If you have been reading my blogs, then you know, much of what I have been writing about is from learning things the hard way. You will also have learned, I have been preparing since 2018 to eventually put my books out there however not before they were ready,..or so I thought. Imagine you do all this work to get the key word search right and meta data, even get a GST number to make Ingram Sparks happy since you are a Canadian customer. You endure their lousy website with terrible glitches and all the rest of it. I even bought a new lap top since the site is so badly designed it won't shrink to fit my mac's screen and I cannot log into my account. All through listening to their podcasts and so on, it is about them generating more and more and more customers. Are the glitches fixed? Nope, just to change my address on there I had to get help. Ingram Sparks is like this HUGE floating vessel with a ton of holes in it. Instead of fixing the holes, they just have a lot of people running around putting their fingers in them while they encourage more people to come. Some folks may be lucky enough to be in part of the ship that they actually get their money from their book sales, they actually have heard from them when things change but in most cases, folks are complaining even after 90 days not a cent...why? Little things like THEY DON'T DO E-TRANSFERS THROUGH SAVINGS ACCOUNTS. Look everywhere but that is one tibit of info you won't find unless you read the reviews from legit sites! Likewise, you won't hear from them at all even when you leave the date to be published blank but they fill it in AND UPLOAD YOUR BOOK WITHOUT YOU ACTIVATING IT! So why do they even have that little box that says expected publishing date (or something close to this) and why do you have to fill in all the blanks on metadata before they upload? Well, I can tell you now...because they want to seal the deal! If you look closely, there is no longer a little garbage can to dump the title, once you are there, unless you email them via their one working customer service platform, YOU CANNOT REMOVE YOUR TITLE ONCE YOU HAVE IT ON THERE, EVEN IF IT IS SUPPOSED TO BE IN THE DRAFT STAGE. It is typical cheap sales practice, seal the deal while the customer is with you. I did a number of proofs with Ingram Sparks using ALL their premium papers and inks. The quality was just terrible. It was like the ink was on newsprint. I didn't want this! I did NOT want to stay with Ingram Sparks and if I had been smart, I would have contacted them and had my titles removed BEFORE THEY UPLOADED AND STARTED DISTRIBUTING MY PROOF WITH ME NOT ACTIVATING ANYTHING! So now I have a proof with my title and all the rest of it floating around out there suckering in unsuspected customers! AND NOT A WORD FROM INGRAM SPARKS ABOUT MY ACCOUNT INFO BEING OLD, NOT BEING ABLE TO SET UP PAYMENT OR THAT IT WAS EVEN OUT THERE. WHAT A SHOCK when I go on Amazon (the platform I decided on for my kids books) and find a draft version on there! And has been on there for a year and half! Now I have to wait for them to respond and remove the thing before I can carry on. My next blog will be on how I can do this. I was intending to use Ingram Sparks for my Murder Mystery. Honestly, they really have no clue what they are doing and they are not fixing what needs to be fixed. There is no communication between existing departments (or my book wouldn't be out there since I only recently got a GST number and the tax info, etc is not completed!!!!). Back to the drawing board. I am completely disenchanted with this group. I put a review in on a reputable site. Lets see if they respond or run away because it is too close to the truth. It is like a bunch of moneys have built this side of their business. Ingram Sparks is an old family business and they are good at what they do when it comes to dealing with larger publishing houses. As far as Indie publishers....NOT A CLUE. Update: They responded eventually to my ticket concerning my title being uploaded and say it will be down in the next few days. The response with the review group was they were glad I had contacted them for help! All I did the entire time I used them was contact them for help! Nothing ever worked properly and their website was a mess. Problem is, it still is! I have disabled every adblock and malware, etc to get on the site and cannot. I try to open it and it just spins! How great is that! I was thinking I would go with these folks but after this experience, I have to make some changes in my printing goals. I deal with folks who know what they are doing, and clearly, these folks are in way over their heads.
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June 2024
AuthorArtist, Buddhist, Educator, Traveller, Cabinet Maker, kayaker, etc and now writer! |