Playing The Numbers Game

When I first became serious about writing, I didn’t pay a lot of attention to things like numbers. I just focused on the writing. After a close friend sold, I watched her change from a rational person to an obsessed writer. She checked her sales numbers more often than she took a breath—okay, so I’m exaggerating, but only a little. Then the magic day came when I got the call and I had to ask myself, should I be concerned about numbers? And if so, what numbers? And how do I know what they even mean? Is there some numbers guide class that I missed ?

That got me to thinking even more about numbers. Does ‘numbers’ mean actual sales or rankings? Does a New York Times bestselling author have preferential status over a debut auhor because of her ‘numbers’ track-record? Do editors and agents even care what my ‘numbers’ are?

When I started this article, naively, explaining the numbers game was my goal. I discovered it might be easier to explain which came first—the chicken or the egg.

If there is a numbers guide out there, it eluded many hours of research and discussions with authors, editors, agents, and booksellers. The more I looked, the more curious (and confused) I became. The more questions I asked, the more different answers I received. Does anyone understand how these numbers work? I decided to go to the sources and publishing houses directly and ask questions, which should clarify things, right? Well, we’ll see.

Leah Hultenschmidt, editor at Dorchester Publishing, states “Even though we don’t always like to talk about it, publishing is a business whose goal is to make a profit. So as much as we’d like to say that numbers have no bearing on a great book, the reality is that they do. Advances, royalties, and new buys are all based on an author’s previous sales. If an author is looking to switch to Dorchester from another house, the first thing I do after reading the proposal is have our sales department check her track record at their accounts. All book buyers base their orders on past sales, no matter what publisher the author is writing for. While disappointing sales figures won’t necessarily break the deal, they can present a bit more of a challenge.”

Sales numbers continue to be important after an author’s book has been bought by a publishing house.

“It’s important for us to track how our authors are doing in the marketplace,” Hultenschmidt says. “We have to keep a close eye on the numbers so that we can make whatever adjustments are necessary to keep growing that author’s career. If a book suddenly takes off, we want to know so that we have enough stock and can follow the surge in sales with appropriate promotions. If an author is not showing growth, we have to know that too so we can figure out what needs to be changed. Is it a problem in just one account? Is it the cover? The content? The numbers can help us gauge where we need to focus our efforts to get an author back on track.”

Noting the direction of an author’s sales figures is only the beginning of the job of the publishing house staff in regards to numbers. When they identify the direction of sales, they have to then consider how to respond appropriately.

“We do look at the sales figures to see if they’re growing, if the numbers are going in the right direction, and if they’re not we really analyze why,” says Jennifer Enderlin, vice-president at St. Martin’s Press. “It can be caused by a variety of reasons: packaging, content of the books, competition within the area she’s writing. We take it on a case by case basis and see what the story is.”

Lots of things beyond an author’s control influence her numbers. It’s important for publishing companies to track this information so they can avoid negatively impacting an author’s sales in the future.

But what about category authors? Should they be concerned about numbers, too? Or is numbers importance limited to single title houses?

Let’s see what Brenda Chin, Senior Editor at Harlequin, has to say about numbers. “When we’re purchasing an author previously published by another house, I don’t let numbers influence me too much. After all, there are a lot of factors that influence those numbers, and there’s no way we can know what actually happened. However, if that author hit a list (USA TODAY or NYT) we definitely take that into consideration. As for our own authors, yes, we keep an eye on their numbers and consider them before every new contract. After all, if an author is consistently selling less than everybody else in the line, there’s a problem. Maybe she’s writing for the wrong line? Maybe her name/pseudonym isn’t connecting with readers? Or maybe she just isn’t telling the kind of story readers want? There are several solutions to these concerns, but it’s only by watching the numbers that we can spot a negative trend before it becomes a real problem.”

Clearly, numbers are important to both single title and category editors. And, let’s face it, what’s important to editors is important to authors. So, how can an author determine what her numbers are?

There are a few ways that an author can track numbers.

Ingram. Ingram is a wholesaler that supplies bookstores, both online and traditional brick-and-mortar stores. Ingram has a great, automated way for authors to check their sales numbers, which are actual sales, not a ranking number. Call 1-615-213-6803 and enter your ISBN number, followed by the pound sign. You’ll be asked to enter the number for the information you want to know. Entering the number 3 gives you all information,--stock, sales, and demand. Stock information is the total number of books on hand across all Ingram warehouses and the warehouses the title is actively stocked. Sales and demand information includes the total number on order, the total number on back order, the total unadjusted demand for the current week, the adjusted demand for the last week, total number of sales for this year, and the total number of sales for last year. Multiple authors told me their Ingram’s numbers consistently represents about 5 percent of their total sales, but this can (and does) vary and isn’t a set amount or percentage.

There are other businesses similar to Ingram, such as Andersen New, LLC. Unfortunately an author friendly number tracking system isn’t currently available. Still, with supplying more than 40,000 retailers in the United States (can you say Wal-Mart?) with magazines and books, Andersen News, LLC is an important supplier and impacts author sell-through and point-of-sale numbers.

