[Web4lib] Amazon ratings

[j. hogle]

Take a look at the Santa Clara City (CA) Library Foundation and Friends booksale success.  I was told they make several thousand dollars/month from book sales, in large part online via Amazon, though they also have a monthly book sale and a small store in the main library.  See their listings at: http://www.amazon.com/shops/friends-of-santa-clara-city-library. Contact the Foundation/Friends director, Maria Daane @ mdaane at santaclaraca.gov, who could refer you to whomever manages their online sales for some insights into their success.

 John Hogle
Freelance academic librarian
Instructor, online research
Email: jjhogle at yahoo.com
Web: www.blueroom.com


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________________________________
From: "Daniels, Tim" <tdaniels at georgialibraries.org>
To: Cab Vinton <bibliwho at gmail.com>
Cc: web4lib at webjunction.org
Sent: Friday, June 19, 2009 12:21:28 PM
Subject: Re: [Web4lib] Amazon ratings

When I was a branch manager we had a local rare book dealer come by every so often and go through the donations and he would buy the good stuff and anything I did not want to add to the collection went into the friends book sale. 

Tim 

Tim Daniels
Assistant State Librarian for Technology and Infrastructure
Georgia Public Library Service
p 404-235-7151

----- Original Message -----
From: "Cab Vinton" <bibliwho at gmail.com>
To: web4lib at webjunction.org
Sent: Friday, June 19, 2009 3:13:54 PM GMT -05:00 US/Canada Eastern
Subject: [Web4lib] Amazon ratings

Folks donate used books here by the box-full and it would be helpful
if we had a quick & dirty way of determining both the value of the
items and their quality.

Would like to bounce the following idea of the Collective Brain to see
if it has merit or if there are better alternatives.

1. Have volunteers scan the barcodes/ ISBNs into a text file
2. Use the ISBNs to populate a pseudo-bookstore which will draw off of
Amazon to pull prices and product ratings.
3. Cull the highest priced items for potential sale on Ebay or Amazon.
4. Cull the highest rated items for consideration for addition to our
collection.

Thoughts?

Would be particularly grateful if anyone can provide suggestions for
Step 2. We have an Amazon Associates account & have put up an aStore
-- hmm, sounds a bit rude actually -- but I haven't figured out how to
get product ratings displayed.

Cheers,

Cab Vinton, Director
Sanbornton Public Library
Sanbornton, NH


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