pretty reasonable, considering different forms of WOM have always rated highly on any reports for bookstore purchases in the past.

One thing about the data to wonder about is if the study takes into account multiple purchases during a session. Meaning did someone purchase a book that they head about via WOM, and then use the Also Boughts to pick another title. Since we already know that it accounts for at 10% of the initial purchases... that could account for a lot of secondary purchases once the customer is already on the site. However it may have already been accounted for in the original study.


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## WHDean (Nov 2, 2011)

vrabinec said:


> I'm not sure the non-fiction searches skew the data.





Becca Mills said:


> ... but I do think we could make better use of it if it were more fine-grained and if we knew more about how it was gathered (see dgaughan's posts above).


Here's the thing about that. We're not talking about some amateur doing a SurveyMonkey survey from his mom's basement. These surveys are done all the time (i.e., the methodologies have long been validated), and they're done by statisticians and psychologists with doctorates. They know what to ask to get what they're looking for. And these results are run-of-the-mill: none of it is new. There's no real problem of bias either, because there's nothing controversial about the questions that would cause people to answer one way or another (e.g., as there would be if the questions asked about, say, erotica or politics).

The aim of these studies is also straightforward. The only thing they're after is *where the decision to buy was made*. Did they go to Amazon to buy something in particular (i.e., pre-planned)? Or did they go there to browse and buy something as a result of one of the mechanisms Amazon uses to sell stuff (e.g., top 100 lists)? If the former, they know outside advertising and word of mouth still dominate; if the latter, they know that internal mechanisms (and which ones) influence consumers. That's objective data that firms can use. And that's why Enders can charge big bucks for it.

Now, the problem in all this wasn't the data. It was the inference the Forbes writer drew from that data, namely, that self-pubbers should focus on external marketing at the expense of internal mechanisms. That inference, I argued, was mistaken because it doesn't take into account the disproportionate influence on sales of "it books" that people buy largely through word of mouth, reinforced by ads. In other words, we have to control for the effect of (basically) once-in-a-blue-moon buyers who are headed to Amazon to buy the latest fad book.

Take a non-book related analogy. Gino's Pizza Shop is located next door to Acme Inc. One day Acme buys 1,000 pizzas for its employees to celebrate its fiftieth anniversary. Researchers survey Gino's clientele for that day and find that Acme is the most important "channel" for Gino's business. But clearly it's not; the anniversary skewed the data. The only difference with book-buying from Amazon is that everyday is Acme/bestseller day, so the sales data will always be skewed in favour of word of mouth/ads because of the power curve of sales.

The big question for self-pubbers is whether you focus your efforts on getting people to go to Amazon to buy your books (creating a fanbase externally), or whether you focus on getting people who are already there to buy books (browsers). Once you discount the effect of bestsellers, it looks like the browsers should be the main target, because you're looking to get discovered. This is not to say discovery doesn't or can't happen externally (e.g., through an influential blog, big media review, etc.). But when you look at the numbers and factor in the comparison of prices (outside ads are expensive and require market knowledge; ergo, expertise), then your average Joe Blow indie should probably look to internal mechanisms to get word of mouth momentum going, so you can build that external fanbase to leverage for future sales.


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## vrabinec (May 19, 2011)

WHDean said:


> Here's the thing about that. We're not talking about some amateur doing a SurveyMonkey survey from his mom's basement. These surveys are done all the time (i.e., the methodologies have long been validated), and they're done by statisticians and psychologists with doctorates. They know what to ask to get what they're looking for. And these results are run-of-the-mill: none of it is new. There's no real problem of bias either, because there's nothing controversial about the questions that would cause people to answer one way or another (e.g., as there would be if the questions asked about, say, erotica or politics).
> 
> The aim of these studies is also straightforward. The only thing they're after is *where the decision to buy was made*. Did they go to Amazon to buy something in particular (i.e., pre-planned)? Or did they go there to browse and buy something as a result of one of the mechanisms Amazon uses to sell stuff (e.g., top 100 lists)? If the former, they know outside advertising and word of mouth still dominate; if the latter, they know that internal mechanisms (and which ones) influence consumers. That's objective data that firms can use. And that's why Enders can charge big bucks for it.
> 
> ...


That's what I said.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

FYI, Douglas McCabe of Enders Analysis responded to my query about his slide. He noted that the data were gathered by Codex Group and that Enders was not tracking them. Though he didn't go into much detail, I gathered that he would generally agree with the _Forbes _writer's conclusion that Amazon's algorithms do not lend themselves to effective book marketing.

So, there you go.

I've dropped Peter Hildrick-Smith (of Codex Group) a line to see if he'd be willing to expand on the data a bit. If he is, I'll update this thread.


