UK Ebook startup calls on publishers to "do a Pottermore"

[stonetools]

Matteo Berlucci of Anobii is calling on publishers to go around Amazon and sell direct to consumers:

When Pottermore launched their ebook store at the end of March, the publishing industry stood still and watched in amazement. Pottermore did something that no one had dared trying before: they forced Amazon to send customers to their site to buy their ebooks.

Some publishers had been thinking about it in the past but concerns about the consequences this could have created to their revenues in case Amazon disapproved and retaliated proved too big to overcome. Controlling the purchasing stage of the user journey is extremely valuable not from a financial but from a strategic point of view: who sells the ebook owns the relationship with the customer.

Pottermore showed that if you are big enough you can actually do it. This precedent is extremely important as it has shown to publishers that if they were to go down this route they could potentially succeed in shifting the power form the retailers back to them.

LINK

Analysis by Mike Shatzkin and comments HERE

Money quote:

The question for the first publisher that wants to try this will be whether the power of a Big Six publisher to compel Amazon to play along is as great as J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter franchise. It’s a really scary thing for them to do. After all, Rowling had zero digital revenue to protect and zero responsibility to anybody else for delivering it. All the major publishers have triple digit millions of dollars of Kindle revenue at stake and thousands of authors counting on them to deliver it.

But with Barnes & Noble now funded (by Microsoft) for battle for the next several years and Kobo and Apple committed to the fight as well, there’s a serious question as to whether Amazon would feel as comfortable going forward without one of the Big Six’s ebooks the way they have been willing to work without those from IPG.

My take? Macmillan has already put its oar in the water going DRM free with Tor.com and its already successfully faced down Amazon once. I predict Macmillan and maybe Penguin will go for it in the next 2 years. Anyone in the UK knows anything about Bertolucci? Discuss

[HarryT]

This would be a very poor move from the perspective of the consumer. Amazon is a "one-stop shop" for eBooks; I don't want to have to go to Macmillan's site for Macmillan's books, Penguin's site for Penguin's books, etc.

[vaughnmr]

Oh boy, can't wait for that one to happen! I've tried repeatedly over the last 2 years to have a single big 6 publisher to respond to me, hasn't happened even once. Now you think I want to buy from them? You should go look up "customer service" and see what that means, then come back and tell me how this could be a good thing.

[piperclassique]

How hard can it be to visit different sites? Click a bookmark or go by Google. No buses, driving, parking.....ok, need to use paypal or a cc but physical shops have checkouts too. Stand in line and wait or remember a password, which is easier?

[BeccaPrice]

If I have to start visiting different shops, it's all the more reason to break DRM and back my books up on my computer.

[ucfgrad93]

Originally Posted by HarryT

This would be a very poor move from the perspective of the consumer. Amazon is a "one-stop shop" for eBooks; I don't want to have to go to Macmillan's site for Macmillan's books, Penguin's site for Penguin's books, etc.

Agreed. I don't want to have to search for a particular book's publisher then go to the publisher website and buy it. I just want to search for it and buy it from the same place.

[mr ploppy]

Given how many visitors/buyers Amazon have I think they'd be daft to do something like that. With a few exceptions, people buy books by writers not publishers.

[elcreative]

Originally Posted by HarryT

This would be a very poor move from the perspective of the consumer. Amazon is a "one-stop shop" for eBooks; I don't want to have to go to Macmillan's site for Macmillan's books, Penguin's site for Penguin's books, etc.

Great thinking... a one stop shop for people without Kindles who have other readers that use ePub or similar... I have never bought an ebook from Amazon as they use a format I don't want and can't be bothered with changing (and many people are not familar with de-DRMing and format changing) so not having Amazon as the "one-stop" shop seems like a very good idea...

[AndrewH]

Assuming the publishers are willing to work with Amazon and other e-retailers ala Pottermore, I don't see what the big deal is. Go to Amazon, find "Harry Potter", click the link to buy from Pottermore.

[murraypaul]

Originally Posted by piperclassique

How hard can it be to visit different sites? Click a bookmark or go by Google. No buses, driving, parking.....ok, need to use paypal or a cc but physical shops have checkouts too. Stand in line and wait or remember a password, which is easier?

Buying them from Amazon is easier.

[Irish Lion]

Pottermore is a unique situation, because Potter fans will visit it for reasons other than shopping. Most books won't have that luxury, so it would just be an inconvenient move from one big shopping site (Amazon) to a bunch of smaller ones.

Plus, J.K. Rowling can defy the system because she's J.K. Rowling. Most of us... aren't.

[laughingdragons]

This would be good for non kindle users such as myself. Just means putting them in my favorites folder. Easy enough. I buy most of my books from kobo anyway, but if I could get it directly at better prices even better.

Better prices is the key word.

I've only been getting free books from amazon just in case I get a kindle in the future. Which could happen now that they got rid of that keyboard.

[stonetools]

Originally Posted by HarryT

This would be a very poor move from the perspective of the consumer. Amazon is a "one-stop shop" for eBooks; I don't want to have to go to Macmillan's site for Macmillan's books, Penguin's site for Penguin's books, etc.

All you would have to do is put the book's title in the search box and press Enter. It wouldn't really be all that much different from now.
And before long, there'd be an app for that. In fact, apps , not websites, may be the way for publishers to go.

That said, I'm ambivalent. I think that publishers should focus on publishing, by cracky. Contrary to popular MR belief, the BPHs carry out important functions, -finding, developing, and bringing authors to market- and I'd prefer they focus on those functions rather than getting into retailing.
Like it or not though, publishers feel threatened by Amazon-with good reason, if you look at the IPG mess -and so they are looking to get around Amazon.

[murraypaul]

Originally Posted by stonetools

All you would have to do is put the book's title in the search box and press Enter. It wouldn't really be all that much different from now.

You'd need a new account with each publisher. Each probably with slightly different password rules. You'd need to enter your payment details seperately with each publisher, and change them all each time your card expired. You'd have to deal with N different rules about returns, N different customer service departments. You'd need N different gift card balances, and couldn't move money between them.
None of that sounds very appealing as a cutomer.
Amazon have done well expanding into so many different product lines because people like being able to get everything from one place.

[stonetools]

Originally Posted by vaughnmr

Oh boy, can't wait for that one to happen! I've tried repeatedly over the last 2 years to have a single big 6 publisher to respond to me, hasn't happened even once. Now you think I want to buy from them? You should go look up "customer service" and see what that means, then come back and tell me how this could be a good thing.

PUblishers do B2b, not B2C , so its not surprising you don't get a response. THey would have to re-orientate themselves 100 per cent to to develop the kind of feel for the consumer and customer service chops that Amazon has now. That said, its possible. Apple did it and they have been very successful. But everybody ain't Apple.