Book Marketing Mysteries: Meditations on Book Values and Pricing
- By Renee Roberts
Titles described in Jules Verne: A Collector's Biography of First Editions in English increase in value.
by Renée Magriel Roberts
Pricing books to sell on the Internet remains one of the real mysteries of this business -- a heady mixture of magic and a sort of subjective science. To price effectively, you really need to know what kind of business you have and what kind of business you want to have (a moving target, I admit). You may find many of these meditations contradictory or illusory, because the basis for book valuation is perhaps better described by the Pythia at Delphi.
If you have a physical store (especially those with comfortable leather chairs, long wooden tables, and a kind of hushed atmosphere, staffed by intelligent sales people), then many of these thoughts may not apply. Sales made in person are generally in the absence of Internet competition and therefore prices can not only be higher, but books can be sold which may otherwise have no value on the Web.
A broad search should give you a reasonable price range for used books in very good or better condition.
If I'm looking at a very good, used book that happens to be in short supply, I'll check two major markets: Amazon and ABE. I may choose to sell the book in both or one of these sites, or in another one of the sites on which we sell. If the book is in fine condition, I choose a price on the high side of the spectrum. Condition is truly a driving factor in value.
Good stuff sells and increases in value.
By "good stuff", I mean truly rare and interesting books. Because they do increase in value, their prices should be re-visited on a regular basis to make upward adjustments. For example: Lawrence Beesley, The Loss of the S. S. Titanic. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1912. First Edition. $600.00 in new full-leather binding.
Don't be afraid to just stick your neck out.
Sometimes there are no comparables. For example: Jules Verne, (Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea, Vingt Mille Lieues Sous Les Mers) Veinte mil leguas de viaje submarine. Madrid: Tomás Bey y Compañia, 1869. Complete with all full-size engravings. $20,000. Arguably the first edition of this work in book form, preceding the French first edition.
The value of a book is what an informed customer is willing to pay for it and what you are willing to sell it for, not what you think it is worth in the abstract.
We are not a bargaining culture, but bargaining is fast becoming the name of the game. If you are already selling a book for 8-20% commission on one of the commercial sites, you have some room for negotiation and many buyers know this. There are millions of listings, and then there are a smaller number of sales. Do you want to get your price, or pay your bills this month?
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Book Marketing Mysteries: Meditations on Book Values and Pricing
- By Renee Roberts
Lee may command a huge salary in the real world, but on the Web, his book is worth nothing.
Value is relative to the market in which you are selling.
Books with absolutely no value on ABE, for example, may not face the same competition on Biblio or ZVAB. You just have to decide whether it is worth the extra effort to check other markets to finalize your price.
Competition diminishes prices; therefore don't bother selling titles with huge print runs on the Internet.
Give books like this to your favorite charity: Lee Iacocca, Talking Straight. New York: Bantam, 1988. First edition, fine condition. $2.00. 169 copies in various states are currently on ABE. Anyway, would you rather sell one book for $200 or 100 books for $2.00 each?
High-priced books make other high-priced books look more valuable.
Would you rather buy your $100 book from a dealer with many other similarly-priced books, or from one with bargain-basement prices? Customers have to have confidence in the value claimed by the dealer.
Values increase with interesting catalogues of related titles.
Even if you're selling on eBay, it is better to sell similarly-valued books with related topics together, than to mix them up with less expensive and unrelated titles. There is a reason that rare book dealers develop catalogues. The longer customers spend with your catalogue, the less likely they are to seek your competition. Intelligently-written catalogues increase perceived value and lead to less competitive sales of related titles.
Value includes safety when purchasing on the Internet. Customers will pay more to ensure a safe and worry-free transaction.
Amazon is an excellent example of this principle. They sell a ton of new books at higher prices, even though Amazon sellers undercut them like crazy. Customers know that by buying direct from Amazon they're not going to have any problems. Problems take time and aggravation to resolve. Problems cost money.