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## TiffanyTurner (Jun 8, 2009)

This really was a great article to read just to get an insight to what is going on in marketing books. I have to agree that my book buying practices have changed in the last few years. And the younger generation hangs out on the internet more than going to book stores and coffee shops. Our lifestyles are changing because of smartphones, the internet, and technology.

But I'm always thinking one question after reading articles like this, how do you create Word of Mouth(WOM)? I'm not a marketing major, but it seems it would help to be as an author these days. I've not really seen any marketing articles or presentations on this specifically. Maybe I've just missed them. But I would love to know the secret to building Word of Mouth. I mean, part of this is writing a good book. But once the good book is written, then what?


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## vrabinec (May 19, 2011)

Becca Mills said:


> FYI, Douglas McCabe of Enders Analysis responded to my query about his slide. He noted that the data were gathered by Codex Group and that Enders was not tracking them. Though he didn't go into much detail, I gathered that he would generally agree with the _Forbes _writer's conclusion that Amazon's algorithms do not lend themselves to effective book marketing.
> 
> So, there you go.
> 
> I've dropped Peter Hildrick-Smith (of Codex Group) a line to see if he'd be willing to expand on the data a bit. If he is, I'll update this thread.


Awsome investigative work. You're a regular Woodward and Bernstein.


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## Terrence OBrien (Oct 21, 2010)

> "Here's the thing about that. We're not talking about some amateur doing a SurveyMonkey survey from his mom's basement. These surveys are done all the time (i.e., the methodologies have long been validated), and they're done by statisticians and psychologists with doctorates. "


We don't know. The fact that other people have done statistically rigorous studies tells us nothing about this specific study. Nor does the fact that some of them have doctorates.

Bogus studies are also done all the time.

The fact that methodologies have long been validated doesn't tell us if those validated methodologies were employed on this study.

Perhaps Becca will get the answers.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

Becca Mills said:


> FYI, Douglas McCabe of Enders Analysis responded to my query about his slide. He noted that the data were gathered by Codex Group and that Enders was not tracking them. Though he didn't go into much detail, I gathered that he would generally agree with the _Forbes _writer's conclusion that Amazon's algorithms do not lend themselves to effective book marketing.


Actually, a further email from McCabe leads me to adjust the above: Amazon's recommendations are good (its algorithms are the best in the business), he says. It's just that what Amazon offers (algorithms and a computer screen) can't be as effective as merchandizing in a physical space with live people to back it up.

I do see his point. Personally, I still love shopping in physical bookstores and tend to find more new books that way. I find that shopping experience more pleasurable and more productive. It's just that I then go home and buy those books on my Kindle. In those cases, I'm using Amazon in the way the data suggest many people do: by the time I come to the Amazon website, I know exactly what I want.


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## JRTomlin (Jan 18, 2011)

Becca Mills said:


> Actually, a further email from McCabe leads me to adjust the above: Amazon's recommendations are good (its algorithms are the best in the business), he says. It's just that what Amazon offers (algorithms and a computer screen) can't be as effective as merchandizing in a physical space with live people to back it up.
> 
> I do see his point. Personally, I still love shopping in physical bookstores and tend to find more new books that way. I find that shopping experience more pleasurable and more productive. It's just that I then go home and buy those books on my Kindle. In those cases, I'm using Amazon in the way the data suggest many people do: by the time I come to the Amazon website, I know exactly what I want.


I think that is actually obvious. People who order Patterson or James didn't just discover them on Amazon. If that is approximately 48% of Amazon's business, there is nothing surprising in that. Best sellers are a big slice of the book market.

What is disturbing is turning that into "no one will ever find indie books". That is demonstrably not true.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

JRTomlin said:


> I think that is actually obvious. People who order Patterson or James didn't just discover them on Amazon. If that is approximately 48% of Amazon's business, there is nothing surprising in that. Best sellers are a big slice of the book market.
> 
> What is disturbing is turning that into "no one will ever find indie books". That is demonstrably not true.


Yes, from emailing with McCabe, I think his presentation pertained to traditionally published books (not surprising ... folks like us don't hire firms like Enders), so he's comparing the marketing/discoverability of traditionally published books in brick-and-mortar stores and the online sales environment. I could be wrong, but I don't think he intended to address the indie situation at all, so the _Forbes _writer was taking those traditional-publishing-oriented stats and extrapolating from them to indie marketing. It's really apples and oranges, IMO. After all, the vast majority of indie books just don't have the possibility of being laid flat on a table at the front of a Barnes & Noble, as traditionally published books do. What may be a diminished sales environment for trad books is the only environment for indie books. And, in fact, the diminishment of the sales environment for trad books in a place like Amazon may be part of what creates a good opportunity for indie books -- it's a much more level playing field.


