Create and test every purchase link
Create or verify preorder links
As soon as retailers open preorders for your book, confirm which formats are available, collect the links, and check that the price and date on each are right.
Why it matters
Preorders turn months of anticipation into orders, and every piece of early publicity needs somewhere to send people. A preorder page with the wrong price or date, or a format that quietly is not available, wastes the attention you worked to earn. Knowing when the pages open also lets you plan announcements around them.
Your part
- What you do
- Verify. Someone else may do it. Inspect the result yourself.
- Who normally owns it
- Publisher and Author. Publisher's feed opens preorders; author verifies and collects links; self-publisher sets them up
- When
- As soon as preorders open, usually 3 to 6 months before publication (Create and test every purchase link: three months before publication, and again on publication day)
Your part changes with your publishing route.
How to do it
The full walkthrough
A preorder is an order placed before publication and fulfilled on release day. Retailers open preorder pages when they receive the metadata, often months ahead, and every preorder is a sale you can point people to during the long stretch before the book exists. Preorders also count toward first-week sales at most retailers, which is why publishers care about them.
The task has two parts. First, find out when preorders open for each format at each retailer and confirm the pages exist with the correct price, date, and cover. Second, collect those links into your canonical buy link list so you can use them immediately. Some formats open later than others (audiobooks in particular), and some retailers do not offer preorders for some formats, so the list is rarely complete on day one.
Preorders open when the metadata reaches the retailer, so at a publisher or a hybrid press the feed does it and the publicist can tell you when to expect the pages: ask, then verify. If you publish the book yourself, preorders are a setting on each platform, with its own rules about lead time and about which formats qualify, and a preorder date is a commitment to deliver the final file by a deadline.
Verify the links again at launch, when preorder pages become regular product pages and URLs sometimes change.
Common mistakes
- Announcing preorders before checking that the pages exist.
- Linking to the hardcover preorder when most readers want the ebook.
- Missing a wrong price that was set from a placeholder in the metadata.
- For self-publishers, setting a preorder date and missing the file deadline.
- Not re-checking links after launch, when preorder URLs sometimes change.
What done looks like
- The preorder opening date known for each format at each retailer.
- Each preorder page checked for correct cover, price, and publication date.
- Preorder links added to the canonical buy link list as they appear.
- Formats without preorder availability noted, with the reason.
- Links re-verified at launch.
Ask your publisher
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Sources and last checked
- Official source
- No single official page for this step.
- Last checked
- Not checked against its source yet.
- How confident we are
- Verified