Value includes speed and ease of purchase.
Customers are not driven to go deep into a web site to get a better price. I performed a personal experiment on this with a book I wrote: Paul and Renee Magriel, Backgammon (2004 edition). Harwich Port: Clock & Rose Press, 2003. I set up listings on Amazon's highest level page, as well as a significantly lower-priced listing on Amazon's z-shop, where I paid a much lower commission. I would say that 99% of my customers did not seek the lower-priced listing because they had no obvious incentive to go beyond the simple search that turned up the top-level page. With new books, this is also true if one compares Amazon to other commercial or private sites.
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Book Marketing Mysteries: Meditations on Book Values and Pricing
- By Renee Roberts
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Value includes clear and detailed product knowledge.
On many occasions we have been able to successfully price books higher because we took the time to discuss them competently. If a customer wants to deal with another person who understands their desire to purchase this particular book, an excellent listing can not only drive the sale but increase value.
Good used books will not retain their value unless they are truly rare. The values of good used books have a very short Internet shelf life.
Both Amazon and Alibris allow you to look at your older listings and compare them to current prices. It is shocking that books competitively priced a few years ago have entirely lost all their value because of the increasing number of listings and sellers entering the marketplace. Therefore, we routinely re-process all of our older listings and we've pretty much stopped buying general stock, focusing instead on rare books. If we had a bricks-and-mortar store, however, our strategy would be different.
In addition to current market pricing, values derived from previous sales can serve as benchmarks.
Internet book sales are not like auctions; they are very much "in the moment". Historical book sale data, however, is very important in approaching auctions, as well as in avoiding major listing errors. Historical book data can also add weight to your pricing decisions.
While there are buyers for books all around the world, in general, values are culture-driven. Books are worth more in the culture to which they relate; conversely they can be worth less in cultures to which they do not relate.
If listings are put on the Internet directly from local stores, without comparing pricing to the worldwide listings, there may be bargains to be found by buying from out-of-the-way locations. Conversely, prices are higher by selling in the market (and with the requisite language interface) of the book's author or subject area.
Values increase with the addition of value-added services.
Like many rare book dealers, we routinely search for titles. We also develop bibliographies and have a publishing company that creates custom books. These kinds of services are not affected very much by the rare book marketplace.
Values increase in positive feedback-driven environments.
Pricing can be less competitive if you maintain a high feedback rating on places like Amazon and eBay.
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Book Marketing Mysteries: Meditations on Book Values and Pricing
- By Renee Roberts
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There is a herd mentality in pricing.
That's why there are so many books with similar prices. It may have nothing at all to do with what they are "worth".
The market can be manipulated. You're not in Kansas anymore.
Dealers can buy up their competitors' books if a lower-priced listing is depressing the price they wish to charge. Auctions can use shills. Dealers can agree on prices they wish to post for rare titles.
The Emperor has no clothes: Beware of paying too much for and overpricing mediocre books that happen to be in fashion momentarily. This is a particular danger in buying and selling modern first editions that are bestsellers.
In a decade, nobody will be very interested in a signed first edition of The Bridges of Madison County. Currently with a ridiculous range of $30 - $910 on ABE, Bridges is already showing severe market weakness.
The dealer who has the best customer can charge the highest price.
I don't dream about winning the lottery. I dream that I've won one of those shop-til-you-drop prizes -- a few hours with a very large shopping cart at Bernard Quaritch, Heritage, or Bauman along with unlimited access to their customer base. Some dealers can charge pretty much whatever price they like. You will have to charge less. Don't bother using them as comparables; they have customers you do not have.
And related to the above:
Bend over backwards to establish relationships with your customers.
If you have warm, respectful, ongoing relationships, you can charge fair prices for your books with minimal competitive pressure. Your profitability goes up significantly with subsequent purchases from the same customer.
Ren? Magriel Roberts can be reached at renee@roses-books.com
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