Automated Reporting Via Your POS

In coordination with Circana (formerly NPD), ABA has made some changes to the underlying technology of weekly sales reporting. As of October 2022, ABA is BookScan’s official aggregator for independent bookstore data. Several POS vendors offer an automated process to submit sales files weekly to the ABA FTP server. These include

  • Anthology
  • Basil
  • Bookmanager
  • Booklog
  • IBID
  • iMRCHNT
  • Wordstock

Below are instructions specific to each of these vendors to get set up for automation.

ABA member stores that report sales via File Upload or Manual Entry on BookWeb.org do not need to make any changes to their reporting method, unless they would like to switch to automated reporting and are using one of the POS systems detailed above.

If you have multiple branches, each reporting branch of your store will have unique reporting credentials. Contact [email protected] if you have any questions or need credentials for another branch.

Anthology

Requests for automation should be sent to Anthology support [email protected]. Anthology will coordinate with ABA to obtain the store's FTP credentials to set up the automatic weekly process.

Basil

Automated reporting setup with Basil is a part of their customer onboarding process questionnaire and is implemented by coordination with ABA. Additional questions can be submitted to [email protected].

Booklog

Please contact Booklog support to set up automation.

Bookmanager

Requests for automation should be sent to Bookmanager General Support [email protected]. Bookmanager will coordinate with ABA to obtain the store's FTP credentials to set up the automatic weekly process.

IBID

Requests for automation should be sent to [email protected], 800-458-1996 Ext 230 or [email protected], 800-458-1996 Ext 204. IBID will coordinate with ABA to obtain the store's FTP credentials to set up the automatic weekly process.

iMRCHNT

If iMRCHNT is your POS system and you are currently reporting your weekly sales via Bookweb.org and wish to start transmitting files through their automated ftp process, please do the following to update iMRCHNT to send your reports to ABA’s server.

Accessing the BookScan interface

  • Go To: Interfaces > Nielsen BookScan.
  • You will need to set up your BookScan parameters for each store in your chain from which you want to report sales data to BookScan.
  • Select a store to establish the BookScan parameters — the Nielsen BookScan window will appear.
  • The Week Ending field always defaults to the previous week (seven days ago).
  • Generally, you will run the BookScan report every week, on Sunday or Monday.
  • If you need to change the date in this field, either key in the new date or click on the arrow at the right of the field and select the desired date.
  • The information for all of the remaining fields has been or can be provided by ABA.
  • You should only need to fill these fields in once for each reporting store.
  • Each reporting store will have unique reporting credentials. Contact [email protected] if you have any questions or need credentials for another branch.
  • To send your sales data to ABA BookScan (if your reporting is not already automated):
  • Click on the Send Report button at the lower left of the BookScan window.
  • A message box appears telling you either that the report has been sent, or that a problem occurred and that it was not sent.
  • Send the BookScan report for each applicable store in your multi-store chain.
  • The report should include sales occurring during the week beginning 12:01 am Sunday through midnight Saturday and be submitted no later than 1:00 pm ET each Monday.
  • Requests for automation should be sent to iMRCHNT Support: [email protected] or by calling 603-298-5721. iMRCHNT will coordinate with ABA to obtain the store's FTP credentials to set up the automatic weekly process.

WordStock

Requests for automation should be sent to WordStock Support: [email protected] or by calling 1-800-444-7224. WordStock will coordinate with ABA to obtain the store's FTP credentials to set up the automatic weekly process.

Manual Entry

Reporters have two options for manually entering sales data into the Indie Bestseller System. From the main-menu, you will see them listed under the heading, “Manually enter sales data.”
 
Option One: All Titles
 
You can use this option to report all of your sales information at once.
  1. Enter ISBN numbers and quantities into the available fields for all of your sales. If you make a mistake, just press the button marked “C” next to any row and that entry will be cleared.
  2. If you have reported previously, the fields will be pre-populated with your last reported list. (Since many of the same books will most likely be represented for the current week, you can simply correct the quantities and add any new ISBNs that were not on the previous list.)
  3. When you are done, press the “Review” button at the bottom of the page.
  4. Select the number of outlets/branches your sales data is for, and press “Save.” Your information is now reported.
Using this method, there is no need to presort your sales data into categories. Our database will automatically sort the ISBNs into the correct categories and sub-categories.
 
Option Two: By Category
 
You can use this option if your POS system automatically reports your sales based on categories. The categories we report are hardcover fiction, hardcover nonfiction, trade paperback fiction, trade paperback nonfiction, mass market, and children’s.
 
