A Not So Simple Question

Since the epic flop that was Amazon’s behavior during #amazonfail, and in the weeks following, I haven’t linked to Amazon.com for sales links, using IndieBound instead. Some readers have emailed me privately to say that while they appreciate the change of linkage, their local Indie bookstore has not been friendly to them as romance readers in the least, and many shared encounters wherein their inquiries for anything mass market were met with derision and outright scorn.

Nice.

Others have emailed me to say that they still shop at Amazon and would welcome a link to support the hot pink palace of Bitchery. One dude said outright, “Everyone still shops there, even if they say they don’t.” Heh. I don’t know about that, but who knows?

So: a poll. I’m not making decisions based on the poll results. This is merely my own curiosity. I’m not inspecting results, and you can use whatever crazy-mo email address you want, so it’s not like I’m going to out you or something. I’m simply nosy: do you still shop at Amazon?

[ETA: Yes, this entry was up yesterday, and I took it down because the freaking poll software stopped working and I can’t figure it out – so it’s anonymous comment time – whee! Make sure you’re not logged in already via cookie (mmm cookie) if you want to be incognito.

ETA: Hooray for Esosoft, whose support staff is always on and populated by people with PhDs in PhP. Thanks for fixing the poll, Esosoft!]

Comments are Closed

  1. Laura says:

    Like Beth and Sandra, I never stopped.  I’ve worked for too many companies over the years where a few people’s screwups got publicized way beyond realism to get in a huff over something until I am sure of what happened.  I don’t have a local local bookstore that stocks romance, but my favorite indie, which is about an hour away, is my preferred spot to buy books (http://www.posmanbooks.com/ – they have a dreadful website, but their store is great with a huge wall of romance nicely categorized).  If they don’t have it, or I am not going to be in that area I look at Borders locally before I shop at Amazon for a book.  But the fact is, Amazon has things I cannot get at either of those sources.  Plus, I have a Kindle, and as well as the other reason I might buy (or download free) things for my Kindle, there’s the “shop at 3am when insomnia hits and I have nothing to read” aspect.

    Validation: really25 … oh, not in years, honey!

  2. MsMoonlight says:

    I prefer Barnes & Noble because the shipping is much better (faster & reliable), but if B&N is out of stock I go right to Amazon.com and find it quickly and at a good price.  I still shop at Amazon, but they are not my first choice.

  3. Muse of Ire says:

    I haven’t bought books at Amazon in years—with the membership, coupons, and free shipping, B&N online is by far the better option for me. But Amazon is an aggregator of so much “stuff” that I do frequently look at them for all types of online purchases, and sometimes wind up buying. I don’t think I’ve actually bought anything since the whole #amazonfail debacle, but it wouldn’t stop me if I wanted to.

    consider37: I consider 37 purchases on Amazon for every one I make.

  4. SB Sarah says:

    Also, can you just have a couple of sets of links for books? Like Book Title by Author (amazon link indieworld link). That way folks can choose where they want to buy from.

    I can, but to be frank, that’s a good amount of work on my part. One thing about Amazon is that the linkage for commission sales is so easy it’s ridiculous. IndieBound is a close second, with their ease of linking, though there’s editing involved because they add text that I then have to remove.

    Borders’ affiliate linkage is so confusing and inept it’s unusable, and I haven’t looked at BAMM or any others.

    Even doing three is extra work on top of the rest of the maintenance and review writing, and sometimes I desperately need those few minutes for something else. Like eating. Or sleeping.

  5. Alessia Brio says:

    Yup. Still shop at Amazon—but not for books. The only dead tree books I buy any more are directly from the author at signings/events, and I don’t have a Kindle.  I buy ebooks directly from the publishers ‘cause I know that’s the venue providing the highest return for the author.

    Amazon gets my business for stuff I can’t find locally—like specialty low-carb goodies. 🙂

  6. Jess B. says:

    I stopped shopping at Amazon before the recent case of #AmazonFail. Basically, I decided that I would rather a) support my local independent or b) buy books through ereader.com to read on my iPhone. In fact my iPhone is what stopped me from originally investing in the Kindle. I just hate the idea of carrying around several electronic devices when I have one that can do it all.