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

vrabinec said:


> Awsome investigative work. You're a regular Woodward and Bernstein.





Terrence OBrien said:


> Perhaps Becca will get the answers.


That depends on if she can find a Deep Throat.

No not THAT KIND.

Sheesh.

People who do studies are nearly guaranteed to tell you that they did them well. But the truth is that many are done poorly, as Terrence has pointed out.

Now, I don't want the study to be good or bad or anything. I just want to know what we can draw from it.

What I lean towards is this: do your best to grow your own pool (fanbase) while taking advantage of opportunities others give you (be they retailers, other authors, community sites, etc.) to expand your influence.

Don't discount Amazon's recommendations engine. But at the same time, don't think that by some magic you will start having success just because you're on also-boughts.

Balanced approach=good approach IMO.


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## WHDean (Nov 2, 2011)

I wrote this response to the earlier post. I didn't see the second one, which I take to be admit my point.



Becca Mills said:


> FYI, Douglas McCabe of Enders Analysis responded to my query about his slide. He noted that the data were gathered by Codex Group and that Enders was not tracking them. Though he didn't go into much detail, I gathered that he would generally agree with the _Forbes _writer's conclusion that Amazon's algorithms do not lend themselves to effective book marketing.
> 
> So, there you go.
> 
> I've dropped Peter Hildrick-Smith (of Codex Group) a line to see if he'd be willing to expand on the data a bit. If he is, I'll update this thread.


That doesn't follow from the data presented, and I say this leaving aside my concern about the influence of outliers. For example, the data shows that a large portion of buyers are buying from top 100 lists. That's good. That means you can be discovered by getting yourself on a top 100 list. Getting yourself there is Konrath 101. It doesn't always work, but it's doable (e.g., through freebies, promotions, etc.).

But how do you get yourself the word of mouth that makes you a pre-planned purchase without *first * getting into one of the other channels? Who knows? Maybe it's magic or luck. So to tell self-pubbers that they have to gain recognition outside Amazon is to tell them nothing because no one knows how to do that. It's like that asinine get-rich-quick/how-Rowling-did-it advice where Step One is "Write a bestseller."

Put another way, the conclusion commits a part-whole fallacy with respect to discoverability. It assumes that because 48% of total sales come from pre-planned buys that 48% of anyone's (or any subset's) sales will have to come from pre-planned buys; ergo, one needs outside fans. That needn't be the case for the discovery phase for individuals or subsets of sellers. Any given seller or subset of them may get 100% of their initial sales from one avenue (e.g., like Robert), which translates into "being discovered," which leads to pre-planned buys.

That's why I've said from the start that you have to look at these figures from a discoverability standpoint, not a retailer's standpoint.


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## Maggie Dana (Oct 26, 2011)

vrabinec said:


> Half the books I buy these days are non-fiction, and while I always know what I want in a general sense such as a book on ships circa 1900 ...


OT ... early 20th-century ships. Have you read Rober K. Massie's _Dreadnought_ and _Castles of Steel_?


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## B. Justin Shier (Apr 1, 2011)

Terrence OBrien said:


> We don't know. The fact that other people have done statistically rigorous studies tells us nothing about this specific study. Nor does the fact that some of them have doctorates.
> 
> Bogus studies are also done all the time.
> 
> ...


Yup. We also don't know how they defined Amazon customers or how said customers were reached. Was it via the dread landline-only method? This was once presumed to be a rather reliable means of collecting data, but proving to be more and more questionable by the day. Just look at the deviation between Pew Research surveys and Google Consumer surveys.

B.


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## Robert Bidinotto (Mar 3, 2011)

If it's true that the data from the Codex study cited by the _Forbes_ writer focused on traditionally published authors, then that's another fatal flaw in the article, which tries to extrapolate implications to indie books.

But there are other big problems with the data and their interpretation that haven't yet been mentioned (I think).

As one correspondent pointed out to me in a comment to my blog post, many Kindle owners download free "samples" of a host of ebooks, and may not go back to read these and make an actual purchase until months later. But when they do, how would they respond to the Codex survey? Wouldn't they be likely to say, "I went to Amazon with a preplanned purchase in mind" instead of "I discovered the book while browsing on Amazon"? That could significantly, yet misleadingly, inflate the 48% "preplanned purchase" statistic. Yet there's no breakout "slice" on the pie chart to account for such buyers.

And ditto all the many regular Amazon customers (like me) who receive the company's daily book recommendation emails. Those emails are tailored specifically to each customer's preferences, as determined by their past buying and browsing habits. In effect, they are "also bought" recommendations. Yet would a customer responding to this survey say, "I went to Amazon with a preplanned purchase in mind" instead of "My purchase came from an Amazon promotion"? If the former, that would also inflate the "preplanned purchase" statistic at the expense of the "internal discovery tools" figure.

