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Distribution means a bookstore, a library, or another retailer can find the book and order a copy. That happens through a wholesaler, mostly Ingram in the United States, and it depends on the discount and the return terms you set. Being for sale on Amazon is not that.
The catalog
Bookstores order from a wholesaler. They expect a wholesale discount, often around 55 percent off the list price, and they expect to return unsold copies. A short discount is a quiet way of saying the book is not for bookstores. Returnable print-on-demand can also produce a charge when copies come back. We put both facts on the table before anyone ticks the box because it sounds professional.
Metadata is how the book is found: title, subtitle, series, BISAC categories, a description, and an author name that matches the cover. A book with the wrong category is in the catalog and still invisible. We set the listing from the book you wrote, then confirm the ISBN is one you can use at that wholesaler. A free KDP ISBN cannot do this job.
Order of the work
What distribution is not
We will not describe a listing as national distribution if the only place a stranger can buy it is one website.
What the catalog needs
If the interior changes after the catalog record, the book a store receives is not the book they ordered.
Decisions
Then this is the wrong page. KDP is the job, and we should say so. Expanded distribution is a thin extra, not a bookstore plan.
Libraries and some online shops can still order. Many bookstores will not. The risk of a return bill is lower.
The setting that makes a bookstore order possible. You need a price that survives a 55 percent discount and the print cost, and you need to know returns are real.
House rule
Distribution makes the book orderable. It does not make a buyer.
Before the terms
No. Orderable is not the same as ordered. A shop still decides. What we can do is stop the book from being impossible to order.
Not at Ingram. That number is tied to Amazon as the publisher. If bookstores are the plan, buy the ISBN first.
The wholesaler pays the publisher on the account. That account should be yours. We do not stand in the middle of the royalty.
If shops matter
Those two answers decide if the book can be distributed or only posted. Call (833) 688-4166 or write [email protected].
The shelf
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