There are three ways to get an ISBN for your book. Does it matter which you choose? Yes, it does.
First, let’s recap the three ways you can get one for a book that you are not going to publish through an established traditional publisher:
- Buy a block of ISBNs that will be assigned to you or your company
- Buy a single ISBN from one of the authorized vendors
- Sign up with one of the innumerable subsidy publishers (who may choose to call themselves, incorrectly, “POD publisher” or “self-publishing company”)
To keep this in perspective, remember that the ISBN is a unique number that identifies a particular edition of a particular title (the paperback edition of Backyard Bigfoot has a different ISBN than the hardcover edition). The ISBN is a supply-chain number that allows wholesalers, distributors, and retailers to identify that particular book/edition and the publisher of record as well as who is the vendor of record. These connections are established through the various databases and catalogs used by those outfits:
- R. R. Bowker’s Books in Print
- Baker & Taylor’s database
- Ingram Book database/catalog (You either have to have an Ingram account, have a distributor who does, or print books through LSI to get in this one, used by almost all bookstores.)
Most published book reviews will include not only the title and author but also the ISBN, so customers can ask for or order it from their local bookstore (or find it in their local library). There are different books with the same title but each must have its own ISBN.
Some of the subsidy publishers allow you to either use one of their block of ISBNs (making them the official publisher-of-record) or one you purchased (making you the publisher-of-record). If you use one of theirs and later decide to republish with you as the publisher, you will have a problem. You see, ISBNs never really go away and are never reused. That subsidy-published book will remain in the various databases forever, possibly listed as out of print but still there. Your republication under a different ISBN may or may not turn up in a quick database search and may or may not be recognized as the same book. This confusion in the supply chain may mean you have to redo much of your marketing program to try to correct that confusion.
One quick note about buying single ISBNs — I strongly recommend against it. You will pay almost 50% of what a block of 10 costs for just that one. What if you later decide to publish an e-book or a hardcover in addition to your original trade paperback (both require a unique ISBN)? What if you decide to turn it into a series (again requiring a second ISBN)? In the beginning, it is difficult to know exactly where your publishing journey may take you, so why cut off your options or significantly increase your long-term expenses when you could have avoided it?
Don’t be penny-wise and pound-foolish. Buy yourself at least a block of 10 ISBNs. If you can’t afford the extra $150 or so, you should probably rethink your publishing plans anyway.
