Book Rabbit!
Thursday, June 26, 2008, 8:44 PM
I recently discovered what I think may be the most exciting book website since Amazon - BookRabbit.com.
As I've been investigating the world of online book marketing, I realised that unlike movies or other media, there is no common meeting place for book enthusiasts. There are countless blogs, low-population forums and websites dedicated to reading and writing, but to try to leverage them for marketing is a daunting task. They are simply spread too thin. The new Book Roast blog is a valiant effort, but still there is no IMDB.com for books.
Until now, that is. At least potentially. BookRabbit.com is a website at once a social networking site and online store for book lovers. They offer a selection of titles that rivals Amazon in both choice and price, but the shopping experience is wrapped up in a library of 'bookshelves' uploaded by the site's users.
Here's how it works: You upload a picture of your bookshelf (here's mine, though it's really a pile on the floor) and then tag your books. The system then finds other users who have the same books, so you can browse what else they have, say hello, comment on the books, or even go and buy them. It's a very well put together website, with bags of potential. It's only a couple of months old, but already I see big things ahead for it - IF it takes off.
The most interesting thing, though, is the potential for author marketing. When you register, you can designate yourself as an author. Using RSS, you can hook it up to your blog, so you can maintain your journal in one place. You can talk about your books in the same place readers are browsing and buying them. And community blogs like Book Roast can feed right into it. It's the step forward in author-reader interaction I believe the Internet has been crying out for up to now. Really, I think it's brilliant, and it deserves to succeed. And the only way it'll do that is by people like us getting involved.*
*One small issue - it's a UK site, so not much use for Americans wanting to buy, but you can still interact.
posted by Stuart Neville at 8:44 PM
6 Comments:
Thanks for the heads-up about BookRabbit. Even if I can't yet buy there, it's an outstanding idea. Hard to imagine it won't eventually be available in localized versions elsewhere!
Sounds exciting! I’ll hop over and check it out. :)
This is interesting -- Somehow I've ended up on LibraryThing, Shelfari and Goodreads. I actually catalogued all of my books into LibraryThing and I was able to export them to the other sites to one degree or another. They all have "friend" functionality and a variety of other functions (I've got my second ARC on the way from LibraryThing's Early Reviewer Program), and I believe they all have author sections too. None of them sell books though. Bookrabbit completely different to these other sites?
Lisa - I think the key aspect is the facility for author and reader to interact at the point of sale. Most small online purchases are impulse driven - I think this is a good chance for the author to prompt that impulse.
This is interesting---
I think online markets are in general underutilized, or utilized in the wrong way (spam-ish)
I'll hop over and check it out...
THanks!
:-)
(And *they* will be begging to join Book Roast. Not the other way around. hehehe)
I just checked it out--
Moonrat has something sortof like this which I like better--The Book Book.
It's not as interactive, but it's a book review forum.
This is giving me some ideas though.
Thanks for the heads up!!
:-)
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