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Re: Market Research 101 [message #74981 is a reply to message #74980]

Thu, 10 February 2011 07:30

pgrigis
Messages: 436
Registered: September 2007

Senior Member

On Feb 9, 4:44 pm, David Fanning <n...@dfanning.com> wrote:
> Folks,
>
> OK, today's topic: "What you want, verses what you
> can get". Or, perhaps, "What you want, verses what
> you can afford."
>
> I wrote this book of mine with only one idea
> in mind: I wanted a book that was both informative
> and beautiful. It turns out that informative you
> can get for a dime a dozen. Beautiful, well, that
> costs a bit more. Quite a bit more, as it turns out. :-)
>
> So, here is the question I should have started with,
> according to my MBA son. How much would you be willing
> to pay for a book about graphics programming in IDL?
>
> Let's start with a couple of assumptions. Let's assume
> it is a pretty good book and that it contains information
> that may be of some interest to you. Would you pay $25,
> $45, $85, $135? Where do you start drawing the line?
> What causes you to draw the line? Do the aesthetics of
> the book have anything to do with it? Do you care whether
> it is in back or white or color? Cloth cover or paperback?
> Sexy picture of the author on the back cover?
>
> At your price point, whatever it is, would you expect
> a full-color book, or would you expect black and white
> illustrations? (Keep in mind this is a book about
> scientific visualization techniques.) If you expected
> color, how much of a premium (above what you would pay
> for a black and white book) would you be willing to pay?
> What would you think is "reasonable"?
>
> Would it matter to you if the book was in black and white,
> but you could gain access to a color PDF of the book for
> some nominal charge if you bought the book?
>
> Or, are you one of those modern kinds of readers who
> disdain physical books, and only consider buying a book
> if you can load on your Kindle or IPad?
>
> Obviously, I have to make some choices here in the next
> week or so. And, obviously, I don't expect everyone will
> be willing to cough up $150 for a book, even if it is
> personally autographed by the author. But I would like to
> get a sense of what people might expect to pay for a technical
> book and what they would expect to get for their money.
>
> Thanks!
>
> Cheers,
>
> David
>
> --
> David Fanning, Ph.D.
> Fanning Software Consulting, Inc.
> Coyote's Guide to IDL Programming:http://www.idlcoyote.com/
> Sepore ma de ni thui. ("Perhaps thou speakest truth.")

I would argue for a price around 69$ or 79$ at most.

Much more than that and you'll have to deal
with illicit PDFs sprouting all over the place...

Color: how many pages have illustrations? I would
think it may be possible to limit color to the illustrations
and use B&W for the text - that should contain the costs.
I am assuming the printer would charge differently for
grayscale pages then colored pages, which may or may not
be true.

PDF: yes - sell in bundle with printed version and/or
separately.

If you worry about illicit PDFs... It turns
out that scanners with OCR are so common and cheap that
I doubt it makes any difference if you provide it or not
yourself anyway.

Ciao,
Paolo

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[Message index]

		Re: Market Research 101 By: Teddy Allen on Thu, 10 February 2011 11:33
		Re: Market Research 101 By: David Fanning on Thu, 10 February 2011 10:48
		Re: Market Research 101 By: astroboy2k on Thu, 10 February 2011 10:38
		Re: Market Research 101 By: David Fanning on Thu, 10 February 2011 10:19
		Re: Market Research 101 By: David Fanning on Thu, 10 February 2011 09:28
		Re: Market Research 101 By: Carsten Lechte on Thu, 10 February 2011 09:18
		Re: Market Research 101 By: David Fanning on Thu, 10 February 2011 09:05
		Re: Market Research 101 By: Carsten Lechte on Thu, 10 February 2011 08:42
		Re: Market Research 101 By: David Fanning on Thu, 10 February 2011 08:31
		Re: Market Research 101 By: ben.bighair on Thu, 10 February 2011 08:11
		Re: Market Research 101 By: David Fanning on Thu, 10 February 2011 07:59
		Re: Market Research 101 By: pgrigis on Thu, 10 February 2011 07:30
		Re: Market Research 101 By: Mike Potter on Wed, 09 February 2011 23:53
		Re: Market Research 101 By: SonicKenking on Wed, 09 February 2011 16:04
		Re: Market Research 101 By: penteado on Wed, 09 February 2011 15:41
		Re: Market Research 101 By: David Fanning on Wed, 09 February 2011 15:10
		Re: Market Research 101 By: Paul Van Delst[1] on Wed, 09 February 2011 14:53
		Re: Market Research 101 By: David Fanning on Wed, 09 February 2011 14:14
		Re: Market Research 101 By: Jean[2] on Wed, 09 February 2011 14:03
		Re: Market Research 101 By: cgguido on Fri, 11 February 2011 11:27
		Re: Market Research 101 By: Paul.Bowyer@gmail.com on Fri, 11 February 2011 01:46

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