When it comes to ebook distributors, the strongest player reaching the library market is Smashwords. It already reaches:
- OverDrive: the most popular supplier of ebooks to libraries in the United States
- Baker & Taylor Axis 360: the digital media platform of Baker & Taylor, which has historically been a key print distributor to libraries and is now owned by Follett, a company that specializes in reaching K–12 schools and universities
- Gardners: the book retailer that reaches the English-language market in Europe
- Odilo: an international ebook distributor
Last week, Smashwords announced a new agreement with Bibliotheca CloudLibrary, which reaches 3,000 public libraries in the US, Canada, the UK, and Australia. With the addition of CloudLibrary, Smashwords now reaches all of the most widely used ebook distributors for US libraries.
The announcement gives us the opportunity to reflect on the dominance of OverDrive in the US market. In 2015—when CloudLibrary was sold off by 3M—James LaRue of the American Library Association commented, “It appears that 3M wasn’t finding the business all that profitable. I suspect that’s because, although 3M’s interface is arguably far superior to that of OverDrive, our patrons have now gone through the initial agony of learning OverDrive’s app and don’t stray much beyond it. OverDrive … has something of a lock on the US library market as it now stands. Changing user behavior can be tough.”
Bottom line: As experienced indie authors know, distribution is just the first step in getting library sales. Just because a book is available through multiple channels doesn’t mean librarians know the book exists or will order it. It’s also important to understand library circulation trends for ebooks: genre and commercial fiction is where the overwhelming demand is. Nonfiction and children’s books can be a tougher sell. To understand how librarians discover new books, take a look at this Q&A with librarians Robin Bradford and Anna Mickelson. Bradford has also written a specific article with advice for indie authors at the Verbs; as a first step, she recommends that authors find out what digital platform their local library uses (OverDrive, Axis 360, or 3M) and make sure their ebooks are available through it.
Jane Friedman has spent her entire career working in the publishing industry, with a focus on business reporting and author education. Established in 2015, her newsletter The Bottom Line provides nuanced market intelligence to thousands of authors and industry professionals; in 2023, she was named Publishing Commentator of the Year by Digital Book World.
Jane’s expertise regularly features in major media outlets such as The New York Times, The Atlantic, NPR, The Today Show, Wired, The Guardian, Fox News, and BBC. Her book, The Business of Being a Writer, Second Edition (The University of Chicago Press), is used as a classroom text by many writing and publishing degree programs. She reaches thousands through speaking engagements and workshops at diverse venues worldwide, including NYU’s Advanced Publishing Institute, Frankfurt Book Fair, and numerous MFA programs.
