When you become a self-publisher you have to learn to think like a bookseller. That makes sense, doesn’t it? After all, you are now responsible for the sales life of your book, and the most important single thing that you need to know is how to sell your book to the person who, even though they may not know it yet, really needs and wants your book.
That’s what booksellers do. They have the day-in day-out experience of selecting, displaying, marketing and selling thousands of books on hundreds of subjects in numerous formats. Walk into any sizable bookstore and look around. It’s a pretty big task.
Booksellers Need Your Help
With so many books in their stock, so many new books coming out every week, and so much change in the publishing business, booksellers have a hard time keeping up. One way you can help them is by printing the principal category the book belongs in on the back cover.
I really suggest you go on a field trip to a bookstore for this exercise. You want to look at the bookstore in a new way, as a publisher. In your new mindset you will see in a few minutes why you need to provide categories on your book.
Look at the shelves that make up the majority of the storage in the store. Notice those shelf tags, or the big signs on the tops of the shelves, or sometimes the ones they have hanging from the ceiling? Each sign tells you what section you are in, “Biography,” “Fiction,” “Cookbooks,” and so on. And that’s how the bookseller knows where to display his books, by the corresponding category.
Categories to Choose From
Here’s a sample listing of bookstore categories. This is pretty typical, and you can use it as a guide in determining the best category fit for your book. You can grab a copy for your use with the download link below.
Categories - click to enlarge
Download the Bookstore Categories Guide. [ PDF – 468 KB ]
As you can see there are almost 150 categories to choose from. Pick one or two, print them on the back cover of your book. The bookseller who needs to shelve your book properly to have any chance of it selling, will see right away where it fits into their own scheme of categories.
Now You Know
You’ve worked hard to get your book this far, don’t let it get shelved in the wrong place. Study a local bookstore if you need to get clarity about where your book belongs. Among the many things you can do to help the people who will sell your book, this is one of the most basic, and now you know how to make the bookseller’s job easier.
Update: If you would like to use the authoritative Book Industry Study Group list of categories, you can now access both the major subject headings and all 2800+ subcategories on the BISG website, by using this link: BISAC Subject Headings. Enjoy.
