Competitive Analysis

One of the most important ways to get a realistic assessment of your publishing opportunities is to find out whether there are similar products currently in the market and available to your readers. Do your research.

Discovering that there are other books on your topic should not concern you. This may, in fact, reinforce that your topic is timely and help you identify publishers who are interested in your topic. Best-selling competitive titles are a good indication that there is a large market for your book. Learning about similar titles can also help you determine a unique positioning for your book.

But your primary objective should be to use this research to discover that your book is different from and better than the competition.

You can perform valuable research on the market and the competition in three ways: •   By visiting your local bookstore •   By getting online at Amazon.com •   By checking out publishers’ Web sites

When performing a competitive assessment, consider the following:

•   How large is the market? •   Which publishers handle my type of book? •   What other titles will compete with my book for readers? Here are some strategies for performing research.

At the bookstore: Find a bookstore with a large section in which your book might be shelved if it were available:

•   Notice how books are shelved. What are the common sizes? Are the largest ones hard to reach on top or bottom shelves? What size will be best for your type of book? •   The part of a shelved book you usually see first is the spine, that skinny section between the front and back covers. As you scan a shelf, what book spines make you want to remove the book and look at it further. Is it the title, the author, the large or interesting type, or something else? •   Are there books exactly like the one you’d like to create? Which publishers are producing most of the books in this section? •   Find a book you admire on a topic like yours, published by a publisher you’d like to have for your book. Does the author have more than one book with this publisher? Does he or he or she thank a particular editor at that publishing company? •   Make notes about the publisher, ISBN, number of pages, price, and author, along with dates of publication and reprints. Also note what you liked about the book and what you didn’t. What would it take to make this book interesting and accessible to the reader? As you note these things, consider cover design, look and feel, type style, and so forth.

On Amazon.com: First, search for your own title to determine whether it has already been used. Then search for titles with similar wording. Next, search by your topic. Pay attention to books recommended by others to find as many competitors as possible.

On publishers’ web sites: Look for any titles not yet released on your topic. Note the number of pages, price, author, and the expected release date, along with the name of the publishers.

For all competitive titles, look for an indication of sales. It is almost impossible to find exact figures, but there are some helpful indicators such as Amazon.com’s rank and number of reprints.

A competitive assessment is a practical way to begin the process of focusing on the topic you’ve chosen and making your book a step above the competition.

Tanyab 08:08, 5 December 2008 (UTC) | www.publishing-store.com