Thanks to a widget developed by Zola Books, the Wharton Digital Press this week announced that it has launched a new online bookstore that will enable readers to discover and purchase books authored by faculty of the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, and Wharton Digital Press authors.
Aimed at a general audience of business and public policy readers, the Wharton Digital Press Bookstore will offer a selection of titles in e-book, print, and audiobook formats. “For the first time, the Wharton School has a central location, with global reach, to promote books by its faculty, regardless of publisher, alongside Wharton Digital Press authors’ books,” said Stephen J. Kobrin, executive director of Wharton Digital Press.
The store is the first to be powered by Zola’s Everywhere Store widget, an API that enables anyone to begin selling books simply by dropping a few lines of Zola’s code on to their website. Formed as part of Zola Books, the widget draws from an extensive catalogue of titles, including books from the Big Five publishers, in both digital and print formats, and works with all e-book formats (often including the Kindle, depending on a book’s DRM), and with print fulfillment handled by Ingram. The widget is free; Zola makes its money through a revenue share. In addition, the seller fully owns the customer relationship—the sellers capture the email addresses, customer data, and analytics.
“We’re excited that Wharton Digital Press is launching their new bookstore with The Everywhere Store,” said Zola Books CEO Joe Regal, in a statement. “We believe it's good for readers, who can buy books directly without having to be sent elsewhere, and good for partners like Wharton Digital Press, who get total access to all the data and analytics, and can easily offer specials, bulk discounts, bundles, and other premiums that make their readers happy.”
After announcing Zola’s pivot to tech provider in November of 2015, Regal said the Wharton store is the first of several launches to come.
