An author friend of mine couldn’t figure out why he was having so much trouble selling his new book. He had a respectable list of published books to his name, a regular schedule of speeches and workshops, and a solid platform in print and broadcast media.
So on a hunch, I looked him up on Nielsen BookScan, an industry service for publishers that reports actual book sales by ISBN number at retailers across the country.
There was the answer in black and white. The sales figures for his last book were dismal.
He was shocked at the news, certain that the numbers were wrong. In fact, he was only dimly aware of BookScan and didn’t really understand what it was or how it worked.
Big mistake.
BookScan numbers are like an author’s credit rating
All book publishers (and some savvy authors) subscribe to Nielsen BookScan. The very first thing an acquisitions editor does is check a published author’s Nielsen numbers, when considering a new submission.
Nielsen BookScan tells the naked truth about how many copies a book sells. It produces weekly tallies via electronic links to thousands of cash registers across the country. This is no guess or anecdotal report. It’s all ka-ching, straight from the till.
The numbers may as well be carved in stone.
“We only report what we receive from cash registers, and we never change our numbers,” said Jim King, the go-to guy for book publishers at Nielsen in a phone interview at the company’s White Plains, NY offices.
“The book may have sold additional copies, but not through our reporting outlets. An author’s book might have sold at non-reporting retailers like Wal-Mart or book clubs, but we have no way of including that. So there’s no way anyone can request us to change an ISBN report.”
Recent BookScan results may determine whether a book is acquired
The most recent Nielsen numbers will therefore have a powerful impact on whether or not a book is acquired in the first place, since publishers take these numbers as indications of the new book’s potential success.
Poor recent numbers may put a damper on a publisher’s enthusiasm to sign up your major new opus. I’ve known authors with a long track record of success slip into a marginal status with a single recent sales failure.
Brutal but true.
How Nielsen numbers impact bookseller orders
Even if a book is ultimately appealing, recent low Nielsen numbers will impact the all-important realistic projections for the new book’s potential sales.
This can affect not only the advance, since most publishers predicate the amount paid on signing on projected first year sales — but also the first printing. That’s because sales reps know that the major accounts will also consult Nielsen as well as their own internal records to determine how many they’ll order of the new title.
In some case, they may actually pass. That’s right, book buyers may skip ordering any copies at all if the author’s last book had unimpressive performance numbers.
How Nielsen collects sales data
Nielsen says that they cover about 75 percent of retail book sales in the United States. In a typical week, they track sales of more than 300,000 titles by their ISBN numbers, at nearly 13,000 retail accounts in the United States, including Amazon, the national chain stores like Barnes & Noble, Borders, Books-A-Million and 450 independent bookstores (extrapolated from 1700 total.)
Other sales outlets include some big box discounters like Costco, Target and K-Mart. Recent additions are some “non-traditional” book retailers like Starbucks and Toys “R” Us.
Keep in mind that Nielsen’s 75 percent of total is an average, depending on where each individual and unique book actually sells. In cases where a book sells primarily in normal retail outlets, the report may be closer to 100 percent accurate.
All this means that we have weekly access to honest sales figures that can’t be altered by agents, publishers, or authors themselves.
A loophole – not all sales are recorded
But as Jim King told me, there’s a caveat. BookScan’s numbers don’t include sales from every source. Wal-Mart sales, for example, are not included. Non-traditional retailers like gift stores and other specialty shops that include books in their product mix aren’t usually hooked up to Nielsen.
Nielsen may also capture fewer sales when significant quantities of your book are sold primarily through the mail, or book clubs, or when the author sells the book directly at non-book store events like trainings and workshops.
Keep in mind also that BookScan didn’t go live until January of 2001, and didn’t begin accumulating data until that time. So Nielsen won’t have data on books published before then.
This loophole gives authors an opportunity to provide a more accurate picture of their total sales record — if they have the documentation to prove it.
My advice to authors
If you have good BookScan numbers that pop up all bright and sparkly, no problem. If, on the other hand, your most recent book fell a bit on its face, you’ll need to anticipate and come up with a defensive strategy.
1. Be prepared: Know your numbers
Writers can subscribe to Nielsen themselves, for a price: $5,000 a year for total 24/7 access to all titles in the system. A better deal for just finding out your own book’s sales history is $85 for a single ISBN number.
You can contact Nielsen directly to order an annual or one-time report at this address: . That way you won’t be blindsided by any surprising numbers.
You can also get this information through your editor and publisher.
2. Check your past royalty statements
If you don’t have copies of your statements, ask your agent or publisher. The statements should provide an accurate analysis of your recent sales and where they came from. That information can be significant if you have substantial sales from non-traditional outlets or bulk orders bought for non-bookstore channels like corporate premiums, schools, or your own public events.
