Nicole Sullivan, owner of BookBar in Denver, Colo., has officially launched ReadTribe.com, a website designed to connect readers to book clubs and book clubs to indie bookstores. This project began in 2014, soon after BookBar's opening, when Sullivan and her staff found themselves fielding several questions per day regarding the availability of book clubs to join. Sullivan envisioned a service where readers could be matched to book clubs that fit their goals as readers while, at the same time, benefiting other independently owned bookstores.
Initially launched in 2018 with a testing phase in partnership with a handful of regional bookstores, ReadTribe's site is now ready for more indie bookshops across the country to sign on and begin serving their customers.
 |
|
| Nicole Sullivan | |
"The concept is simple even though the roll-out has been complex," she said. "There is a chicken and egg situation at work where we want as many users as possible but we want those users to be connected with their local, indie bookstore. So the first step is to get my bookstore colleagues on board."
The website invites readers to sign in as individual users; they can browse through lists of book clubs, narrowing by ZIP code, reading styles, book club reading goals, genre focus or the bookstores to which they are linked. Users who already have book clubs and are seeking new members, or just looking for a way to organize their groups better, can create a book club profile, and set it to public or private, accepting or closed to new members (toggling back and forth as needed), with features such as member polling, forum, calendar, book club news, bookstore news and book recommendations.
According to ReadTribe, bookstores can enjoy the benefits of a free service that allows them to manage book clubs better that meet and/or shop in their stores. Admins of the bookstore's profile can update their events and book recommendations, which appear on the sidebar of each affiliated book club's page. Any book club recommendations will link to the store's IndieCommerce page for easy and direct purchase. Bookstores can highlight amenities they offer to their book club affiliates, such as meeting space or discounts on book club orders. ReadTribe provides marketing materials to each bookstore that signs on so they can easily get their customers on board.
"This will be a way for all of us booksellers to be able to directly market and sell to all of those book club customers that we know we have but haven't had a great way to reach directly," Sullivan said. "I wanted a solution for this and I wanted to be able to share this solution with all of my bookseller friends so we can all sell more books."
The service is free to users and booksellers, with ad opportunities for publishers and authors. For more information, contact Anne DeLong at anne@readtribe.com.