How Does IngramSpark Work? How Do They Get My Books Out To Retailers? | Self-Publishing in 2021

so how does ingram spark work so this is a real question i've actually received from clients and from commenters here on this channel so i'm going to take a moment just break down what ingramspark is how they operate and how they get your book out to retailers stay tuned [Music] hi i'm mk williams i'm an author and independent publisher i love sharing my insights about all things self-publishing with you before i get started on today's topic please be sure to click the subscribe button below so you can be here every week as i release new videos on all things self-publishing and making a career out of being an author the question that has come up several times in the comments on this channel as well some of my client calls is people want to understand how ingramspark works right so a lot of people are familiar with the idea of kindle direct publishing you're publishing directly to the amazon network it's on amazon amazon does it and so it's that one-to-one retailer to distribution relationship right the same thing with google play books i publish to google play books my book shows up on google play books one-to-one relationship i think a lot of people understand that it's when they get into these aggregators like ingramspark that they start to wonder how does this work so ingramspark is a subsidiary of the ingram publishing conglomerate i don't think that's the official term but they they own a lot of different subsidiaries that all relate to publishing so in my mind that makes them a conglomerate they have one of the most if not the most comprehensive distribution networks for selling books into retailers so long before kdp existed long before smashwords and other places existed ingram existed and they sold their books into amazon.com barnes noble books a million walmart target and many other retailers that sell books and many specialty retailers are in their network for that reason so because of this major publishers think the big five publishing houses work with ingram the parent company to get their published books out to the bookshelves and online retailers so they already have this distribution network it's in the works over the years ingram has opened up their offerings to smaller presses through ingram distribution services so one of the indie presses can actually be subscribed through ingram and they can get their books out to that same distribution network so ingram has warehouses where they would store the books and they would ship them as needed to the regional stores that are requesting them they actually have locations all around the world for this but just to understand within the u.s like if there's a warehouse in fresno that's holding the books and they can easily get them to all the west coast stores same thing with tennessee and get them to all the midwest stores etc so as time has passed and the traditional publishers use ingram and indie publishers use ingram they decided to open up ingramspark to help self-publishers and indie authors so that means that you as the self-published author as the independent author have this access to the same network as the big publishing houses and what they use so for the self-published authors like us who are used to just managing their account with amazon and then one with google and then one with apple this is a huge help right if you just have one place you can go to get your book accessed by all these different retailers that's amazing now the retailers may not elect to shelve your book you do have to do some leg work there to show that it would be worth their while to make the purchase order to get it on the shelves they want to see sales numbers they're also going to drop it from their digital offering as well but the point is that you have access and you have a seat at the table so lightning source now if you're already working with ingramspark you already know the name lightning source that's the proprietary print on demand service when you list your book with ingramspark you have access to the lightning source printers that means you don't have to maintain inventory you do pay a slightly higher cost per book than if you did an offset run of a thousand books or more but you don't have to have this huge inventory on hand that's super helpful to you also you don't have to worry about if amazon has you know went from 100 copies of your book down to 10 oh no i need to get another shipment of books to the amazon warehouse for amazon to distribute because it's print on demand when the user demands it and clicks purchase then it will be printed and shipped out so much easier for you to handle so for independent authors looking to use ingramspark the main concern is well but i'm already on amazon so can i be on both you can absolutely be on both your amazon listing whether it's ebook or a print book will supersede anything from ingramspark pushing to amazon so there's your amazon listing and then there's ingramspark over here has your files and they're going to push it to amazon and amazon's going to say nope we've already got this book we're good so if you already have these individual relationships you can still use those you just do need to make sure you're not opted in to expand a distribution in amazon otherwise ingramspark is going to say like but wait they have expanded distribution with us and then that's going to get messy otherwise you're totally fine to use both so ingramspark will push everything out now if you're just getting started if you haven't even self-published your first book you can absolutely do it all through ingramspark i think one of the downsides is well if you are going to get the majority of your sales through amazon i know even for me i get still 50 of my royalties as of 2019 were coming from amazon like well i just want to pay amazon their fee i don't want to pay amazon and ingram sparked the fee so that is a reason why i do still maintain that just because if i can pay fewer fees of my royalty i would like to do it so that is how ingram spark works they already have this huge distribution network they already have all these resources and they are letting you as a self-publisher come in through ingramspark that's also why you pay an upload fee to their directory network i know a lot of people don't like the fee they're always waiting for the coupon for the fee they're a professional network they do a lot of work to maintain those relationships for you so i i think it's worth it for the small fee that they're asking for would i love to get a free code all the time absolutely i love to save money but i don't think that what they're asking for is unreasonable that's just my two cents so with everything i've just explained with ingram spark i hope that clears it up a little bit about who they are how they work if you do still have more questions though as always drop them in the comments below let me know what your experience has been with ingramspark anything like that i always want us to keep the conversation going if you found this video helpful please give it a thumbs up and don't forget to hit the subscribe button below this lets youtube know that you're getting value from the videos i'm putting out and then they can get those videos in front of other authors like us now you can get back to writing your book [Music]

Channel: M.K. Williams

Views: 19,420

Keywords: ingram spark, self publishing, print on demand, ingramspark, ingramspark vs kdp, ingramspark hardcover, how to self publish, indie author, self publishing a book, how to publish a book with ingramspark, ingramspark vs lulu, self publishing a book 2020, independent publishing, ingram spark publishing, ingram spark tutorial, how to self publish a book, how to self publish a book with ingram spark, ingramspark publishing, ingramspark distribution, how to self-publish a book

Id: 6z849cYBzIM

Length: 7min 13sec (433 seconds)

Published: Wed Feb 03 2021