One catch, however, is that royalty statements usually include a “reserve for returns”, which means that you don’t get full credit for all copies shipped until enough time passes for all potential returns to come back to the warehouse.
Some publishers, especially when accounting for mass market paperback sales, take as much as a 50 percent reserve and wait one or two years before accounting fully. Or, as is frequently the case, maybe you didn’t sell as many copies as everyone told you. Your advance may have never earned out, and therefore the accounting may have been cursory or incomplete.
3. Have a dynamite proposal or manuscript
One of the best ways you can overcome recent negative numbers, of course, is to have a dynamite proposal or with fiction, an irresistible completed manuscript.
Remember, no matter what you hear: Publishers are still in the acquisition business, turning out a new list every season, looking eagerly for the next big thing, the terrific book, the first novel with promise of many others to come, the fabulous original or compelling non-fiction proposal.
One author’s solution
In my friend’s case, mentioned above, he was able to explain how many books were sold at his workshops and trainings and found some old royalty statements going back before Nielsen started counting.
The total combined numbers added up to a better risk, and he was ultimately able to find a publisher who liked what he wanted to do and was willing to take a chance.
Your BookScan experience?
If you’ve had a Nielsen Bookscan experience, please share — we’d be interested to hear about it.
I have had three books on Amazon since 2010. and I am not seeing any sale points. However, there are resale’s on copies of my books. How does this happen and what can I do to find out about sales?
Another problem is sales overseas. I’m in the UK but largely published in the US and Japan, as the Nielsen UK site only includes books published in the UK and the US site doesn’t show overseas sales, any titles I promote and sell in the UK of the American edition are ignored. This system also makes it very hard to represent the whole range of an author’s output. Considering how narrow the “pond” between Britain and the US has become now, with online retailers selling overseas editions at pretty well the same price as locally published titles, it’s a shame that the tracking technology hasn’t kept pace.
Just a note for Amazon/Createspace authors out there. If you login to your Author Central page you have FREE access to Nielsen BookScan data. Click on the SALES tab.
Thanks so much for this post. I’m wondering whether the numbers Bookscan would provide for $85 would be any different from those I can get on Amazon (for a book that just came out — in 2014).
lmb,
Amazon is only reporting sales on Amazon. Clearly your book has also sold in other retail outlets: book chains like Barnes and Noble, Books a Million; small independent book stores of which there are still hundreds across the country; and in big box stores like Walmart and Costco.
Congratulations on a good sale in a short period of time.
I realize I’m coming very late to this party, but I want you to know how helpful this post has been to me during the first months after my book launch. My book came out in April of 2014. It’s now July. Amazon Author Central tells me I have sold 3,473 books. My publisher told me this afternoon that I’ve sold 10,373. Quite a discrepancy!
Great post, Alan. I talked about Bookscan in my book Hooked a few years ago and your post is right on the money. The problem with it is like you stated–it only covers POS numbers. This can really hurt authors. For instance, my own Writer’s Digest books have both earned out their advances within six weeks of publication, but their sales aren’t reported as many sales were through the book club, Amaazon, B&N online, etc., which aren’t reflected. As I understand it, mainly sales from brick and mortar box stores are recorded. It’s a problem with many agents. I was sitting in an agent’s office one day when he got a call from a publisher on a client’s new book proposal offering (not mine), that they were turning it down as their accounting dept. had seen the Bookscan figures for his last book and they weren’t good enough. The agent just happened to have that client’s last royalty statement in his hand when the publisher called and the figures on that statement were over three times more than what Bookscan reported. He was furious and told the editor what he had in his hand. The editor said he completely understood and sympathized and said he knew they underreported true sales all the time… but his hands were tied. It was his publishing company’s (a Big Six pub) ironclad policy to always go by Bookscan when deciding on a new book, even though he was well aware of how flawed they were. The agent told me this happened all the time and he didn’t know how to combat it. He said everyone in the industry was aware of their incomplete and inaccurate reports as to actual sales, but accounting ran everything and they always went by Bookscan. He fights it sometimes, by showing them other, truer figures, but he admitted he didn’t have the time nor resources to do it for everyone and even when he did, he often lost the argument.
What’s a writer (and an agent) to do? Actually, this might be an opportunity for someone to start up a new company that takes ALL legitimate sales numbers to create a true picture of sales… Entrepreneurs…?
Alan, this is excellent information and the added comments by Steve equally helpful. Would you consider adding a ‘tweet button’ to your blog, so that we can more easily pass the info onto others?
Thanks for the post!
