Ebook Bundles Anyone?

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by neilmarr

Slashed cover price apart, a single bundle of titles would allow for easy cataloguing in your libraries and devices and it also allow us to cut story catch-up prologues title-by-title as a series develops and to drop the closing pages we used to carry in each title which were actually the first chapter of the pending sequel as a taster. Less bulk in the collection but flowing continuity. New bundle cover art but original cover on each book within the bundle. We'd also be able to title the bundles themselves rather than the individual novels within them. For example 'The Beldina Lawrence Mysteries -- books one to four', 'The Petronicus Legacy -- books one to three', etc, etc. N

This really does sound more like omnibus editions, which are also good (e.g. Baen's recent omnibus editions of the Vorkosigan series).

I think that a 40% discount for the omnibus over the individual volumes sounds OK, given that the individual volumes are already reasonably priced.

I'm slightly concerned about the idea of changing the omnibus contents over time. That seems like a lot of work, and a lot of confused customers. I'd suggest that you plan on either two or three book omnibuses, and don't try anything like you describe: getting to a five-volume omnibus and then splitting into two three-volume omnibuses.

If you have a big series, it might well be worth releasing the first one as a free book, to introduce the series to new readers. This should also help to sell the omnibus editions to new readers. (They're more likely to buy the rest of a long series if they've read the first one.)

You might even be able to persuade webscriptions to add your SF/Fantasy free ebooks to the Baen Free Library, they do have some from publishers other than Baen, which would expose your books to a wider audience.

[GraceKrispy]

I love bundles. In fact, I would much prefer to buy in bundles that offer an overall discount than to buy title separately. Bundling has caused me to buy some sets that I wouldn't have bought otherwise.

[Ravensknight]

By bundles, do you mean 3-4 separate book files, all for one purchase price? Or one Gie-Ganto file?

I would buy the first, not the second. My Lord of the Rings are 3 separate books. I find it much more managable to deal with 3 separate books than 1 very large one.

and for a 5+ series, definitely individual books.

Good luck

[FizzyWater]

Originally Posted by Ravensknight

By bundles, do you mean 3-4 separate book files, all for one purchase price? Or one Gie-Ganto file?

I would buy the first, not the second. My Lord of the Rings are 3 separate books. I find it much more managable to deal with 3 separate books than 1 very large one.

and for a 5+ series, definitely individual books.

Good luck

I've bought both kinds of these, and I agree that I prefer the separate file "bundles", although it doesn't stop me from buying if they're in a single file.

I did notice some boneheaded "bundles" recently from one of the Agency 6 publishers that actually cost a tiny bit more than the individual books. For example, one had 4 books at the fixed 7.99 price. The bundle was 31.99. Yes, it's only 0.03 more, but it seems to me the whole point of the bundle was to give you a little discount to catch up on the author's backlist.

[j.p.s]

Originally Posted by FizzyWater

I did notice some boneheaded "bundles" recently from one of the Agency 6 publishers that actually cost a tiny bit more than the individual books. For example, one had 4 books at the fixed 7.99 price. The bundle was 31.99. Yes, it's only 0.03 more, but it seems to me the whole point of the bundle was to give you a little discount to catch up on the author's backlist.

It's a convenience fee.

[fjtorres]

I've bought both bundles and omnibus editions in both print and ebook.
A long time ago in my university days, I ran into a bundle offer from Berkley SF for a boxful of paperbacks (60, I think) for the price of 10, pretty much sight unseen. Took care of a whole summer's reading almost by itself. And, of course, I have dozens of book club editions that combine multiple volumes into one edition.

In more recent times, I've bought into Baen's webscriptions (all), an occassional Nightshade bundle from them, and most of their single author introductory backlist bundles. Some of the discrete volumes in the bundles are omnibus editions.

As I see it, an Omnibus collects multiple volumes by a single author that can be presented as a single narative or arc, whereas bundles are simply a marketing/discounting move. Both are welcome, but if you are doing any editorial mods, "omnibusing" would make more sense, as I don't *think* you'd want to carry two editions/versions of the same volume, one for discrete sale and the other for bundled sales.