And what about impulse purchases? A customer goes to Amazon with a single "preplanned purchase" in mind, but once there, notices some "also bought" recommendations, or begins to browse and -- using various "discoverability" tools -- ends the session with four other purchases. How does the customer report this to the people who conducted the survey, and where does it appear on the chart? Yet there have to be millions of such purchases.

All together, such considerations would render the pie chart figures worthless for any author seeking to enhance the "discoverability" of his own book. But the _Forbes_ writer is trying to make the opposite case.

But, bending over backward for sake of argument, let's assume that all the pie chart numbers are absolutely complete and accurate. Let's further assume that the pie chart does apply to indie books as well as traditionally published ones. And for sake of convenience, let's also assume that the chart's division between "preplanned purchasers" and "browsing customers" is split evenly, 50/50. What would this mean, then, for any given author seeking "discoverability" on Amazon for his own books?

The first thing to realize is that the "universe" of his target audience does _not_ consist of "all Amazon book buyers," which is what the pie chart depicts. By definition, his own total universe of potential buyers for his books _must exclude_ those going to Amazon with predetermined purchases in mind. Instead, his target audience is limited _only_ to that 50% of book buyers using Amazon's various "discoverability" tools to browse for new books.

Now, if we break out that 50%, then show them alone on a new pie chart, a funny thing happens. The 50% of the original "pie" becomes 100% of the new pie -- and correspondingly, all the internal percentage "slices" also double in size. In other words, the 17% of overall Amazon book buyers on the old chart, who discovered a book by browsing its bestseller lists, now doubles to 34% of book-browsing customers on the new chart. Likewise, the "mere" 12% of all Amazon book purchasers who were influenced by promotions also doubles, to 24% of all browsing book buyers. Etc.

Viewed this way -- by measuring only the target audience of browsing Amazon customers, rather than anyone buying a book on Amazon -- we realize that _Amazon's "discoverability" tools are twice as effective as the Forbes article declares them to be_. Face it: If more than 1/3 of these browsing customers consult Amazon bestseller lists for their purchases, that is a very significant number of potential buyers that any author would want to target. Likewise, if a quarter of all those browsing buyers respond to promotions and sales, then those marketing tactics are twice as significant for generating sales as the _Forbes _piece suggests.

The fallacy in using the pie chart as the _Forbes_ author did also can be demonstrated by reductio ad absurdam. If including all book buyers (instead of only _browsing_ book buyers) is valid, then why don't we make an even more-inclusive pie chart -- one that includes not only Amazon _book _customers, but customers for _all_ its millions of other kinds of products? If we did, then "book buyers" would constitute a small sliver of Amazon's overall retail business -- and simultaneously, each of the various "discoverability" percentage slices would be even tinier. Would the _Forbes_ writer then mock those "paltry" percentages by saying something like, "See? Only 0.5% of Amazon overall customers actually use its bestseller lists to buy books"? Similarly, we could expand the pie chart again and again -- first, to include all of Amazon online book sales competitors...then online retail competitors for all its goods...then all its competitors in the U.S....etc., etc. Each time we expand the "customer" universe with a new, more inclusive pie chart, the percentages of "individuals using Amazon's internal discovery tools just to buy books" would become tinier and tinier.

Would anyone in his right mind conclude that this is the way for an author to gauge the value to himself of those book discovery tools?

Nobody, but nobody, has crafted better "discovery" tools for book buyers than Amazon has. That's why it's the 800-pound gorilla of online book retailing (if not of book-retailing, period). IMHO, any author who dismisses and refuses to utilize those tools to promote his or her own works is being terribly foolish.


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## JRTomlin (Jan 18, 2011)

Bards and Sages (Julie) said:


> I work in contract packaging. I see studies like this all the time on other products. There is nothing in this study that contradicts the dozens of other industry studies I have seen. You can all argue that every single industry study on selling to consumers is wrong because it wasn't done the way you wanted it to be done. That's fine. You can all argue that every single industry study on selling to consumers is wrong because you personally don't shop in a certain way. That's fine. I'm no more going to argue with people any more over the validity of this or any other industry survey than I will argue with a birther over the legitimacy of Obama's birth certificate. Believe, or don't believe, as you wish.
> 
> But for folks that want perspective, "Planned Search" has a very specific meaning in the industry. And I think it would be useful to know what that meaning is so you can correctly decide on how to interpret the data. Otherwise, you come across like those folks who argue that "evolution is just a theory" without knowing how the scientific community defines the word theory in the first place.
> 
> ...


One question:

When was the last time you had a "shopping cart" of e-books at Amazon?!

