Price Point on eBooks
I found my price point on ebooks. That is the point where I think the price is too high for the book and I refuse to buy. I had just read a very nice murder mystery which I had purchased at a sale price at eBookwise. The book was published by a small publisher, direct to ebook, by an author I am not familiar with - nothing wrong with that as it stands.
However, after finishing, and enjoying the first book I wanted to read another mystery by this author and that is where I hit my price barrier at anything above US$7.00. The actual book was $7.50 and I choked. Sorry, even though I liked the author's writing, and his fictional detective I consider $7 to be a bit high for a mass market paperback let alone an ebook for an unknown author. Also we are not talking about a big thick novel here.
Sorry, call me a snob, but I will pay bigger bucks for a Tom Clancy, Steven King or Dean Koontz blockbuster because I know those authors and I pretty much think that they can command that kind of money for a paperback. I do not think an unknown author, from an unknown small press, in ebook format can command the same prices. Here is the real shame: I was standing there (figuratively), cash in hand and ready to buy, actually hunting for more books by this same author when I saw the price of $7.50. If it has been a paperback I might have bought, but for an ebook I felt the price much too high.
I would be a lot more willing to try new authors by small publishers in the $4 - 5 range than I would at $7 and above. When they publish at $7 I can find much better deals at the used bookstore down the street.
Now I still want that book, but I am going to wait until the next general discount sale before I buy it.
So what is a fair price for an ebook? How should ebooks be priced?
4 Comments:
I agree that the price of some e-books is insanely high. Especially when the e-book version of a title costs as much as its hardcover edition. I'm not inclined to pay more than a paperback for a book, and even that seems high to me when I see how much mass markets are being sold for these days.
Then again, I grew up without easy access to a bookstore (other than the book rack at the local grocery store) and so got all of my reading from the library. I never grew up buying books so I always experience a bit of sticker shock when I go into the bookstore. This is aggravated by three years work in a used bookstore that afforded me a nice discount on top of used book prices. I don't think I'm cheap (although I could be wrong) I am just used to paying lower prices over all for books, e- or otherwise.
Raechel Henderson Moon
I'm also with you on this one, Brad. I can't understand the justification for the prices of an ebook to be equal to those of a paper book. Come on, the cost for maitaining a site for selling books, plus the licenses for whatever the DRM can't be even close to comparable to the price of printing batches of pbooks. It does seem like a ripoff. Especially if you consider that at least a pBook looks good on the shelf. You can't really say the same thing for a CD full of ebooks.
Prices should come down.
Hi! I know I'm coming to this party late but I just got here after googling for a "cheap ebook reader". That was a waste of time as it turns out but at least I found your blog and I've had an interesting time so far, so thanks for that!
The DRM aspect of ebooks puts me off paid downloads. Here's a scenario - suppose I download a book for five bucks and it's really great, so I tell people about it. With a physical paperback I can lend it to them, or I can tell them to get it out of the library or suggest they go pick it up at the second hand shop or, indeed, sell them my copy.... you see where I'm going with this. With the ebook all I can do is suggest they go buy it.
Now the actual reason I was googling for a ebook reader was because someone pointed me at the Baen free library project, which pretty much blew my mind. So from there I went to look at their webscription service and I just thought it was real neat. I already pay a sub for DVD rental, for a newspaper and a couple of magazines, so adding an ebook sub isn't going to break the bank. Plus the downloads aren't DRMed, so if I wanted to I can share the odd book with a buddy. I don't see a problem with that - your mileage may vary, but if at the end of the day Baen picks up another subscriber because of it would anybody be getting hurt? I basically want to pay for my ebooks, I just want to pay a reasonable amount and end up with something that has all the functionality of a physical book.
The Baen free library is worth a look if only for the Eric Flint editorials "Prime Palaver".
http://www.baen.com/library/defaultTitles.htm
The editorials tailed out in 2002 but the Janis Ian (Palaver 11) article is a must read.
Thanks for the comments that Bean free library looks good.
For a low cost ebook reader I recommend the one available from http://ebookwise.com You can upload your own content or buy new books through the store.
Otherwise, your best bet is a good PDA. You can find good deals on them at Amazon and Overstock.com
I hope that helps.
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