  7. Overquoted says:

    I missed the #amazonfail, but Amazon used to be where I bought 100% of my books. Over the last year, however, I’ve become increasingly more irritated with them. It started with a few newly released books taking ages to ship. Then it became everything taking ages to ship. Then they changed shipping times on the “free shipping” option. Basically, if you wanted free shipping (especially for new books), you could plan on waiting 1-3 weeks for them to actually get into the mail. I found it pretty funny that the processing time was extra-long for “free shipping,” as if there’s something more difficult about processing those orders. More like a deterrent.

    I decided it was just easier to go get my books at a local store. However, since Buy.com has a similar shipping option and none of the massive (intentional) delays, I may start buying there when I need to. As is stands, Amazon is only an option for stuff like marketplace items and the occasional college text book that I can’t find cheaper anywhere else. Maybe when I have some moolah to rub together, I might take advantage of their 4-for-3 program again, but only for books I’m in no hurry to read.

  8. Janet W says:

    http://www.rainydaypaperback.com/—this is my rec for inside the US—great, GREAT place to buy used Romance books. And, best of all and unlike Amazon, they ship for FREE if you order $25 worth of books. They’re friendly on the phone and that’s my solution.

    I still use Amazon for very very obscure OOP Regencies: no one has better prices and a larger selection. Once in a while I combine Amazon orders with a CD I want and throw in a new book. Also, in lieu of spreadsheets and such, I use Amazon wish list as the place to keep track of books I want: usually just clicking over from AAR or where ever.

    Frankly, I don’t pay any attention to the various brouhahas—I will say one thing about Amazon though: for the most part I do NOT respect the reader reviews, especially if there are hardly any.  It’s all too easy for a Friend of the Author to slip in a 5 Star “Oh My Gawd, the best book since P&P”. Yeah, right.

    About Tattered Cover: super store—sold me an autographed Harry Potter before anyone had ever heard of the author—but 30 romance books? That’s gross. And I have a great bookstore in my neck of the woods too: Book Passage—when it comes to romance, they’re pitiful. Great for mystery, new authors, travel, everything it seems but romance so why would readers want to go to indie stores that by in large, I’m sorry, treat us like pariahs?

    (My type-in code: found87: I doubt I’ve found 8 indies with decent romance sections. What REALLY pisses me off even more than indies are UBSs that are snobby about carrying used Romance books … oh and then have shelves and shelves of SF. Like SF is so much more respectable? Give me a break. Not to criticize SF but really … )

  9. Kalen Hughes says:

    For eBooks (which means any and all fiction I can get in eForm) I’m a FictionWise girl. For anything else it’s Amazon all the way. It’s fast, reliable, cheaper than brick and mortar, and I don’t pay sales tax or shipping. Though Amazon does sometimes manage to an epic #fail, it’s mostly full of win for me as a customer.

    And unlike B&N, when Amazon says something has a 2-4 week wait, they actually mean it. It’s been 8 weeks since I ordered such a book from B&N (because I got a gift certificate) and not so much as a note explaining the delay . . . talk about #fail!

  10. Michele says:

    I shop Amazon, but NOT for books.  My discounts at Barnes and Noble and Borders are about comparable, and I’d rather shop at a bookstore.  If an indie has the book and I can get it for a reasonable price, I’ll choose that over Amazon any day.

  11. Mary Beth says:

    Like another responder I’ve noticed that my shipping time from Amazon gets longer and longer.  When it comes to books I am an instant gratification gal and hate to wait weeks for a book. I have surfed the other sites mentioned above to find a replacement for Amazon.com but I have a difficult time browsing their selections as compared to Amazon. I try my local bricks and mortar stores and a not-so-local used book store but can have a really difficult time finding older titles- and by older, in many cases we’re just talking 3 or 4 years. I carry a list of SF and romance titles in my purse of books recommended on SBTB and other sites but unless it is a brand-spanking-new title I have to resort to Amazon to find a copy.

  12. jessica says:

    I use Amazon more than ever for a few reasons – one I though the whole amazonfail thing was a ridiculous overreaction by a mob mentality with little relationship to reality.  And as a librarian who knows a little bit about online book databases, well I know all too well how easy it is to miswrite a little code and lose a whole bunch of stuff. 

