I had the “handover” meeting just now with Sam Pearce of SWATT Books. Sam showed me, via video-conference, how to navigate my Ingram Spark account. Including how to order a print run of my book, and how to see reports on my sales in Ingram Spark’s markets (US, UK, Australia). In the course of this review of my Ingram Spark account, we learned I have sold 12 copies of the book in the one week it has been published!! Three copies were sold in the U.S. and a whopping nine copies were sold in the U.K.!!! This is amazing to me, and I am beyond thrilled! Thank you Samantha!!!
Finding a New Distributor for My Book
Well, after realizing that if I “pressed go” with Amazon KDP as a distributor for my book, I would need to get a new ISBN, and would require an additional new ISBN for Ingram Spark as a distributor to “brick and mortar” bookstores, I thought — “Wow, I am in over my head”! So I just stopped. I didn’t know what to do, so I did nothing. I realized that Amazon still has about 50 copies of my book, so they could fulfill the occasional order. There didn’t seem to be any urgency to act. However, I certainly couldn’t do anything to promote my book, since there were only a limited number of copies available for distribution.
Luckily, and serendipitously, my friend Judy connected me with a woman by the name of Barbara Boldt. Barbara is writing a book and working with “book coach”, Susan Steele. I met with Susan about my interest in creating a financial wellness workshop from the content in my book. In that conversation, I spoke with Susan about my “distributor issues”. Susan connected me with Samantha Pearce. Samantha works in the U.K. Amazingly, she specializes in working with people just like me — self-published authors who worked with small distributors which subsequently went out of business!! I had a wonderful “ZOOM” meeting with “Sam”, and became convinced that she was very, very knowledgeable. I have signed up with her and she will be working with me to create a second edition of my book, under my own imprint, secure the required ISBN’s, and establish the paperback and electronic listings on Amazon and Ingram. I’m thrilled I will be working with Sam and I look forward to the next phase of promoting and selling my book.
Book Distributor went Chapter 11. Now what?
My home town book publisher and distributor, Thomson-Shore, has gone into re-organization, and has cut out a lot of the services they had been providing. Leaving me to find a new book distributor. I determined to move to Amazon KDP for book and e-book distribution to Amazon customers (meaning Amazon will print the books rather than ordering them from another company), and to Ingram Spark for distribution to brick and mortar stores. Signing up with Amazon KDP has been more complex than I anticipated but I’m almost there. Then will tackle the move to Ingram Spark.
Every step of the way, this has been such a learning process — the writing, publishing and distribution of the book. It’s what I appreciate, really. The learning and growing. Since my husband died, I’ve been figuring out what’s next. I feel like I still don’t know “what’s next”, but am creating it as I move forward. Building the bridge as I cross it. It’s funny — when you are a kid, you know what’s next. When you’re a young adult and when you are starting a family, you have an idea of what’s next. But this is new territory. When you’ve raised your kids, had a career or two, and then have been widowed, the path is not so clear. What are the tasks that remain to be accomplished? Sure, you need to provide for yourself and be there to help your kids, friends and community. But are there life tasks to accomplish? What are they? Remaining a contributing member of society is one, I think. Does it have more to do with “being” than with the “doing” which was so critical to every other stage in life?
Back to the book — I presented to a group at the end of April and it went great. Once the new book distribution is set up, I plan to approach a local radio station or two about being interviewed. See how I like that!