At BEA, I talked with fellow booksellers a lot about our website: its design, how best to format events calendars and what to do with the store blog. Sooner or later during these conversations, they would lean in close and lower their voices, asking, "But are you actually making any money from it?"
A fair question, given my last column. But the answer is a cautiously optimistic yes. And the main reason is a bit surprising: we stopped trying so hard to sell books.
When we launched the site and for a couple months thereafter, we tried to increase awareness about the site and sell books, primarily by discounting and offering free ground shipping on orders over $50. Free shipping seemed to increase the amount of any given sale, but not necessarily lead to a sale in the first place. Discounting resulted in a few extra sales but not nearly as many as we would have seen if the discounting had been in-store.
So we turned our attention elsewhere. Much as Bananagrams and journals have helped bookstores keep the doors open in tough times, there are a number of nonbook items that can help get a website on its feet and running:
1. Sell branded items. For us, this has primarily meant tote bags. Other stores have done much more. Vroman's, Pasadena, Calif., has a page not just of Vroman's-wear, but items related to Pasadena and other custom T-shirts for book lovers. Fire Petal Books, Centerville, Utah, just introduced a line of T-shirts and totes called Team Literary (for those who would rather be Team Darcy than Team Jacob). Idlewild Books in New York City showcases its great globe collection. There are umpteen-places to buy books on the web. There is, as far as I know, only one bookstore that sells a pint glass with its logo.
2. Sell tickets. Many of us ticket events for high-profile authors, usually including the price of the book in the price of the ticket. Selling tickets online has helped us lessen confusion over the phone and in the store. It also reminds regular customers about our website and introduces first-time customers, folks who are fans of an author but who don't know about WORD, to a new side of our bookstore. (One example of how we do this is our page for a July 13 event featuring Chuck
Klosterman.) Many people are still shocked to hear that an independent bookstore has a website at all. Can you imagine their pleasant surprise when they realize they can sign up to see their favorite author through said site?
3. Create wedding registries, baby registries and book drives, an idea that came from a customer. There are plenty of couples who would rather have a shelf of cookbooks (or dystopian fantasy) than a matched gravy boat set. You've got the customer service and beautiful gift wrap---put it to use! In our case, I created a separate web page for each registry that we could unpublish after the wedding. Here's a current one that has a nice twist: guests are buying books that will end up being donated. Along the same lines, we've been working with tireless literacy organization ReadThis to help get classroom sets of necessary texts into schools. ReadThis looks for individual donors to help buy books that teachers have requested. We handle all the sales and keep track of what's left, and once the set is purchased in full, ship the books to the teacher. Here's the current drive, again with its own webpage.
4. Selective special offers. I'm not certain we should discount at all online---not when anyone with an Internet connection is one alt+tab from checking out competing prices--and I've found that offering a 20% discount with a coupon code doesn't push sales. But one promotion worked very well. Inspired by a customer's tweet that we should do something for Mother's Day called "WORD to Your Mother," we offered free wrapping, a note and free shipping for all online purchases made in May before Mother's Day. This netted far more sales than we would have gotten in that period and probably made some moms very happy.
By doing things online that we do in the store--sell our tote bags, sell tickets, help the community and have special offers for holidays--we help expand what we love about WORD onto the web, which means that our regular customers have more chances to visit and support us and that we are reaching a larger base of future customers.
A curious thing has happened as we've moved from pushing book sales and towards expanding other parts of the site: book sales have increased. Whether it's the law of bookstore qi transplanted to the web or a matter of increased Google juice, more people are buying books on our website. Most of those orders are for pick up in-store, which is perfect. We keep telling customers that they get the best of both worlds: they can shop online whenever they want and guarantee that the book they want will be waiting for them, but they also still have the serendipity of the browsing experience and help keep their neighborhood bookstore in business. The second most popular book order is from folks out-of-town who are having something shipped nearby. Which tells us that our customers know we have a website and are telling their relatives, even if they're not always using the site themselves.
So, yes, our website is paying for itself. But what else should we all be doing? What is working for your website? And if this isn't enough to convince you---what would? --Stephanie Anderson, manager of WORD, Brooklyn, N.Y.