    My other big reason for using Amazon is that they have always had the best prices, best service, and best shipping options for me.  As a grad student for the last many years, all that really matters. 

    Finally, now I live way out in the middle of nowhere, with a not very well stocked grocery store, no bookstore of any kind for over 40 miles, and now I have a Kindle (which I really really love).  I buy lots of grocery type stuff, esp things like environmentally friendly paper towels and dish washer detergent and rice noodles – all things I either can’t get nearby or would have to pay ridiculously high prices for.  I also continue to buy books, love the option to search for used books when it comes to textbook buying time, and I buy stuff mostly for my Kindle now whenever I have a little extra book money. 

    Altho I occassionally buy from Powells, their selection is much more limited, prices are higher and it takes them forever to ship stuff. Plus it comes by US mail and that delivery person leaves my boxes in very strange places that I sometimes can’t even find.  UPS and Fedex never do that, which matters when you live somewhere where its either freezing cold, snowing or raining most of the year. 

    On a slightly related topic, I think the new Kindle DX is awesome and is going to be perfect for the academic market.  All the faculty I know (who are interested in things like that) are very interested and many are considering buying – the ability to natively display PDFs without changing anything is huge all nearly all journal articles and even most textbooks come in that format and they have to see the charts, graphs, etc.

  13. daisy says:

    I didn’t vote but the answer is “only as a last resort”.  I live in a very rural area and the nearest bookstore is 100+mile (one way) so for years the majority of my book buying was online.  When ebooks arrived on scene I was estatic – no more paying for shipping, no more waiting for shipping (which Ami would send out within two days of order, but could sit in a warehouse somewhere for 2+weeks at times), but then along came the Kindle. 

    I don’t like the Kindle, I don’t like the price of the Kindle, I don’t like that Ami only sells ebooks in Kindle format.  So – I don’t buy from Ami, unless it is a book that I want in paper and can only find there. 

    Now, I still rely on Ami for other things – again with the rural, I do most of my gift buying online and have it shipped directly to the receiver from there – Ami is great for that.  But books?  Nope, I can get better deals and better pricing and more format options at other places. 

    About the whole #amizonfail thing?  Way blown out of proportion IMO.  Before the days of internet and instant messaging, things like this occurred and the company had a chance to correct the error before it became public knowledge.  Now, almost before the company knows the error has been made, it is a huge deal on the internet.  Sometimes mistakes just happen because someone hit the wrong button. 

    @JanetW – before I moved to the middle of nowhere, I lived in a civilized area that had two Rainy Day (used) Bookstores in my general area.  I still dream about the hours and hours I would spend roaming those aisles and sampling their wares.  Love, love, love Rainy Day Books.

  14. Alisha Rai says:

    I’ve never used Amazon for books, except to research what’s out. I usually shop BN, or in the case of ebooks now, fictionwise or the publisher’s direct website.

    Last Christmas though, I spent a good chunk of money on Amazon for gifts for all my nieces and nephews; two of my sisters even requested it, since they find the return policy easy if something goes wrong. The free shipping, low prices, and HTF items made it nice for me. Unless some new entity emerges offering similar deals, I may end up doing the same thing this year.

  15. Willa says:

    I also use Amazon as a very last resort, if I can’t find the book I want anywhere else. But I often go on to Amazon to see what’s available, not just in books but all kinds of merchandise, and I LOVE the reader reviews for books, I read the one star reviews for popular books when I’m in the mood for a laugh. Some of those reviews are just hilarious.

  16. darlynne says:

    I still buy from Amazon those titles I can’t get elsewhere, which means out of print books from the Amazon sellers.

    I’m very enthusiastic about The Book Depository and perhaps their affiliate program could be of use to you: http://affiliates.bookdepository.co.uk/affiliates/index.php

  17. Reacher Fan says:

    I did take ‘less than I used to’.  I shop BN more now.  I have no independents.  Oddly, I am using Paperback Swap more than I used to as I’ve slowly learned the good traders and how to slip around the ‘wish list’ system of FIFO.  Today I sip out 17 books and I have 11 on order.  I have prders coming in from Amazon, BN and directly from 2 different publishers for books not available at either and too expensive at Alibris. 