Best wishes,
Patricia
As a balance against the claims of publishers Bookscan could be very useful. It’s naturally scary to authors with unimpressive numbers, but if it’s to exist then it’s good we know about it and find ways to utilize it. Thanks for the post!
@m s,
I think you’re missing the point. Bookscan exists because it is an unbiased aggregator of book sales. If bookscan contacted the publisher, there’s a possibility the publisher could provide inflated sales numbers for a variety of strategical reasons.
As for enacting YAL (Yet Another Law), I’d rather continue to rely upon the efficient self-policing rules already built into the publishing market instead of looking to of all organizational bodies the federal government. Fraud of the sort you’re referring to is nonexistent within reputable circles of the publishing industry.
Jason
Hi, I believe you could be 100% accurate by simply contacting the publisher of any published book. Keep in mind who produces the book, and has to record total number of books sold at the years end! If I wanted accurate numbers, all bookscan has to do is contact the publisher. I cant see why it’s more important that bookscan has the facts on sales, but not the author who wrote the book? Instead of auditing publishers, I think a law should be set in place that all publishers have to provide the IRS, reports on all sales of every title, so authors aren’t cheated royalties due them, where’s their protection?
Publishers are the only source of Bookscan numbers for an author, other than paying Bookscan the reasonable one-time fee of $85? For authors who dispute their royalty statements, this is a problem.
This article was very enlightening and I thank you for sharing the information and doing such a thorough job.
I was fortunate enough to become lead title for my publisher as a debut author in mass market paperback and had 3 books released back to back in 2008. I learned a lot from the experience. And with a new series starting in 2009, I’m hoping to expand my knowledge base. And your single ISBN report is a great idea. Thanks.
In 2008, I subscribed to the discounted RWA Bookscan for the top 100 romances and looked at it religiously after my 2008 releases, but have reconsidered renewing my subscription because Bookscan only represents 25-30% of my total sales. I had 3 books released in 2008 and had painstakingly gone over these numbers until I got my first royalty stmt. My publisher had also provided sales to me by contacting their 10-12 key accts and they also got Walmart numbers in their totals (which is 35-45% of my total sales). (And the smaller wholesale markets–airports, drug & grocery stores, etc–are harder to get on a timely basis.) Getting reliable sales numbers in a timely manner is next to impossible, from my experience, without Wal-mart reporting.
And with regard to selling at workshops without a bookstore transacting sales. Because I do speaking engagements where they request I sell books on my own, I’ve negotiated a special rate (40% discount) from a local indy store that I love. It allows them to make a little money on my wholesale transactions and I get official sales off the books I buy from them. I can purchase through my publisher at a steeper discount – 50% – but those sales don’t go against my official numbers. So I’ve chosen to handle my own sales this way to support my local indy store as well as have my purchases become a part of my official sales numbers. This might be a helpful tip for your readers.
Thanks again for your great article.
As an independent niche publisher with full distribution, I know that BookScan catches about 25% of our sales. I monitor sales all the time, but I only compare apples to apples–within a given set of similar books, I can gauge their relative success in comparison to each other. However, I am cautious about drawing conclusions between books with dissimilar topics and probable distribution channels.
RWA members can purchase a subscription to Bookscan’s top 100 romances, a very useful tool and well worth the very modest price. My agent provides my bookscan numbers to me. I can see where I’m selling well (or not) There’s also Publisher Alley, which provides sales figures for books distributed by Baker & Tayler, I believe. This is also available to RWA members for a modest cost. Combining these reports can give you a better idea of how things are going for you and for books similar to yours.
What a great blog this is, and with so much handy info. Thank you for writing it. Is there any way to find out which independent bookstores Bookscan surveys? Wouldn’t it be a good strategy for an author to do events at such stores over others and/or encourage people to buy from a “Bookscan” store?
Hi Steve (Weber),
I checked with Dennis Halby at Nielsen, who confirmed that they aren’t yet capturing ebook sales into the BookScan system. He said, “We are actively working towards that goal but currently do not have an ETA as to when we will be able to include this data in BookScan.”
He also confirmed that BookScan tracking does require an ISBN number.
-Alan
Hi Steve-
Thanks for your cogent advice to authors about ways they can build their BookScan numbers to more accurately reflect their total sales. I wouldn’t call it gaming though — just smart strategy.
-Alan
Also, if you anticipate buying and handselling a bunch of your own books, consider getting a reseller account from Amazon or Ingram (who will report the sale to BookScan) rather than using the author discount your publisher gives you. You may lose a few percentage points of profit margin this way, but it will pay dividends by making you and your books look more successful in the trade. I have worked with NYT bestselling authors who game the system this way, it is even more critical for 1st time or midlist authors.
