Or, A Guide On How To Alienate YOUR Customers

Now this news is actually from last month. I somehow missed it last month when Engadget reported that this was happening but it was pointed out to me last night and I’m nothing but annoyed with the idea. I don’t care if you are lazy or enjoy not having 10,000 books around your place like myself or enjoy ‘being green’ but the eBook (and for myself the Kindle) has been a boon. I live in a condo in the city. I do NOT have room for a library. I enjoy having 1 decide that I can have all of my books on. So let’s take a look at what happened here.

Step #1: Embrace new technology, for this example let’s go with I don’t know- The eBook. Simon and Schuster was one of the first major publishers to not only embrace the idea of a digital book but actively encourage it’s use.

Step #2: Build a community and loyal readership. Kindle digital novels outsold physical books over this last Christmas. Sales overall are UP on digital copies. People enjoy them.

Step #3: Delay ALL digital copies of the novels you publish for 4 months after a hard cover comes out. I don’t get it. Are you worried that there will be less of a profit margin over the hard cover? You don’t have paper your printing on to cause that AND you can always jack the price up $5 on release for 4 months. That’s the concern is that they believe consumers will believe a new book is only worth $10 regardless of the media and sales will go down. I think I just addressed how to take care of that. Mark it up at the beginning. It’s NOT unheard of. Maybe you are worried about piracy? HELLO. DIGITAL COPIES OUTSOLD PHYSICAL COPIES OVER CHRISTMAS. Sorry. Bad excuse.

I’m pretty sure step #3 is the one anyone who has a business going should learn to avoid. Seems kind of like a practical idea.

The whole thing just gives me a headache that as a consumer I cannot get the novel I want to read on release date because you are purposely holding it back. I don’t care if you mark up the price to start with. It’s acceptable if that’s what you want to do. Just start doing it now not before the outrage that will ensue because of doing this and trying to do a markup later. I don’t know who in your marketing team pushed this idea and who agreed to it but they should all be fired. This is one customer who is not happy.