Oh, hey. I was just looking at this article the other day.
I think this article makes some good points, but it's a little too absolutist about this data. As far as I can tell, if you are an author or industry professional, you can get access to the following data:
* If you want data on comps (i.e., comparable books, or books you are competing against): sign up for Publishers Marketplace and pay for the monthly package ($25/month on top of the PM subscription). This gives you the ability to track 5 ISBNs (and I assume, you can pick new ISBNs every month). https://www.publishersmarketplace.com/bookscan/about.cgi#dat...
The situation only really gets ugly if you want access to broad market data (i.e., across all ISBNs for a given time window, and covering a majority of retail outlets). The best I'm able to find is this comment by Kristen McLean from NPD: https://countercraft.substack.com/p/no-most-books-dont-sell-...
But this data is (a) limited, and (b) I think it has some pretty serious issues [1]. I sent an email to Kristen to try to address this, but so far no response. (If anyone has any connections that might help, please contact me!)
I am actively working on improving this situation, and I've got some ideas for what we could do while still abiding by NPD's terms. If that's something that interests you, please contact me (see my profile).
[1]: My issue with Kristen's analysis is that it follows (in her words) a "conveyor belt" pattern. That is, the time window is fixed. Within that time window, some books have been on the market 364 days. Some may have been on the market 1 day. So it's not surprising that some books have very few sales: they may simply have not been on the market long enough. And you can't just say, "well, multiply the data by 2x to account for the average case" because I'm pretty sure that doesn't work. But without real data I can't fix this.
I think this article makes some good points, but it's a little too absolutist about this data. As far as I can tell, if you are an author or industry professional, you can get access to the following data:
* If you want data on your own books: sign up for Amazon Author Central and they'll give you the BookScan data on your books. This is free. https://press.aboutamazon.com/2010/12/weekly-nielsen-booksca...
* If you want data on comps (i.e., comparable books, or books you are competing against): sign up for Publishers Marketplace and pay for the monthly package ($25/month on top of the PM subscription). This gives you the ability to track 5 ISBNs (and I assume, you can pick new ISBNs every month). https://www.publishersmarketplace.com/bookscan/about.cgi#dat...
* If you want public library data checkout data: as linked in the article, go to the Seattle Public Library. Free. https://data.seattle.gov/Community/Checkouts-by-Title/tmmm-y...
The situation only really gets ugly if you want access to broad market data (i.e., across all ISBNs for a given time window, and covering a majority of retail outlets). The best I'm able to find is this comment by Kristen McLean from NPD: https://countercraft.substack.com/p/no-most-books-dont-sell-...
But this data is (a) limited, and (b) I think it has some pretty serious issues [1]. I sent an email to Kristen to try to address this, but so far no response. (If anyone has any connections that might help, please contact me!)
And if you want to get access to the data yourself, you're talking about something to the tune of $2,500 USD. And the terms are pretty restrictive. https://www.publishersmarketplace.com/bookscan/about.cgi#pri... https://www.publishersmarketplace.com/bookscan/terms.shtml
I am actively working on improving this situation, and I've got some ideas for what we could do while still abiding by NPD's terms. If that's something that interests you, please contact me (see my profile).
[1]: My issue with Kristen's analysis is that it follows (in her words) a "conveyor belt" pattern. That is, the time window is fixed. Within that time window, some books have been on the market 364 days. Some may have been on the market 1 day. So it's not surprising that some books have very few sales: they may simply have not been on the market long enough. And you can't just say, "well, multiply the data by 2x to account for the average case" because I'm pretty sure that doesn't work. But without real data I can't fix this.