There are ways to inflate your BookScan numbers. E.g if you are speaking at a conference, have conference bookseller order your books from Ingram (who reports to BookScan) rather than from you or your publisher (who do not report). Also…if while waiting to get your trade manuscript (novel, etc.) published, you write some books for non-trade markets (textbooks, school library books, etc.) consider using a pseudonym for those.
Alan, thank you for a extremely informative article.
Does Bookscan include any sales information on e-book sales? Until recently I suppose this was negligible, only 1% or 2% of the publishing business. But Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos two weeks ago claimed that 35 percent of Amazon’s unit sales are now Kindle editions (as long as you’re counting only those titles available in both Kindle and hard copy). Amazon is perhaps 15 percent to 20 percent of the trade book market today, but I believe they influence many more purchases elsewhere because of the information available at their site (customer reviews, recommendations, etc.)
Another complication I can think of: many of the titles Amazon sells in Kindle edition format don’t have ISBNs. If Bookscan requires an ISBN for a book to be counted, this could get complicated.
Excellent overview, Alan. I spent years in the online media business and have had to answer the “well, if it’s not accurate, why should I care?” question for years.
Yes, the numbers are misleading. In BookScan’s case, they miss out on sales made at a huge retailer of books — WalMart.
But understand that the numbers are _equally_ misleading for all titles. It’s not just that WalMart’s sales are missing from *your* book, they are missing from _every_book.
In other words, they are an index. If one book shows 200 sales via BookScan and another at 400, it can be assumed — with a high degree of certainty — that the second book outsold the first 2-to-1. Keep in mind (and here I’m talking to this site’s audience more than you, Alan) that the decision makers are looking at book sales _comparatively_ amongst other titles.
The metric matters, people. You may not be able to do much about it, but it matters none the less.
Great post. As a publisher, I use bookscan continuously. It’s very much part of the acquisition process, not only the author’s previous books, but competitive books, etc. Spot on.
I know my Bookscan numbers, but how do I put them into perspective? And how do publishers and booksellers? If my first book had a tiny print run, but I sold it out, is my 1000 on Bookscan lousy or great?
Hi Anahita-
Publishers and retailers use Nielsen BookScan because it’s the only source of honest real cash register sales and is usually 75-90 percent correct, so it’s not difficult to extrapolate up to a more accurate total.
Why would publishers turn to BookScan rather than to their own internal numbers? In many cases publishers need sales figures for books they haven’t published themselves, as I’ve described in this post — and BookScan supplies that information.
Also in my experience, internal numbers are not always 100 percent accurate since they never seem to catch up with returns, statements get lost, and the accountings are incomplete or have mistakes in them.
You’re right about what your friend should do. She would definitely sell more books in the back of the room immediately before or after she speaks, and that’s exactly how most writers I know do it.
-Alan
Hi Jon-
Nielsen is eager, I’m told, to sign up as many participants as possible. They do have-big box stores on board, and are aiming not for a cross-section, but rather a full accounting.
I can only assume that Wal-Mart has not joined on because they march to their own drummer. Wal-Mart is a special case for publishers. They may place a large order for a single title, in the tens of thousands, but on a test basis. If the books don’t perform quickly as expected, Wal-Mart may return them within a few weeks. On the other hand, if it all works, they can sell a lot of books and results can be important.
Also, keep in mind that Wal-Mart features mainly big blockbuster mass-market titles plus a few books relating to cooking and home repair. So authors who are trying to figure out if their BookScan numbers accurately reflect their total sales, need to keep in mind where their titles are sold. Wal-Mart may not be a factor.
-Alan
As I think about this further, it is making less sense to me. Please correct me if I see this wrong. The publishers have access to the accurate sales numbers, the authors have access to their own numbers, then why resort to a system that is inaccurate and expensive and limits the sales?
A friend of mine who is an author, and has seminars in many places, puts her books and CDs in the nearby bookstores and not in the place that she speaks. Now wouldn’t people buy more if they could buy right there after the seminar?
Imagine if your credit score would be good only if you used a certain credit card, or shopped at certain stores?
So I fail to see the reason why this system is used.
I guess you do learn something new every day. I never heard of this either. But if Nielsen ignores many major outlets (I’d say Wal-Mart is fairly major) how useful can it be? It seems they ought to try to collect a good cross section of types of markets (big box book stores, Amazon, independents, deep discounters) for a more accurate accounting. Do these places simply refuse to participate? I understand that they can’t count sales at shows or out of the back of a trunk – but Wal-Mart?
~jon
I had never heard of Nielsen Bookscan before reading this post. In fact, last year, as part of a research, I went to our public library and asked the reference people how one could find sales figures for a particular book. I think they had not heard of it either! Thanks for the information.