    I went nuts in BN’s discount section getting some historical fiction.  All hardcover books and all under $5 each!  Remaindered books are my happy hunting ground that kind of offsets all my ‘I can’t wait for it’ hardcovers.  AT least, as a member of BN’s club, I do get the extra 10% and I get frequent discount coupons.  BUT they charge me sales tax, and Amazon does not.  With the amount of buying I do, it matters.  In many ways, that gives Amazon an unfair selling advantage.  I do price shop, and their 4-for-3 promotion constantly.  But I get newly released mass market cheaper at BN with my 10% compared with no discount at Amazon.

  18. Betsy says:

    I use Better World Books now, and I can’t say enough good things about them.  Fast shipping, selection and prices rivaling Amazon (books only, of course) and you can buy used without having to deal with potentially smarmy individual sellers.  They’ve also sent me tea and chocolate with my past orders, and they donate proceeds to promote world literacy.  Now THAT is bitchin’.

  19. Helen M says:

    I don’t buy anything from amazon (.co.uk OR .com) any more. I’d been getting more and more frustrated with them, and amazonfail was the last straw.

    I buy my new books from The Book Depository (cheaper, faster, better service) or a shop in town (fopp, Waterstones, borders, etc) and , my OOP or older books from ebay.co.uk (some real bargains to be found, and postage is NEVER as high as amazonmarketplace [ÂŁ2.75 for a 99p book!?! Ha!]) or I go trawling in usedbookshops.

    The only other things I bought from amazon were cds/dvds , which I now get from fopp – comparable-ish prices, instant gratificationand some electronic stuff – usb drives, headphone extension cords, and so on, but I buy them from the shop I work at now. A few more pennies in our till, to help in these rather trying times!

  20. azteclady says:

    I get a lot of my presents (birthday, etc) in the form of amazon gift cards, so you can say I still buy at amazon.

    I suck, I know.

  21. I don’t know what amazonfail is so I can’t speak to that.

    I buy very few books new these days, but I do sell some of my stuff on Amazon and buy used there when I can’t get a book from Paperback Book Swap (which is my preferred option).  If I am going to buy new, I will go to Ye Olde Bookstore (not an actual name) in person.

  22. Mary Stella says:

    The only time I buy from Amazon is if someone gives me a gift certificate.  Several years ago, Amazon started advertising to buy books used and put a pretty obvious button right up there along with the new book sales.  Some people decided to sell ARCs so used copies were available on the first sale date of a new book.

    RWA, on behalf of members, asked if the service could at least move the Buy Used button a little further away and pretty much received no response.  So, on behalf of my published friends, I did all of my online buying at BN.com.  Yes, I know that BN.com also offers used books as an option, but at the time it wasn’t as obvious.

    I’m not crusading against UBS.  In fact, the UBS stores often introduce someone to an author they’d never read.  All I ask is that we authors at least have a chance to sell a new copy and earn a royalty. 

    It might have been Amazon’s rudeness that got to me.  In the end, however, I don’t need more than one online bookseller, so I remain with BN.com.

    I live in the middle of the Florida Keys.  The closest full service new bookstore is over an hour away in either direction.  The local half bookstore/half health food store has a horrible selection and the owners don’t know anything about stocking titles.  It’s deplorable.  I can pick up new books at the supermarket, but the selection is very limited.

    When I go “off the rock” to the mainland, as I did this last weekend, I frequent bricks and mortar stores.  Rang up $88.00 worth of books.  The stash should last me a while.

    This brings me to a new rant.  I didn’t realize that Nora Roberts’ new series is coming out in trade-size paperback.  Of course I bought Vision in White anyway but I was surprised at the move to publish a more expensive version when it could as easily have come out in mass-market size and price.  No wonder this title never appeared at the local supermarket.  It doesn’t fit their racks.  Now I need to conduct an informal survey to see if the book is also not stocked at CVS or Walgreens.  I wonder if this will impact sales.