Your entire post is irrelevant to how people shop at Amazon for e-books. As far as the data, I find nothing particularly surprising about it although I think the interpretation of it in the article that was linked to was ridiculous, so your huge argument about how we're all idiots if we don't accept it is a little odd.


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## WHDean (Nov 2, 2011)

B. Justin Shier said:


> Yup. We also don't know how they defined Amazon customers or how said customers were reached. Was it via the dread landline-only method? This was once presumed to be a rather reliable means of collecting data, but proving to be more and more questionable by the day. Just look at the deviation between Pew Research surveys and Google Consumer surveys.
> 
> B.


There are three basic reasons to be sceptical of a study like this: (1) it was published by a dubious source, (2) its results are counter-intuitive, or (3) it flies in the face of previous research. This isn't a case of Imperial Tobacco claiming that smoking doesn't cause cancer. It's a case of someone saying what others have found before and for years, and it fits with much of the anecdotal evidence provided by KBers.

I don't fault you for wanting the whole story, especially if you haven't seen similar findings before. But I fail to see how invoking other bad studies with bad methods somehow creates a prima facie case for scepticism in this one.


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## Adam Pepper (May 28, 2011)

It really doesnt matter much if the data is flawed or accurate. The article is all but useless. It starts by dismissing 10% of Amazon's book sales as "a piddling."  How about putting a dollar value on that 10%? I doubt it's a piddling. It doesnt consider that the vast majority of book sales are going to a small number of already well-established authors and it makes no mention of what approach is more cost effective/time effective.

I love reaching readers directly.  I have a small following of readers who communicate by email and actually anticipate my next release.  My ego needs them and loves them.  But those are onesy-twosy.  With Amazon's outreach, I can reach exponentially more potential customers.  It's not even close. There's nothing to debate.  I certainly plan to continue to grow my e-mail list and build relationships with as many loyal readers as are interested in my work. But if I had a gun to my head and had to choose one approach?  Come off it......am I going to reach a few readers one at a time or thousands of readers at once?


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## B. Justin Shier (Apr 1, 2011)

WHDean said:


> There are three basic reasons to be sceptical of a study like this: (1) it was published by a dubious source, (2) its results are counter-intuitive, or (3) it flies in the face of previous research. This isn't a case of Imperial Tobacco claiming that smoking doesn't cause cancer. It's a case of someone saying what others have found before and for years, and it fits with much of the anecdotal evidence provided by KBers.
> 
> I don't fault you for wanting the whole story, especially if you haven't seen similar findings before. But I fail to see how invoking other bad studies with bad methods somehow creates a prima facie case for scepticism in this one.


You can limit yourself to three basic reasons if you please, but my list will remain quite a bit longer. I've been burned by "authorities" greater than these, and I won't even begin to assess a data set until after I know how the information was gathered.

B.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

Robert Bidinotto said:


> If it's true that the data from the Codex study cited by the _Forbes_ writer focused on traditionally published authors, then that's another fatal flaw in the article, which tries to extrapolate implications to indie books.
> 
> But there are other big problems with the data and their interpretation that haven't yet been mentioned (I think).
> 
> As one correspondent pointed out to me in a comment to my blog post, many Kindle owners download free "samples" of a host of ebooks, and may not go back to read these and make an actual purchase until months later. But when they do, how would they respond to the Codex survey? Wouldn't they be likely to say, "I went to Amazon with a preplanned purchase in mind" instead of "I discovered the book while browsing on Amazon"? That could significantly, yet misleadingly, inflate the 48% "preplanned purchase" statistic. Yet there's no breakout "slice" on the pie chart to account for such buyers.


Many good points in your post, Robert, and especially the one above ... if I were in that position and being surveyed, I'd probably report the sale as being predetermined, forgetting that I originally came across the book because of an Amazon recommendation.

But to clarify, I didn't mean to suggest Codex Group's data is in some way only about traditionally published books, but rather that Douglas McCabe's use of that data in his presentation was probably intended to inform/advise traditional publishers, not indies. So the _Forbes _author was the one making the leap from the data to "what indies should do." That's all.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

B. Justin Shier said:


> You can limit yourself to three basic reasons if you please, but my list will remain quite a bit longer. I've been burned by "authorities" greater than these, and I won't even begin to assess a data set until after I know how the information was gathered.
> 
> B.


I agree with B., WHDean. I know that skepticism for the sake of skepticism can seem tiring, but data are so easily skewed, so easily misconstrued, so easily mishandled ... and then added to that are the vagaries of polling. I do think this sort of research is one area where some degree of skepticism is never a bad thing. Data problems happen, generally with no ill intentions on the part of the researchers. Having a lot of eyes on the methods is the only safeguard.


