My plan, in a nutshell: Order everything, immediately cancel most
Why should you do this MY WAY? (Good question.) Doing it my way is initially faster than a properly considered decision on each individual title. Doing it my way locks in the lowest available price through June 2011 on EVERY title. You may think you don't need the Moody Church Leadership Collection (24 Vols.) now but you could be called to pastor a church in January and get a book allowance with your new responsibilities! (Who knows what the future holds?) Doing it my way gives you time in the future to leisurely investigate each purchase before deciding to buy.
Preliminary considerations:
What is the Pre-Pub program? Look here http://www.logos.com/prepub
Who is Dan? Director of Sales & Marketing departments as well as CEO Bob Pritchett's little brother & a determined and capable individual.
Who is eligible? You MUST read Dan's post here for this answer. If you have actually read the post, you now qualify.
Limitations. This is only for Pre-Pubs that you can add to your Pre-Pub order page in your account during the remainder of October. Don't whine if a new Pre-Pub gets listed November 2nd and Dan won't let you add it to the plan. Also, don't get angry because Anchor Yale Bible Reference Library has already shipped (making it impossible to add to the Pre-Pub order list. ALL titles you seek to handle with the special provisions of this offer MUST be in an October dated snapshot of your Pre-Pub page. That snapshot is the umbrella. Anything not in the snapshot will have to be negotiated through Sales and will likely cost a bit more. Current catalog titles (already published) can not be added either. The Pre-Pub system isn't built to handle anything other than titles holding Pre-Pub status. I don't even think a manual override is possible.
Maintaining integrity of the Pre-Pub plan. Several people have warned how this could undermine the stated purpose & functionality of the Pre-Pub program. Bob Pritchett points out the program is designed to aid Logos in deciding which resources to pursue first. If everyone adds everything to their lists and leaves them there, the Logos development team will have a harder time knowing what titles are sure sales and what titles are likely to cave right before shipping. My suggested plan of action here will have you purge your Pre-Pub list of all titles you are not prepared to pay for on ship date. This will ensure you have the privilege to purchase titles at the special price any time through June 2011 without sending false signals to Logos that would hamper true productivity & profitability. Bob's Pre-Pub program is still viable and you still have choices till next Summer. That is a win-win.
Facts you need to know. Pre-Pub do not ship on weekends. They do not begin shipping until noon on release date. Your Logos account Pre-Pub page is currently not sortable by price or title. The page only displays the most recent entry at top. If you enter them by price (low to high or high to low) they will be presented on your list in a graduated fashion. Lastly, you must perform my Megaplan yourself. The Logos Sales department doesn't have the time to do this for each individual. If you want to save lots of money, expend a little effort!
Matthew's MegaPlan:
1) Go to the Pre-Pub page, sort titles by price: high to low or low to high
2) Click the "Easy PreOrder" button. Immediately after clicking, reposition your mouse cursor over your Browser Back Button. When you see the order confirmation page, click the Back Button to return to the Pre-Pub page. Notice: the page takes several seconds to refresh. If you click your mouse while it is refreshing it will home to the top of the page and you will have to keep scrolling back to your position. If you allow the screen to complete refreshing and take you there before clicking, you will save a lot of time.
3) Work sequentially down the page, keeping the window open until you are done. Use a second window with your account Pre-Pubs page to keep track what you have added in case you forget your place.
4) Skip any titles you are absolutely sure you will never, ever, buy. I skipped all but one Spanish resource. Skip all the Baker Academic stuff because the Pre-Pub prices are the same as their regular sale prices. Skip the Nelson Commentary Collection if you already have the contents. If there is a slight interest in a title, add it! Accidental duplicate entries won't affect you if you delete them before ship date.
5) When you are done, snapshot your list (need more advice how to?) Print out your list in hard copy too. Call Logos Sales and request they do the snapshot too. The snapshot is your claim to buy at the cheap prices.
WARNING: Three titles ship on Monday, 10/11/2010 at Noon. If you still have them on your list, your credit card will be charged! Delete them as soon as Sales has your snapshot.
6) Start deleting all titles from your Pre-Pub list that you are not 100% committed to buying as soon as they are available. You now have the freedom to delete the ones you are unsure of. You have until June 2011 to make up your mind.
7) Do NOT delete titles you want Logos to actively develop and bring to publication. This tells Bob Pritchett how much money is on the barrel head and the Development team which titles to prioritize.
Follow up post coming that explains another good reason WHY you should go overboard on the snapshot.