[Freeshadow]

One of the great advances ebooks have in comparison to paper is that, omnibus editions are not limited to what is still possible from a bookbinders perspective. I think it's a major point indeed.

[CazMar]

I like those bundled packages and they would work well with fiction, especially genre fiction (eg - all the detective stories by one author)
I wish someone would bring out all the works by Arthur C Clarke or Evelyn Waugh in a bundle - they are hard to find as ebooks but are not quite old enough to be in public domain. There are probably quite a few authors like this where works are about 30-50 years old and usually only available as 2nd hand pbooks.

[Ransom]

Not with modern authors. I can't think of many worth bundling. Orson Scott Card's Ender quartet would make a great bundle. Arthur C Clarke's 2001 series would work. I haven't read an author in the past ten years that I wanted to buy another book by though except for Susanna Clarke, but she'll probably be another ten years writing it.

[Fbone]

The title and description would have to make it clear that you are purchasing multiple books. And please list all the titles and sequence if a series.

When the author writes number 4 which wasn't included in earlier editions, will a new omnibus be created?

[neilmarr]

The idea is to bundle a minimum of three and a maximum of four, when two later titles are available for bundling, we'd split the collection into two bundles of three.

The aim of cutting superfluous pages (prologues to explain earlier books in a series and black pages that contain the first chapter of the next book in the series) is to keep meaningful content intact whilst also keeping the file size acceptably small so that three or more full titles and their individual covers can be included in a single, quick download with a single new ISBN.

After reading your invaluable comments here, I'm undecided about the word 'omnibus'. Like so many established words, its definition is becoming blurred in the brave new world of internet technology and subsequent language development.

I get the feeling that 'omnibus' is more aptly applied these days to 'completed' series, trilogies and collections of works by authors now in the public domain. These are all relatively new books (none first published over five years ago) and will not necessarily include a 'full' series but those earlier titles that lead up to a latest release in a running series. Some bundles would also nclude earlier stand-alone novels by prolific authors who tend to produce a new title every year. We have several pro authors who do just this.

Your advice on this wee point would be much appreciated, but I'm leaning more toward 'e-bundles' with a brief one-sentence description as to what exactly they are.

Many thanks, folks. As always your input is like striking gold in a maze of dark and confusing mine tunnels. Best wishes and happy July 4 to all friends on the far shores of the Shining Big Sea Water. Neil et al

[fjtorres]

e-bundle is a nice, short-n-snappy way of describing what you're trying to do.
You might even want to bill them as "catch-up e-bundles" so you can list them as companions to the new release.
And if you want to provide a single-file download of discrete volumes to take advantage of the psychology of "many for one price" there is always the zipped folder, which would let you throw in promos like high-res cover images for wallpaper, a newsletter, an anthology of sample chapters of other similar authors, etc). And that would also take care of the multiple sku issue.
Lots of tricks can be played once you start thinking of the bundle as a promo tool.

Which reminds me that in the old days many publishers *used* to do all sorts of consumer-level promotions, newsletters, grab-bag bundling, etc. Stuff like the Ace doubles... Or DAW numbering their releases...

With ebooks lowering entry barriers, maybe we'll see a return of creative book retailing.

Good luck!

[banjobama]

I have never bought an ebook bundle. While I appreciate the money saving aspect, I would rather spend less money at first, get one book, and go back for the rest later than I would spend more money at first to get three books I may or may not like. I might buy an ebook bundle if I already knew I would like the books or I was already a fan of the author. I guess if I'm not sure I'd like all the books, I don't want to buy all the books. Then again my to-read list is so long that I'm not strongly motivated to lengthen it.

[RichL]

No bundles here. Seems to me that quite often what I'm reading is a books worth of story line stretched to a three or four book length. Not always mind you, but often enough that I wouldn't buy as series sight unseen.

[CRussel]

Being a frugal Canadian, I am always looking for ways to save a few $$ on my eBooks. And both bundles and omnibus editions are a good way to do that. I've bought both from Baen, for example, but admit I prefer bundles (ie, separate downloadable files for each title), even when the books in the bundle are all from the same author and series. The advantage is management and organization. That being said, the discount for omnibus editions is often steeper, and that does have its appeal.