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## 41413 (Apr 4, 2011)

Becca Mills said:


> I agree with B., WHDean. I know that skepticism for the sake of skepticism can seem tiring, but data are so easily skewed, so easily misconstrued, so easily mishandled ... and then added to that are the vagaries of polling. I do think this sort of research is one area where some degree of skepticism is never a bad thing. Data problems happen, generally with no ill intentions on the part of the researchers. Having a lot of eyes on the methods is the only safeguard.


Man, I sure do like you.


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## JRTomlin (Jan 18, 2011)

Adam Pepper said:


> It really doesnt matter much if the data is flawed or accurate. The article is all but useless. It starts by dismissing 10% of Amazon's book sales as "a piddling." How about putting a dollar value on that 10%? I doubt it's a piddling. It doesnt consider that the vast majority of book sales are going to a small number of already well-established authors and it makes no mention of what approach is more cost effective/time effective.
> 
> I love reaching readers directly. I have a small following of readers who communicate by email and actually anticipate my next release. My ego needs them and loves them. But those are onesy-twosy. With Amazon's outreach, I can reach exponentially more potential customers. It's not even close. There's nothing to debate. I certainly plan to continue to grow my e-mail list and build relationships with as many loyal readers as are interested in my work. But if I had a gun to my head and had to choose one approach? Come off it......am I going to reach a few readers one at a time or thousands of readers at once?


This I totally agree with.

Building relationships with readers is very wise, but the best way to find those readers in the first place is, to be frank, through Amazon. Then I build the relationship. It's not the other way around.


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## scottnicholson (Jan 31, 2010)

Looks to me like nothing more than

(A) Put on a tie and go to a big publisher conference and toss up a slide that verifies that, "YES! Publishers still have value and hope! Amazon hasn't won yet! Hooray, we all still have jobs and consultant fees!"

(B) Publishers applaud, all go out for German expense-account lunches.

All this reminds me of Steve Jobs claiming 27 percent of the ebook market (on a similar slide) and PW reporting a BN spokesperson saying their ebook sales were "on par" with Amazon's (which clearly would have been the publishing story of the new millennium.)

Everybody's got a dog in the fight. "Statistics" are the bone.

(Although of course it is good business to bring as many of your readers as possible into your email list/mediasphere. It's clearly not the only way.)


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## Adam Pepper (May 28, 2011)

Did anyone else notice this same Forbes writer blasted Leather, Locke et al in a previous piece for manipulating Amazon's algorithms? Now the algos are irrelevant? 

Which is it?


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## Edward W. Robertson (May 18, 2010)

WHDean said:


> For example, the data shows that a large portion of buyers are buying from top 100 lists. That's good. That means you can be discovered by getting yourself on a top 100 list. Getting yourself there is Konrath 101. It doesn't always work, but it's doable (e.g., through freebies, promotions, etc.).
> 
> But how do you get yourself the word of mouth that makes you a pre-planned purchase without *first * getting into one of the other channels? Who knows? Maybe it's magic or luck. So to tell self-pubbers that they have to gain recognition outside Amazon is to tell them nothing because no one knows how to do that. It's like that asinine get-rich-quick/how-Rowling-did-it advice where Step One is "Write a bestseller."
> 
> ...


Awesome post.

It's interesting to see the shopping data broken down. But the conclusion in that article is pretty crazy--and it's refuted by dozens of people right here whose careers and fanbases were built on the back of Amazon's recommendation engines.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

smreine said:


> Man, I sure do like you.


You're just sayin' that 'cause we're married.


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## Terrence OBrien (Oct 21, 2010)

> "I don't fault you for wanting the whole story, especially if you haven't seen similar findings before. But I fail to see how invoking other bad studies with bad methods somehow creates a prima facie case for scepticism in this one."


There is a case for skepticism of all such reports. That's why so many people in the business regularly report basic parameters along with results and references for those who want to review the methodology and internals.

Note how polls in the recent election frequently reported a margin of error and sample size along with the results. Drilling down in the internals often revealed data that those reporting on them either missed or ignored.

And the case for reliability is strengthened by invoking other good polls and doctorates? But all those bad polls shouldn't prompt skepticism?

We don't know if it is reliable. We need more information.


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## Elizabeth Ann West (Jul 11, 2011)

You know, the "Best New Artist" this year was the group Fun. They are on heavy repeat right now on my playlists. But, first time I heard them on SNL, I thought they sucked. I had to hear them again before I really liked their "Some nights" and bought the single. Then, I was playing that three days straight as I emptied out my dishwasher, singing "Ooooh, ooooh, ooo," stacking the glasses and tossing the silverware into the drawer. Finally, I bought the full album. Then I made sure to watch the Grammys just so I could see them perform again to decide if I want to try to see them live (I do). 

