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At the Bookologist, we like to emphasize specifics, the nuts and bolts of selling books, over more general bromides that pass for sage advice, such as "buy low and sell high." However, sometimes I think it's helpful to back away from things and look at the larger picture, to examine principles that, after all, breed the specifics in the first place. Sometimes it's helpful as well to back away so far that we stop talking about books altogether. Take a more global view, then return to the business of books with a clearer purpose.
That's exactly what I'm going to do today; in fact, I'm going to talk about something that has no relationship with books whatsoever - pearl necklaces - then apply certain principles involved in their manufacture to the job of selling books.
If you've ever thought about process of making a pearl necklace, it might have occurred to you that there are two directions to come at this from:
- Take a string in one hand and apply the individual pearls to it with the other.
- Line up the pearls in a row and try to pass the string through them.
Well, it's obvious that #1 is by far the easier approach. Start with the string; apply the pearls. If you start with the pearls and go to the string, well, pearls are round. They roll. Taking the second approach, as the process of lining them up proceeds, the holes would almost inevitably be bumped out of line and require realignment, probably again and again. Also, strings (or chains) are flexible. You might get the end of one through the first hole but what about the next? Near impossible. It seems almost silly to try.
So far this seems simple enough, starting with a sort of framework and adding to it, and it applies to so many things we do. Building a house, cooking a meal, even writing a letter. But does it apply to bookselling? To your bookselling?
What exactly is the string in a business sense? It's vision. A controlling idea. Something around which everything grows. If the string is long or has a large diameter or is comprised of solid gold or silver or platinum, this will affect the kinds of pearls that are chosen to make it into a necklace. A solid gold chain would necessarily demand pearls of high quality; silver (to some eyes) or platinum are perfect for setting off black pearls; large pearls require chains that are stout enough to hold them, and so on. Decisions are made, in other words, on the basis of the vision which precedes them.
If there is no vision to begin with, results are often less than satisfactory because the controlling factor is no longer the composition of the string; it's the number of pearls. Once the pearl diver has found enough pearls, in other words, manufacture of the necklace can commence immediately. This isn't always a good thing, even in the short run, because it doesn't take into account the importance of pearl matching, which may have more to do with the ultimate value of a necklace than the pearls themselves.
Example: how many booksellers dive into the waters of estate sales, used bookstores and library sales and grab oysters only because they're oysters, then use whatever type of pearl they happen to find in them to feed their business? Yes, they may dispose of the shells which contain no pearls, but they're still left with a group of pearls that often bear no resemblance to each other. What kind of necklace does this make? Not an especially valuable one.
Here's why. A necklace with small pearls only can still have value. It's quite possible, that is, to make a go of things selling only low-dollar books. It requires a certain thread/vision to succeed, however, one based on low-dollar investments in inventory, minimal but clear sales presentations, and exceptionally efficient fulfillment. These strategies, however, aren't necessarily valid for selling higher priced books, which might require higher investments, more elaborate presentations, and substantially more personal customer relationships. As long as the appropriate vision controls the activity, things have a much better chance of working out.
Another possibility: the necklace may consist of pearls of differing sizes and values, and yet, if the pearls are properly matched and arranged from small to large, there can be a stunning result. This is equivalent to the bookseller who specializes in a genre or topic, selling both high- and low-dollar titles. Buyers will more often than not perceive an enhanced value in a book offered by a dealer who is both specifically knowledgeable and experienced in the field.
Some disagree, of course, that any vision is necessary, that a stubborn refusal to be defeated is enough to win the day. So much of life, after all, involves taking what we're given and doing the best we can with it. When this topic first came up in my life, well over twenty years ago, I was talking to a friend of mine, at that time an aspiring scientist, about the difference between inductive and deductive thought. Inductive thought starts with pearls and attempts to arrive at a necklace; deductive thought starts with the vision of a necklace, then searches out particular pearls to make it happen.
My friend theorized that a scientist trained in inductive thinking would no doubt attempt to overcome the problems associated with the #2 method of making a necklace by, say, dipping the string into liquid nitrogen, freezing it so that it would readily pass through a line of pearls. For stability, the pearls themselves could be lined up in a groove. Problem solved? Perhaps, but the resulting necklace would bear more resemblance to a paint-by-number painting than a Van Gogh, and we know what this would mean in terms of dollars and cents.
Problems most often arise when there is no vision, and fixing them is just as often frustrating and ineffectual. Otherwise valuable books may be deposited in a groove of substandard presentations, which very directly affects how much they will benefit the seller. Conversely, if low-dollar books happen to accumulate in large numbers (and they will), too much attention may be given to them on the assumption that an upgraded presentation will produce a sale. Lavish time on them no matter what they're worth, is the thinking, no matter how your life is affected. Can you spell ... stubborn?
It isn't wrong to sell cheap books, expensive books or anything in between. You can succeed by emphasizing any one of them, separately or in combination. But if there's no controlling vision, where are you?
You are at the mercy of strategies formed by involuntary, external reactions to a marketplace that you have no control over.
It's far better to exercise control, to look inside, decide on an approach in advance of acquiring inventory and use that approach to shape your purchases and how you dispose of them. This is what gives your business the foundation it needs to grow on, the clarity of purpose it needs to impact your buyers, and its ultimate success.
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