  1. Choose the category you wish to report.
  2. Enter ISBN numbers and quantities into the available fields for all of your sales. If you make a mistake, just press the button marked "C" next to any row and that entry will be cleared.
  3. If you have reported previously, the fields will be pre-populated with your last reported list. (Since many of the same books will most likely be represented for the current week, you can simply correct the quantities and add any new ISBNs which were not on the previous list.)
  4. When you are done, press the “Review” button at the bottom of the page.
  5. Select the number of outlets/branches your sales data is for, and press “Save.” Your information is now reported.
  6. Repeat this procedure with each of the categories.
Automated options may be available to you.  Please refer to the section “Automated Reporting Via Your POS”.
 

File Upload

Bestseller Upload File ExampleQUICKSTART Directions

  1. Export a .txt or .csv file from your POS system composed of one line for each title sold during the Sunday through Saturday of the reporting period detailing, for each book, the ISBN and the quantity sold separated by a tab or comma (see image of example at right). The quantity may not contain decimals or be a negative number.  The ISBN should be 13 digits and not contain special characters.  Note: We cannot process Excel or PDF files. Please review your file before submitting.
  2. Open bookweb.org/bestsellers/report/upload
  3. Click “Browse”, select your reporting file and select the number of outlets the upload is for.
  4. Click “Submit.”
  5. The page will display a table with the first few ISBN and quantity fields from your file. Confirm that the ISBN and Quantity are correctly identified and adjust if required by selecting the ISBN or quantity checkbox identifying the field. (This is not your full file — just the fields from the first few records of your file to make sure it will be processed accurately.)
  6. Press the “Submit” button again below the verification table.

 

EXPANDED DIRECTIONS for specific POS systems

How to export and upload a file from your POS system.

Anthology

  • Go to Reports
  • Go to Sales History
  • Change the dates on the screen to reflect the previous week
  • Under Which Report?, change this to Bestsellers
  • Under Send Report Where?, answer file (not printer) and label it

Please use the Bestsellers Reporting link to upload the file you've just created. 

Basil

Booklog

Run the report to pull all books you sold in the one-week standard reporting period. Save the file in .txt format, then upload the saved file to Bookweb. Only sales with a valid ISBN will be loaded.
  • Go to Reports | Report Pick List.
  • The Report Pick List will open.
  • Find the ABA Bestsellers Report and click on it to select it.
  • The reports parameter window will open.
  • In the Rows Displayed field, change the 10 to a large number, such as 10000. This will ensure that all of your sales are displayed, not just the top 10.
  • In the Department field, select your book department.
  • In the Sales Period field, select the last week, from Sunday through Saturday.
  • Click “OK” to run the report.
  • You will see the report on your screen, showing a list of ISBNs and the number of copies of that ISBN that you sold during the sales period.
  • Click on the Export icon in the toolbar.
  • The Save As window will open.
  • In the Save In: field, choose a location that will be easy to find later.
  • In the File Name: field, enter a file name that easily identifies this file.
  • In the Save as Type: field, choose “Text” with headers.
  • Click “Save.”
  • Your file is now saved to your computer and ready to be uploaded.
  • Upload the file to the File Upload page. This page will only be accessible each week from Saturday, 3:00 pm ET, to Tuesday, 3:00 am ET.
For Multiple Departments:
The File Upload system will consider the most recent file from your store as the authoritative and only file for your store for the week.
 
If you can't get all of your book sales into a single file because they are in multiple departments, you must run the report for each department and assemble the results into a single, combined file.
  • Run the report multiple times, exporting each time. Make sure that the names of your exported .txt file include the department name.
  • Open the first export and copy the contents of the .txt file to a new .txt file. Call the new file “Complete” or “Combined.”
  • Open the second export and copy the contents of the .txt file to the new combined file.
  • Continue until you have copied each department's values into the combined file.
  • Upload the file to the File Upload page. This page will only be accessible each week from Saturday, 3:00 pm ET, to Tuesday, 3:00 am ET..
If you need more help contact Booklog at (800) 320-5834 x260 or [email protected]. Contact [email protected] if you would like to sign up for a training session.
Please use the Bestsellers Reporting page to upload the file you've just created. 

IBID

For questions on the file upload process please contact [email protected], 800-458-1996 Ext 230 or [email protected], 800-458-1996 Ext 204. 

All Others

Even if your POS System is not specifically listed in our instructions, this system can still accept an uploaded file provided it is in the correct format.
Simply create a report for one week of sales containing only ISBN numbers and quantities. (Do not include any other data such as price, author, publisher, quantity on hand, etc., as this will cause the upload to fail.)
 
Once you have verified that the report contains only ISBNs and quantities, save it as a .txt or .csv file. When prompted by the reporting system, select this as the file to be uploaded, and click the "Submit" button. Confirm that your ISBN and quantity fields are correctly identified and press the “Submit” button again below the verification table.
 
Please use the Bestsellers Reporting page to upload the file you've just created. 
 
Automated options may be available to you.  Please refer to the section “Automated Reporting Via Your POS”.