Moral of this story.... how do I attribute the purchase? Was is SNL? No, because if I hadn't heard them again (and I don't remember where, but it wasn't the taco bell commercial, I had the album by then), I wouldn't have bought the single. And I only bought the album because Amazon kept recommending it to me in my Music store based on my other purchases when I turned my Kindle on to clean.

Finally, turns out the Best New Artist has been at this gig for 12 years! :/ It just amazes me how quickly we have been able to "jump" to the head of the line with digital distribution as content creators.


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## James Bruno (Mar 15, 2011)

I've read every post in this long and very constructive thread -- and it makes my head hurt. If we were to distill lessons learned, here's what we'd get:

Indie authors need to play Amazon to the hilt while also getting their name and product out there via the myriad online resources familiar to us all. So, what else is new?


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## WHDean (Nov 2, 2011)

Becca Mills said:


> I agree with B., WHDean. I know that skepticism for the sake of skepticism can seem tiring, but data are so easily skewed, so easily misconstrued, so easily mishandled ... and then added to that are the vagaries of polling. I do think this sort of research is one area where some degree of skepticism is never a bad thing. Data problems happen, generally with no ill intentions on the part of the researchers. Having a lot of eyes on the methods is the only safeguard.





B. Justin Shier said:


> You can limit yourself to three basic reasons if you please, but my list will remain quite a bit longer. I've been burned by "authorities" greater than these, and I won't even begin to assess a data set until after I know how the information was gathered.
> 
> B.


Well, scepticism might be warranted if this was actually new. But it's just another "smoking causes cancer" study, so I fail to see the reason for the extreme caution. If you google "word of mouth" and some of the other terms like "pre-planned buys" you'll find a lot of research that says the same thing.

So, you can exercise extreme caustion around this survey if you want, but this survey is itself just one data point in a sea of pre-existing research that says the same thing.


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## Speaker-To-Animals (Feb 21, 2012)

> It really doesnt matter much if the data is flawed or accurate. The article is all but useless. It starts by dismissing 10% of Amazon's book sales as "a piddling." How about putting a dollar value on that 10%?


I put this earlier, but the number is $6,100,000,000

Amazon did 61 billion dollars in sales, so the piddling 10% is 6.1 billion dollars.


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

Katie Elle said:


> I put this earlier, but the number is $6,100,000,000
> 
> Amazon did 61 billion dollars in sales, so the piddling 10% is 6.1 billion dollars.


I will take a piddling .001% of that piddling 10% gladly if nobody else wants it.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

WHDean said:


> Well, scepticism might be warranted if this was actually new. But it's just another "smoking causes cancer" study, so I fail to see the reason for the extreme caution. If you google "word of mouth" and some of the other terms like "pre-planned buys" you'll find a lot of research that says the same thing.
> 
> So, you can exercise extreme caustion around this survey if you want, but this survey is itself just one data point in a sea of pre-existing research that says the same thing.


Oh really? I didn't realize that. I'll take a look -- access to a university library, and all that.

ETA: Google not turning up much for me. I'll figure out which databases index business research and have a look (I never search for this stuff).

FYI, it's not just that I think it's generally good to be skeptical about data; it's also that I'd just like to _know more_ about Codex Group's findings.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

Found one: A study reported on in _Publishers Weekly_ (5/23/2011, Vol. 258 Issue 21, p3-4, 2p)

Abstract: The article discusses the results of the report "2010-2011 U.S. Book Consumer Demographics & Buying Behaviors Annual Review" from Bowker PubTrack Consumer Service and "Publishers Weekly," which addressed issues on the way people buy books online. According to the annual review, only 11% of book buyers who bought a book online said they did so as an impulse purchase, while 44% claimed the book they bought online was the one they planned to buy. The report also found that people spent more money buying books online than any other channel in 2010.

A little dated, but the data match fairly closely, eh?


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## Terrence OBrien (Oct 21, 2010)

WHDean said:


> Well, scepticism might be warranted if this was actually new. But it's just another "smoking causes cancer" study, so I fail to see the reason for the extreme caution. If you google "word of mouth" and some of the other terms like "pre-planned buys" you'll find a lot of research that says the same thing.
> 
> So, you can exercise extreme caustion around this survey if you want, but this survey is itself just one data point in a sea of pre-existing research that says the same thing.


Skepticism is warranted because we are ignorant of the methodology employed. That's not extreme, just prudent.

Past results of other studies tell us nothing about the methodology of any specific study.

Data points should not be included in any set of reliable data unless they are the product of statistically sound methodology.

Presuming statistical rigor based on agreement of results with prior studies is not warranted. That would confer statistical rigor on a string of bogus studies simply because each agreed with the previous bogus study. That is error built on error.