    Given that it’s a Nora book, probably not.  🙂  We who are Nora fans are not easily deterred.

  23. Zita Hildebrandt says:

    I only ever shopped at Amazon.ca once, and I got lousy service, so I never went back. I tried Chapters/Indigo instead and got great service, so I use them almost exclusively. The only exception is when I buy direct from the publisher or from an Indie for signed copies. For the most part, the prices at Chapters are better anyway, so I probably wouldn’t buy from Amazon even if their service wasn’t as spectacularly bad as my experience was.

  24. Scrin says:

    I’d be grateful for a summary of the Amazonfail. I take it they did a blanket banning of books or something?

  25. Scrin, there’s a Smart Bitch summary here. There are more details at Dear Author but I’ll just extract a little bit of that DA post:

    For those who don’t know, Amazon has decided to derank and then remove from front page searches books labeled “erotic” and GLBT. For example, books that are about Lesbian parenting have been identified as “adult content” and deranked. Patti O’Shea’s book that is listed “erotic horror” despite having only one sex scene has been deranked and removed from front page search results. Amazon has deranked Annie Proulx, E.M. Forster, but not American Psycho. Mein Kampf and books about dog fighting are ranked and can be searched from the front page, but not books about gay love or books with erotic content.

    This and a number of other Amazon controversies are listed at Wikipedia.

  26. Moriah Jovan says:

    I expressly stopped shopping at independent bookstores when they were nasty at me about romance novels. I’d rather shop where no one’s going to sneer at me while they are holding their hand out to take my money.

    Amazon is my go-to if I am forced to buy paper. Otherwise, it’s E all the way.

  27. Sandia says:

    If the Amazon affiliate link is easy to put up, why not just add it and for those who still shop at Amazon, we’ll continue to click on it.  For those who choose not to do business with Amazon, they don’t have to click it.  I mean at the end of the day, I’d rather click on the Amazon link and have you guys get some money out of it – if only to support the increasing cost of stamps for your awesome giveaway contests….  Just my 2 pennies.

  28. Camilla says:

    Can I vote for Barnes and Noble??????? they have great quick service, and I use their site more than Amazon – its easier to browse…………..

  29. SB Sarah says:

    I’d rather click on the Amazon link and have you guys get some money out of it – if only to support the increasing cost of stamps for your awesome giveaway contests

    Thanks for that one. If I can do BN and AMZ, that might do. I like my local indie bookseller, but have heard from many people like Moriah Jovan that others have been downright awful about romance novels in their stores. Which, for fuck’s sake, people.

    Also: an interesting note: currently at the Twitter Boot Camp sponsored by O’Reilly, RonHogan just twittered (twatted?) that Whole Foods, as part of its presentation on corporate use of social media, said:

    @wholefoods brings up #amazonfail as an example of, well, corporate social media fail.

    Amazon’s performance, or lack thereof, was noted, apparently, by others who are trying to use social media for customer connection. So even if Amazon didn’t notice/didn’t care about the reaction, other corporations did.

  30. Jenny says:

    I just wanted to say that at the Independent bookshop I work at, if it is a book, we support you! We actually have a customer who really started reading for pleasure about 8 months ago, starting with Stephanie Laurens, and she is in almost every week, every staff member knows her by name (and most know her by voice on the phone), and who cares that they are (sometimes cheesy) romance novels? they are books!

    So to the people who feel slighted by their indies, they should find their favorite romance novels, bring them in, and ask some of the open minded staff members to read them, and if they don’t find them fun and perfect for escapism, THEN they can be snooty!

    I love romance novels, though I also read regular fiction and non-, and yeah, I still love Romance Novels. (which is why I own the SM,TB book!)

  31. Madd says:

    I used to buy all my books at Amazon, but not anymore. I still use their site when looking up books though.

    Recently I bought 3 books from Borders online. On Amazon they came out to $26+ and qualified for free shipping. At Borders they came out to $24.68 with shipping.

    I’ve noticed people mention the free shipping for spending over $25 at Amazon, but pretty much all the big online book stores are doing that now. Books-A-Million does it, Borders does it, and Barnes and Nobles does it. They’re reliable, they deliver and they comparably price their books.

