Why so Few Crossway Titles?
Each week Crossway offer specials on four to five books and I am consistently amazed/disappointed that the title are not offered at Vyrso or Logos. For example this week:
Inerrancy and Worldview
Author(s): Vern S. Poythress
Publisher: Crossway Books
Price: $0.99 (Ends Sept 30)
and
The Deity of Christ
Editor(s): Christopher W. Morgan & Robert A. Peterson
Publisher: Crossway Books
Price: $1.99 (Ends Sept 30)
I realize Logos/Vyrso cannot or does not offer every single book by every single publisher, but it just seems that Crossway's books seem particularly slow in being offer. Since Vyrso books are straight conversions of the publishers electronic files, I don't see what prevents Logos from adding these to Vyrso in very short fashion. The quality of Crossway books is consistently high, almost everything they publish is worth reading.
I hope someone at Logos realizes that every single book added our Logos libraries increases our commitment to Logos. Even if Logos makes very little money on Vyrso sales it is to their advantage because it gives Logos users one more reason to stick with Logos.
Comments
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Keith,
maybe Brian will answer to that with a much better founded explanation, but I think at least in some cases it's exactly the presumed high-quality content. As I understand it, Logos and/or Crossway will put some titles from a publisher's catalog on reserve as potential candidates for the full Logos edition. Only "the rest" will be offered at Vyrso (and - for whatever reason - not all of that).
Unfortunately, the Logos production process is much more tedious and thus it may be years until such books arrive there - if at all. I personally think there should be a feedback loop / re-evaluation for titles from that list that won't make a Logos edition in the foreseeable future, thus getting all of a publisher's catalog either into Logos or on Vyrso - something I'd call for especially in the case of Crossway.
Mick
Have joy in the Lord!
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Keith, I remember this title being offered in Vyrso a couple years ago and then converted into a Logos title and now accessed only by the Theology in Community Series (5 vols.) CollectionKeith Larson said:...and
The Deity of Christ
Editor(s): Christopher W. Morgan & Robert A. Peterson
Publisher: Crossway Books
Price: $1.99 (Ends Sept 30)
It was great when they moved it over and dynamically priced the collection for those that purchased the volumes in Vyrso, but not so much I guess if you just need one book out of 5.0 -
Paul Newsome said:
Keith, I remember this title being offered in Vyrso a couple years ago and then converted into a Logos title and now accessed only by the Theology in Community Series (5 vols.) CollectionKeith Larson said:...and
The Deity of Christ
Editor(s): Christopher W. Morgan & Robert A. Peterson
Publisher: Crossway Books
Price: $1.99 (Ends Sept 30)Thanks, Paul - I knew this title sounded oddly familiar
Have joy in the Lord!
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NB.Mick said:
Keith,
maybe Brian will answer to that with a much better founded explanation, but I think at least in some cases it's exactly the presumed high-quality content. As I understand it, Logos and/or Crossway will put some titles from a publisher's catalog on reserve as potential candidates for the full Logos edition. Only "the rest" will be offered at Vyrso (and - for whatever reason - not all of that).
Unfortunately, the Logos production process is much more tedious and thus it may be years until such books arrive there - if at all. I personally think there should be a feedback loop / re-evaluation for titles from that list that won't make a Logos edition in the foreseeable future, thus getting all of a publisher's catalog either into Logos or on Vyrso - something I'd call for especially in the case of Crossway.
Mick
I had the same thoughts and as you said the production process is so much more involved with the full Logos editions that years can pass by until these titles see the light of day. In the interim customers purchase these titles from Amazon and thus are much less likely to purchase them when they come out in Logos format.
I am not without sympathy for the plight Logos is in. If they immediately offer these titles in Vyrso format they loss future sales to off set the cost of producing them in Logos format. However, if they do not offer them immediately in Vyrso format they will lose future sales because their customers have purchased them in a competitors format.
With this said, happy customers are worth a lot. Most of my purchase are still with Logos, not Vyrso and my guess is that is true for most of us.
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NB.Mick said:Paul Newsome said:
Keith, I remember this title being offered in Vyrso a couple years ago and then converted into a Logos title and now accessed only by the Theology in Community Series (5 vols.) CollectionKeith Larson said:...and
The Deity of Christ
Editor(s): Christopher W. Morgan & Robert A. Peterson
Publisher: Crossway Books
Price: $1.99 (Ends Sept 30)Thanks, Paul - I knew this title sounded oddly familiar
[Y]
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Another Crossway title:
Thinking Biblically! b John MacArthur
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As Mick mentioned, we have specifically chosen to not sell certain titles on Vyrso because we feel that they would be better suited for Logos. To ensure a clear distinction between Logos and Vyrso we want to make sure that we remain as consistent as possible with the types of resources we push into Vyrso. I apologize if this disappoints you or holds you back from getting great ebooks into your Logos Library. Let me know if there is anything I can do to make your experience better!