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## Pnjw (Apr 24, 2011)

For me it's not so much questioning the data. It's more questioning the conclusions of the article and what type of questions were asked to form an informed opinion. For instance, all those people who found me from my free book likely downloaded it on a whim. Unplanned "purchase". Then the next two in the series are likely pre-planned purchases. Great. But I still built my audience by using the storefront. I didn't find it outside the store. So the conclusion of the article to not rely on Amazon or B&N to find my customers is bogus. 

Data is just that-data. But interpreting that data is subjective. That's what I'm questioning.


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## JRTomlin (Jan 18, 2011)

Deanna Chase said:


> For me it's not so much questioning the data. It's more questioning the conclusions of the article and what type of questions were asked to form an informed opinion. For instance, all those people who found me from my free book likely downloaded it on a whim. Unplanned "purchase". Then the next two in the series are likely pre-planned purchases. Great. But I still built my audience by using the storefront. I didn't find it outside the store. So the conclusion of the article to not rely on Amazon or B&N to find my customers is bogus.
> 
> Data is just that-data. But interpreting that data is subjective. That's what I'm questioning.


Exactly. I don't know the survey methods, but the data is very similar to what I've seen elsewhere. I have little or not problem with it, but the conclusions drawn from it were absurd. *shrug*

Honestly, it has drawn more discussion that it deserves.


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## WHDean (Nov 2, 2011)

Becca Mills said:


> Found one: A study reported on in _Publishers Weekly_ (5/23/2011, Vol. 258 Issue 21, p3-4, 2p)
> 
> Abstract: The article discusses the results of the report "2010-2011 U.S. Book Consumer Demographics & Buying Behaviors Annual Review" from Bowker PubTrack Consumer Service and "Publishers Weekly," which addressed issues on the way people buy books online. According to the annual review, only 11% of book buyers who bought a book online said they did so as an impulse purchase, while 44% claimed the book they bought online was the one they planned to buy. The report also found that people spent more money buying books online than any other channel in 2010.
> 
> A little dated, but the data match fairly closely, eh?


Sorry to leave you in the lurch with Mulder's answer to Scully (i.e., "the truth is out there"), but I don't keep a bibliography of this kind of thing. Maybe I should start.

Anyway, if I do see something that supports this case, I'll send it to you directly.


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## Guest (Feb 24, 2013)

Becca Mills said:


> Oh really? I didn't realize that. I'll take a look -- access to a university library, and all that.
> 
> ETA: Google not turning up much for me. I'll figure out which databases index business research and have a look (I never search for this stuff).
> 
> FYI, it's not just that I think it's generally good to be skeptical about data; it's also that I'd just like to _know more_ about Codex Group's findings.


You really aren't going to find a lot of these studies available for free online. Market research firms don't give away their work. This is their bread and butter. I have access to lot of studies through my job, but they are restricted access because my employer subscribes to these services. I can read them from my work computer. No, I won't copy the data and share it to appease anyone's curiousity as I don't want to get fired. I'll share general overviews (as I did in my previous post) but that's it. We also conduct some studies in association with clients through one of our divisions.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

Bards and Sages (Julie) said:


> You really aren't going to find a lot of these studies available for free online. Market research firms don't give away their work. This is their bread and butter. I have access to lot of studies through my job, but they are restricted access because my employer subscribes to these services. I can read them from my work computer. No, I won't copy the data and share it to appease anyone's curiousity as I don't want to get fired. I'll share general overviews (as I did in my previous post) but that's it. We also conduct some studies in association with clients through one of our divisions.


Yeah, I think that's true. In general, there's a huge amount of info available on the academic side of things. Academic databases and journals are also extremely expensive. Having access to a university library can enable you to get your hands on reams of info that is not out there for free general consumption. That said, I have yet to turn up a lot that's specific to the book trade, much less that's specific to Amazon. Academic research often moves slowly, so I bet there is more out there on the paid market research side, at this point.

I'm also inexperienced at putting together effective searches in business and marketing, so I might just not be finding what's there.


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## WHDean (Nov 2, 2011)

Becca Mills said:


> Yeah, I think that's true. In general, there's a huge amount of info available on the academic side of things. Academic databases and journals are also extremely expensive. Having access to a university library can enable you to get your hands on reams of info that is not out there for free general consumption. That said, I have yet to turn up a lot that's specific to the book trade, much less that's specific to Amazon. Academic research often moves slowly, so I bet there is more out there on the paid market research side, at this point.
> 
> I'm also inexperienced at putting together effective searches in business and marketing, so I might just not be finding what's there.


Yes, you should have access to a lot through the academic databases. You may have to pick up a few marketing textbooks and do an index search to narrow down the field a little with the right terms. Scholar's Portal works good (assuming you have it) because you can restrict the search by database, and then go by the keywords attached to the articles to narrow things down further. Start with "word of mouth; books."


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