Writing Ethics 4: Amazon Ranking and Best Seller Status
July 25, 2007 by Lillie
This post is a follow-up to my last three posts and continues a conversation at Grow Your Writing Business.
While this topic didn’t come up in the original discussion, my thoughts extended to one more issue that bothers me. Do you really know what it means that a book is a bestseller?
One of the most common ways for a book to become an Amazon bestseller is to use a technique developed by a book promotion company that sells an expensive program to make books bestsellers. Lots of authors copy the technique on their own, and at least one book marketing guru promotes this concept.
Since a book can be called a bestseller if it hits the top ten (I believe it’s ten; it might be a higher number) in its category on a single day, the gimmick in this program is to generate huge sales of the book at Amazon on a specific day , usually the day the book is officially released.
To generate those huge sales, the author (or the promotion company) sends mass e-mails and enlists other people to e-mail their lists offering incredible bonuses for ordering the book from Amazon on a specific day. I’ve seen claims of more than a thousand dollars in bonuses for ordering a $15 book! Of course, the bonuses are $297 e-books, $29 special reports, $89 software, etc. – downloadable products that are assigned outrageously high value but have little or no direct production and distribution costs.
The customer places the order at Amazon on the specified day, e-mails a copy of their receipt to the author or promotion company to prove it, and receives a link to download the bonuses. The sales for the book are enough for it to be called a “bestseller,” most of the time in a category (though the authors don’t say that). In one specific case I know of, the book was second only to the latest Harry Potter book at the time on its launch date. The author can then promote his book as #2 at Amazon.com, even if there is never another book sold on Amazon!
Do you think that’s fair?
Of course, “bestsellers” in general often sell far fewer copies than the general public realizes. Every bestseller list uses different criteria and sources, but the major lists (New York Times, USA Today, etc.) primarily track sales only through larger distribution channels in specific time periods. The sales aren’t necessarily sales to retail buyers; some lists track sales to bookstores. A book can be a bestseller based on the orders shipped to chain bookstores for the launch date, even though many of those books may be later returned.
I’ve heard that about one-third of all books “sold” to bookstores are returned. Books are really placed on consignment in bookstores with the option to return them if they don’t sell. For mass-market paperbacks, “returned” means the cover is stripped from the book and sent back to the publisher for credit, and the rest of the book is discarded. Imagine that a third of the books published are filling up landfills every day without ever being read by anyone.
Books can acquire bestseller status from a particular publisher or bookseller (either overall bestseller or bestseller within a specific genre). These books can be legitimately called bestsellers, even if the book was the bestselling historical novel at ABC Publisher. While consumers may not realize that a “bestselling book” or “bestselling author” may have actually sold far fewer units than a title that isn’t a bestseller, the authors or publishers aren’t manipulating the system.
But when an author bribes customers with outlandish bonuses to buy the book at Amazon.com on a specific day so the book can become a bestseller … I call that manipulating the system.
What do you think?
Related Posts:
Writing Ethics 1: Fake Testimonials
Writing Ethics 2: Voting in Readers’ Choice Contests
Writing Ethics 3: Reviews
[tags]writing ethics, Amazon.com, bestseller lists[/tags]
You’re on a roll Lillie. This has been an interesting and thought provoking series. The Amazon manipulation is certainly an eye opener.
Sounds like quite a racket to me, Lillie! It reminds me of floating checks, in that it, too, is manipulating the time factor for personal gain–only, unfortunately, unlike check floating, it isn’t illegal.
Thanks for a very enlightening post!
Jeanne
This series is quite interesting. I’d love to comment on all of the entries, but I don’t have too much to say, as I agree with you all the way. It’s amazing how people behave in certain circumstances. It all makes me wonder: when is the madness going to end?
Lillie,
I was in a meeting with five authors last Friday and this topic came up. I shot the whole scheme down and one author looked at me and asked why I thought it was a bad idea. My simple answer to him is that the process is manipulative and unethical. I had an author put on her cover a banner that said “Reviewed by a New York Times Best Selling Author” with everything in a small, hard to read font except “New York Times Best Seller.” How unethical is that? But this is the main reason people will give away $1,000 gifts to sell a $15 book. Authors desparately want to be able to say they have a best-seller. But what good is having a “fake” best seller?
[...] To find out more about this Amazon book promotion technique visit Lillie’s site by clicking here. For more information you might want to check out this site, [...]
It is more than just disturbing to see that ‘bestseller’ status can be manipulated on amazon. It spells doom for ardent readers like me who’ve been taking the bestseller status as the ultimate benchmakk.
shilpy,
It’s sad to think that some people do this … but people do things like this in all walks of life every day.
But is this not against all the ethics? Why can’t anything be done to prevent all this.May be the bestseller award forums can come forward and do something to avoid all this?
jen,
I don’t know anything about bestseller award forums—have never heard of them, so I can’t address your question.
The bookseller doesn’t object because its goal is to sell books, and these campaigns obviously generate sales over the short term. The promotion company makes money on the promotion. The author gets to call himself a bestselling author, and that status probably generates future sales. Other authors who don’t participate in this kind of campaign aren’t necessarily hurt because most wouldn’t make bestseller status even if the one book being promoted this way wasn’t a bestseller on that particular day.
Consumers may be better off using something other than bestseller status to determine what books they buy. Reviews and contest wins can be manipulated, too, as discussed in other installments in this series. I prefer to choose books based on reviews from reviewers I trust (such as book bloggers and Goodreads reviewers I have read enough to know their taste) rather than customer reviews at Amazon, etc. And I really like to read excerpts—often available from the publisher or author Web site, from Google Books, or Search inside the book at Amazon, and similar programs.
Impress post, I will be more selective.
.-= Sharon@Audiobook´s last blog ..First Look: Kindle 2 Underwhelms =-.
Sharon,
I like to make my book buying choices on the basis of reviews and excerpts. Those are more reliable than bestseller status and rankings.
Not only is this not illegal, Jeanne, people pay a lot of money to a publicity company to do it!
Thanks, Mig. What amazes me is not that people behave unethically, but that unethical behavior is promoted as good marketing.
It’s amazing what people – not just authors – will do. I advocate that authors promote their books in a variety of ways, as long as the methods are not manipulative and unethical. But deceptive practices like your example of “reviewed by a New York bestselling author” … all I can do is shake my head.
Well, we should really define good marketing and differentiate it from ethical marketing. If unethical behavior sales it is, in the end, good marketing. That’s as long as the consumers don’t care about “the ways.”
True. There is a difference between “good” marketing (meaning effective) and “ethical” marketing.
There’s a lot of controversy about this, but the company that originated the concept is a well-known book publicity company. It has been taught at book marketing/promotion seminars and is advocated by one of the book promotion gurus (and possibly more than one).