Consumer Discounting

Regardless of the actual purchase price, a perceived discount is a major psychological factor in consumers’ buying decisions. Potential buyers want to see that they are getting a deal and saving money on their purchase. Your most recent price and consumer discount data can be found in the Amazon Snapshot panel.

Marketing Insights looks at the Amazon product detail page to determine what discount (if any) consumers see off the list price for a product. The discount percentage is based on the strike-through list price and discount amount that Amazon displays to the consumer.

A displayed discount percentage greater than 25% is optimal in most cases.

Print books

For print books, the discount percentage is calculated as Amazon's discount to the consumer off the manufacturer's suggested retail price for that edition.

A typical print edition on Amazon		A typical print textbook on Amazon
Discount percentage: 36%		Discount percentage: 34%

Ebooks

There are a few different scenarios for ebooks based on whether or not there is a corresponding print edition of the ebook and the terms of sale between Amazon and the publisher (agency versus wholesale).

For ebooks with a corresponding print edition...

The discount percentage is calculated based off the list price of the prevailing print edition.

Agency ebook (with print edition)		Wholesale ebook (with print edition)
Discount percentage: 45%		Discount percentage: 41%*

 * Though Amazon displays the digital list price, the discount percentage is still calculated based on the print list price (in this case, 41%).

For ebook-only titles (those without a corresponding print edition)...

The discount percentage is calculated as Amazon's discount to the consumer off the digital list price.

Wholesale ebook (without print edition, discounted)		Wholesale ebook (without print edition, and not discounted)		Agency ebook (without print edition)
Discount percentage: 45%		Discount percentage: 0%		Discount percentage: 0%
Amazon displays the digital list price, and the discount percentage is calculated accordingly (in this case, Amazon is discount the ebook 44% off the list price).		When there is no discount on a wholesale ebook-only edition, Amazon does not display the list price or a discount, and the discount percentage is 0.		The Kindle Price is both the digital list price and the sale price to the consumer. When there is no print edition, Amazon does not display a discount, and the discount percentage is 0.