  32. Marita says:

    I understand it’s useful to have a nice easy link, but why can’t the people who are annoyed by you not linking to amazon go to amazon themselves and search the book in question?  It’s your right as a blogger to avoid advertising for a company you disapprove of just as its their right as a consumer to shop where ever they want.

  33. SusannaG says:

    I think I’m lucky in my local used bookstore – about a third to a half of it is romance novels!  (The mystery section is also large; I’m also a mystery addict.  Especially historical mysteries.)

    Nora has an entire shelf all to herself, LOL.

  34. Chicklet says:

    I stopped buying at Amazon after #amazonfail, which was the final straw for me in terms of their monopolistic tendencies. I buy books at B&N during the week (three blocks from my office) or from a local independent. I have no compunction about ordering romances at independent stores. If they sneer at me, I sneer right back about the overwritten prose of Rick Moody. *g*

  35. phadem says:

    While I felt sympathy for the authors affected by the rankings debacle, I didn’t get on the whole #amazonfail wagon. I bought a Prime membership before all that happened and it’s saved me so much money and I get all my purchases in two days now. Not just having to wait the standard longer time for the free shipping w/$25 purchase. When it comes to that, in this economy, there’s no contest.

    As for things taking longer to ship now from Amazon, I suspect, though I certainly may be wrong, that they may be doing so to save some money. So when I did use the free ship/$25 option before, I noticed it might take them a day or two longer to get the package to my door. I was really not surprised given the economy. No matter how much money any company makes, it’s almost always smart to save money if they you can. At my own job, we’re not even allowed to overnight packages anymore without written approval from our accounting department. They claim it’s already saved us a lot of money. And I’d rather a company adjust their shipping speeds (and me get my package a little later) than hear about them having to cut jobs to save money. And I know doing just that might not save their employees, but enough money saving might.

    I was glad when Amazon apologized, but those that feel opposite of how I did certainly had their own reasons for distrusting all of it. To each their own.

  36. Jessa Slade says:

    I tend to shop in person (lucky me!) at Powells Books so I didn’t vote.  But honestly, I would still buy at Amazon.  They screwed up, but I don’t think they’ve crossed over into hopeless evil, and I do believe that buying from them and making your feelings known still influences them.  Better to have that power from the inside.

  37. Rebyj says:

    I tried Barnes and Nobles for Naamahs kiss because of the “fast” 3 day shipping at reasonable cost . Still waitng day #5 LOL. Honestly I have no problem with you linking to any source that benefits the site the most. As for the time involved in multiple links, I bet there are techy fans of smartbitches that would work for free or for a smart bitch title banner thingy LOL . You’re a famous author now outsource the grunt work !!

  38. Estelle Chauvelin says:

    I cut back on my Amazon purchases long before #amazonfail because of their bad Buy Blue rating.  B&N is rated very high, so if I’m buying books or other media online, I buy from them.  I have a membership and usually buy from them when I’m visiting a brick and mortar store, also, since our area formerly-independent bookstore was bought out by Books-a-Million over a decade ago, anyway.  The only reason that I chose “less than I used to” rather than “no” is that I will buy from Amazon if I absolutely can’t find an item for sale anywhere else, not that that happens often.

  39. romantic@heart says:

    I just want to share that I buy a lot of books from Amazon based on recommendations from posts and reviews I see here. And, since I enjoy this site tremedously, I am all for you guys getting a share of the $$$ I spend.

  40. Diana Hunter says:

    I, too, have stopped linking to Amazon.com as a direct result of #amazonfail and I won’t link to them again until they apologize for the loss of sales of not only my books, but thousands of others’. However, since it has now been 2 months since they “glitched” and there has been no acknowledgement of the problem they caused, I doubt I’ll be linking to them any time soon.

    To those of you who cannot get books directly from my publisher’s site…Use whatever site you must. It isn’t your fault technology reaches only so far! But I urge everyone to support their local independent bookstore, even if that store has never carried the types of books you want in the past. Time to make your voice be heard so they know what customers truly want! 🙂

    (captcha: reported36 …okay, who’s ratting out that I’m actually older???)

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