Heya folks,

I just wanted to share this link that was emailed to me by one of our readers - The Book Garden

Build Your Own Amazon aStore Tutorial

I have had a number of readers respond to my recent article on Amazon’s aStore - including Amazon themselves

For the most part, book sellers were receptive to the idea of having an aStore that would only show the specific editions they had listed in the Amazon Marketplace.

A representative from Amazon was also interested in learning more about the possibilities of offering aStore’s that would only show books for sale by a specific seller in the Marketplace as well.

There are no promises as to whether or not Amazon will be able to incorporate this into the Marketplace for us sellers,  but I think it is very positive that Amazon is interested in researching it for us.

I will continue to follow up to see if this is indeed a service Amazon will be launching in the near future.

I’ve been working with Amazon’s aStore system for the last couple of days as a way to funnel my distribution channels into 1 central store. I must say, I am a little disappointed.
The setup of the store is easy, the integration into your site is easy, the product selection is easy, in fact the whole thing is nice and easy - unless you want to feature just your book inventory.

The official word from Amazon is:

“You will be able to select a specific title to place in your aStore. However, you are correct you will not be able to direct customers to your Marketplace listing and only your Marketplace listing.

When a customer chooses to buy the title you have placed in your aStore they will be able to choose for themselves the seller of the item. This is where having a high seller rating and a good price will enable you to “beat out” the competition.”

As a book seller, I find it very frustrating that I cannot market the books I have available in the Amazon marketplace directly to the consumers. I also don’t think that’s the sharpest attitude for Amazon to take as book sellers will develop their own shopping cart solutions instead of referring them to the Amazon marketplace (thereby reducing Amazon’s revenue).

While I realize Amazon is primarily a distribution channel, I think it would be an excellent value add if the Marketplace service (either through the % or flat rate) would allow us to build an aStore that only has our inventory available.

Is it just me?

Comments are always appreciated - please email me: paul [AT ] booksellingonlineblog.com