If you plan to distribute your book to major booksellers or retailers, you’ll need an ISBN (International Standard Book Number).
An ISBN is the thirteen-digit number that identifies each book uniquely and connects them to a publisher–it’s like your book’s social security number. If you’re establishing your own publishing company, your ISBN will be linked to your publishing company. There are several benefits to establishing your own unique publishing name, so we recommend that you do this.
If you hire a publishing company, they’ll provide you with an ISBN. Buit, if you need to purchase your ISBN, visit: www.myidentfiers.com, a subset of R.R. Bowker, the U.S. agency licensed to sell ISBNs. The current cost is $125.00 to purchase one ISBN and $250.00 to purchase ten. No, that’s not a typo. The price for one is dramatically higher than buying in bulk. And you may as well buy in bulk, because each version or revised edition of your book, including different e-book formats, requires a new ISBN (for example, a new format or an expanded special edition) However, a subsequent printing where the book is identical to the original can keep the original ISBN.
Here are a few other ISBN pointers to keep in mind:
- Most bookstores will not sell a book that does not have an ISBN and a barcode because it makes their world way to complicated with tracking, ordering, and returns.
- There are hundreds of websites on the market advertising single ISBN sales, but to make sure you’re the sole owner it’s best t0 purchase directly via the US ISBN Agency.
- Post ISBN purchase, register your book in the Books-in-Print database and to do this, you will need to register your ISBN number with Bowker. Books-n-Print is the bibliographic database store used by libraries, bookstores and booksellers and indie authors.
- Once you have your ISBN number(s) assigned, you will need to obtain a barcode from BowkerLink.
- Allow 15 business days for non-priority processing from the time an ISBN application is received at the agency (not from the date sent by the publisher.) Priority processing is two business days from the time an application is received at the agency. Express processing is 24 business hours.
- ISBNs are sold in blocks of 10, 100, and 1000. When purchasing ISBNs, estimate your projects for the next five years, and select a quantity based on your longterm plans. It is always best to select the block that will last you for a few years because you will be able to maintain one publisher prefix (the first unique block of numbers assigned to publishers), and it also minimizes the unit cost per ISBN.