Amazon.com. Amazon’s numbers are a ranking, and it’s easy enough to check one’s numbers. Just click on your book, scroll down, and you’ll find the current day’s number and the previous day’s. But what does this number really represent? Entire theses and many articles have been written on the subject with different hypotheses being made on how Amazon’s ranking is determined. All offer educated guesses, but none definite conclusions on Amazon’s magic formula. Amazon refuses to release the information, but it is not based solely on actual number of sales. Velocity of sales, overall number of sales, and expected sales within certain time frames are believed to play into the numbers.

Being a best seller on Amazon means a particular book sold a higher number of books within a certain time frame--this could be as short of a time period as an hour. The Web is filled with programs that “teach” authors how to become a best seller on Amazon with prices for such classes ranging from a few hundred dollars to several thousand dollars. Essentially these programs buy into having all your friends, relatives, mailing lists, and all acquaintances’ mailing lists buy your book from Amazon within a short time frame (usually a 24- hour period) by giving an extra incentive to those who email receipt of purchase during that time frame. Some programs offer their mailing lists and the mailing lists of their former clients.

Amazon has been criticized because of this loophole in the way its numbers are determined that allows such manipulation of numbers. Others praise a way for “savvy” authors to boost themselves onto a best-seller list.

Barnes & Noble. Same as with Amazon, you can go directly to the Web site www.barnesandnoble.com and pull up a book’s ranking. Barnes & Noble keeps the way their numbers are calculated secretive, as well. Again, it is theorized that the numbers are based on number of sales and projected sales within a certain time frame.

Waldenbooks and Borders numbers are a ranking. Reportedly, Waldenbooks and Borders account for around 30 percent of the romance market. Titles are bought about four months in advance and how many are bought is determined by print run, imprint, and, you guessed it, track record. Sue Grimshaw, romance buyer for Waldenbooks, Borders, and Borders Express, says this in regards to numbers “As buyer for Romance at BGI, previous books sales are, for the most part, taken in consideration when buying an author's next book. If the stories are related, part of a trilogy or series, the new buy heavily relies on the previous books sales. If it is an unrelated story, then the previous books sales are just part of the criteria we would use in determining a new book buy. Overall, at BGI, as long as the authors books are all written in the same genre, the sales of previous books will be considered, if she is crossing genre's typically the sales are not considered.”

An interesting side note is thatWaldenbooks and Borders recently joined up with Amazon for their online sales.

BookScan. Launched in 2001, BookScan is often considered the most accurate indicator of what an author’s sales numbers really are other than direct from the publisher. Nielsen BookScan compiles its numbers from point-of-sale data. This means that the list is compiled from cash register sales (whether that be online or in a physical store). Each week, participating retailers send Nielsen a sales file of data scanned during purchases. About 70% of sales are now recorded via this method.

Purchasing BookScan’s information is expensive, but let’s say an author wanted to know how a particular book’s sales were going. The Web site, www.thebookstandard.com offers a program called Book Sales Research Service that’s powered by Nielsen BookScan. You can purchase a report for a single title that provides a year-to-date sales figure for any edition of any book from January 2004 to the present. The report contains the total sales for the given week and current year-to-date sales of the book. The report is broken down into units sold in retail stores and discount/other stores, sales in eight different geographic regions, and a city/suburb breakdown. The Web site offers a sample report. Currently, a report can be purchased for one title at $85, two titles for $145, five titles for $340, and ten titles for $600.

There are numerous other numbers lists out there (ranging from those compiled by local and major cities papers to Web sites to bookstore chains) that I haven’t mentioned due to the limited scope of this article.

So, what does all this number stuff mean? In theory, a book can sell 100,000 copies yet never hit a best-seller list if those sales are spread out rather than achieved during a short amount of time. Amazon numbers can be manipulated to drive a book to hit their bestseller list. And most of the numbers/best-seller lists maintain highly secretive formulas for determining their ranks/lists—which is probably for the best as otherwise online courses offering to teach manipulation of these numbers would abound as well. BookScan or directly from your publisher is the best source for true numbers.

We’ve established that numbers are important to editors and publishing houses, but are they important to agents? Yes, but as with editors, it’s just one aspect of how they view an author.

Pamela Harty from The Knight Agency says that “Numbers are important to an agent, particularly sell through numbers, but what really counts is an author’s writing.”

I have to agree. Write a great story and the numbers should come.

TABLE 1. Numbers:

Sales number: The number of books that have actually sold. Examples: Ingram

Ranking number: This is a ranking based upon multiple factors determined by the owner of the ranking system (with the exception of BookScan and smaller lists that use a point-of-sale system to determine ranking). Examples: Amazon, New York Times, Barnes & Noble, etc.

Sell-through number: The ratio of the number of books sold to the number of books printed expressed as a percentage. Example: First book run of 40,000. Actual books sold is 30,000. 75 percent sell-through.

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After winning the first ever AMERICAN TITLE contest,2003 Golden Heart finalist JANICE LYNN celebrated the release of her debut novel JANE MILLIONAIRE (Love Spell) in December 2005. Currently, she’s working on her next release for Mills & Boon Medical, serving as PAN Liaison for From the Heart Romance Writers, blogging at http://janicelynn.blogspot.com and not obsessing about numbers—well, not too much, anyway.