In the past, I have not recommended that authors use Author's Republic to distribute audiobooks to retailers, primarily because you could only be paid via PayPal, and because Findaway had a much larger reach.

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However, with the acquisition of Findaway by Spotify, that has changed.

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There's been some controversy around Findaway's terms of service in the past few years, primarily regarding Apple and this year's fumbled change. Still, in my experience, Findaway has been a much more responsive company than ACX, and served as an important balance to Audible's monopoly in the industry.

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My current concern with Findaway has more to do with the fact that Apple Books and Barnes and Noble see Findaway as a competitor after the Spotify acquisition. Meaning, it's possible that either or both may migrate distribution away from Findaway at some point.

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Delving into Author's Republic, I was relieved to learn that (as long as you're in the United States), you can now be paid via direct deposit. Additionally, they are now able to distribute to Chirp (one of the most important retailers). In fact, their retail partner list currently numbers 50+, compared to Findaway's 35+.

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It took an email to customer service to find out if authors can run price promotions on Author's Republic. (It's not addressed in their FAQs.)

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Here's the response I received:

Yes – we can do a price promotion.  Currently, it’s just by way of emailing us to lower your price for a promotional period.  We would need one weeks’ notice, and you would just let us know the sale price and duration. 

 

We can do this price drop for the following retailers:

 

Kobo

LibroFM*

Audiobooks.com*

Chirp

Google*

Barnes & Noble

Apple

Storyfair*

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*My note: you cannot run a price promo on these retailers using Findaway's Promo Dashboard tool.

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If you have books already distributed via Findaway, moving them will cause some disruption, and your audiobooks may disappear from retailers for a few weeks in the process.

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Rather than cut out Findaway completely, (until I see how things play out with Spotify and the other retailers) my plan is to upload my books to Author's Republic to cover the list of partner retailers missing from Findaway's list. Then, the books will be there should I decide to move away from Findaway more completely.

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I will keep you updated and in the meantime, I'd love to hear your experiences.