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Keith Larson said:
I am not without sympathy for the plight Logos is in. If they immediately offer these titles in Vyrso format they loss future sales to off set the cost of producing them in Logos format. However, if they do not offer them immediately in Vyrso format they will lose future sales because their customers have purchased them in a competitors format.
Yes, it's kind of "damned if you do, damned if you don't". I think Logos needs to make sure that they will get all of the relevant books into their 'ecosystem' - thus increasing customer loyalty and also breaking into the market of people who only buy a package once and do their theological oriented book purchasing eslewhere.
I think Alabama proposes the very interesting idea to not see a title "upgrading" from Vyrso to Logos as an accident but to find a way to envision Vyrso as a kind of PrePub stage - making the book available at once and upgrading later. The problem is to find an economically viable way to cover the Logos production cost.
Maybe a way would be to put all these "potential Logos books" into a special category in Vyrso which requires the buyer to purchase a "Logos upgrade eligibility token" for $1 (or: $1 for 'normal monographs', $2 for heavily footnoted theological works, $3 for commentaries and dictionaries). along with whatever sales price the book holds. The token would not entitle the user to force Logos to upgrade that specific book, but only that should Logos ever offer the 'full' version to receive it for free. This will accumulate a fund for the conversion cost - it allows taking part in any publisher-driven sales and making sure the "upgrading" is not such a loss for Logos, that they rather not offer a book at all than putting it on Vyrso. This conversion fund has the charme of flowing cash into Logos' pockets now - in fact, buyers would still see only a limited percentage of books upgraded, and those over a long period of time.
Have joy in the Lord!
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Brian Williams said:
As Mick mentioned, we have specifically chosen to not sell certain titles on Vyrso because we feel that they would be better suited for Logos. To ensure a clear distinction between Logos and Vyrso we want to make sure that we remain as consistent as possible with the types of resources we push into Vyrso. I apologize if this disappoints you or holds you back from getting great ebooks into your Logos Library. Let me know if there is anything I can do to make your experience better!
Thanks for the reply. I totally understand, perhaps two factors that consider.
1) This post has allowed me to discover "silent" additions to the Logos catalog. I was surprised to see all the Crossway titles that bypassed the normal pre-pub procedure. I realize this has always gone on, but from the marketing standpoint I question the wisdom of adding all these great books to your catalog and not telling anyone about it. You do want to sell these book?[:D]
2) Crossway does seem to be singled out. B&H and Baker to a lesser degree have a lot of books in Vyrso that are a little more meaty than your typical Amish romance novel. Perhaps this is a new policy and we will see more "Logos worthy" books from these other publisher pulled in the future.
3) Your doing a great job Brian! I hope that you guys don't pull all your good books from Vyrso. I don't daily visit Vyrso to see new Christian fiction book is on sale!
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NB.Mick said:Keith Larson said:
I am not without sympathy for the plight Logos is in. If they immediately offer these titles in Vyrso format they loss future sales to off set the cost of producing them in Logos format. However, if they do not offer them immediately in Vyrso format they will lose future sales because their customers have purchased them in a competitors format.
Yes, it's kind of "damned if you do, damned if you don't". I think Logos needs to make sure that they will get all of the relevant books into their 'ecosystem' - thus increasing customer loyalty and also breaking into the market of people who only buy a package once and do their theological oriented book purchasing eslewhere.
I think Alabama proposes the very interesting idea to not see a title "upgrading" from Vyrso to Logos as an accident but to find a way to envision Vyrso as a kind of PrePub stage - making the book available at once and upgrading later. The problem is to find an economically viable way to cover the Logos production cost.
Maybe a way would be to put all these "potential Logos books" into a special category in Vyrso which requires the buyer to purchase a "Logos upgrade eligibility token" for $1 (or: $1 for 'normal monographs', $2 for heavily footnoted theological works, $3 for commentaries and dictionaries). along with whatever sales price the book holds. The token would not entitle the user to force Logos to upgrade that specific book, but only that should Logos ever offer the 'full' version to receive it for free. This will accumulate a fund for the conversion cost - it allows taking part in any publisher-driven sales and making sure the "upgrading" is not such a loss for Logos, that they rather not offer a book at all than putting it on Vyrso. This conversion fund has the charme of flowing cash into Logos' pockets now - in fact, buyers would still see only a limited percentage of books upgraded, and those over a long period of time.
Our perhaps something like Amazon Match Book in reverse. Purchase a cheap eBook and you can "upgrade" for a set price. I think this would be more attractive to both Logos and their customers.
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