Here is what my sales looked like:
Showing posts with label pricing. Show all posts
Showing posts with label pricing. Show all posts
Saturday, October 1, 2011
September Sales for Cancelled
I am very proud of my release month! My original goal, way back when, was to sell 50 copies, releasing the beginning of the month. I didn't release CANCELLED until September 14, so I only had 16 days, not 30. I sold a total of 28 copies!!! Extrapolating that rate out, it was roughly 1.75 books on average per day, and if I had had 30 days, multiplied by 1.75, that would have been 52.5 books!
Here is what my sales looked like:
Here is what my sales looked like:
Friday, July 22, 2011
Rethinking the Paperback's Place in Self-Publishing
Now, this doesn't mean a paperback version of my book is worthless. Far from it. But, it is more likely that the people who want a printed version have already read the electronic version and enjoyed it. Or, they know someone who read it and don't own an e-reader. In the first situation, I've already made my royalty off the reader, I don't care if they get the paper version for the lowest price possible. In the second situation, they're trying me out on the recommendation of a friend, so again, I'd like them to get a hold of the book for the lowest price possible. And, I'd like to encourage them to adopt e-reading as that helps grow author-centric publishing for all of us.
SO HERE IS MY PLAN:
I am not in favor of long-term $.99 pricing for my ebook. That is just me, and I understand other authors will have different strategies for their works. That's great! For my plans, I will price my ebook at $2.99. This will net me roughly a $2 royalty per ebook sold.
My printed books with be POD through Createspace. I will sign up for the ProPlan for $39 a year, so that this plan can work. My paperback will be 6x9, 300 pages. Included in the purchase of the paperback will be an offer for a free electronic version (probably in PDF). I should preface all of this with I do not believe in DRM. My paperback price? $7.99.
Royalty-wise this is roughly $.34 if a reader buys my paperback book through Amazon's website, and $1.94 if they buy it from my author site.
This is how it would look:
Reader who wants BOTH e-book and paperback copy: Buy it from my site for $7.99 and get both. (I make $1.94)
Reader ONLY wants ebook: Buy it for $2.99. (I make $2.00)
Reader stumbles on my paperback on Amazon.com: I make $.34, but did 0 marketing for that sale, and hopefully the reasonable price makes the reader more likely to recommend it to someone else. Also, there will be an offer for the reader to email me and get an electronic copy for free.
I think the number of readers in the last category will be very small. This idea started from reading on another's blog (I honestly do NOT remember who's blog it was) that they offered the print version mainly as a service to their readers, they didn't expect major sales. Yet, the paperback version was priced at $12.
This got me thinking...what does the paperback version as a SERVICE to readers really look like? And this is what I came up with. I'm happy to hear comments and concerns from others. Maybe there is an angle I missed. However, I think pricing the paperback as low as possible will be better for readers overall.
"CANCELLED" arriving SEPTEMBER 2011. A robotics engineer asks his business partner to marry him, but a previous one-night stand is having his baby.
Sunday, May 29, 2011
Self-Published Author: Deadlines, Making a Living, 10-year plan
Going to be close on deadline, but I can do it! Tuesday at midnight is the deadline for my first manuscript. I'm currently sitting at 48,000 words. I have about 20,000 more to go. Then let it simmer, and work on outlining second book.
Which brings me to one of my favorite activities: GENRE SNOOPING. That's right. What are people in my genre writing? What are they pricing it at? What does it read like? I've mentioned Lucy Kevin before in regards to her ebook pricing strategy, and was surprised to realize why I couldn't find a ton of information about her. She doesn't exist. Okay, she does, but her main writing name is Bella Andre. No, I'm not unmasking a superhero, she plainly lists her pseudonyms on her main site.
Bella Andre is an indie publishing goddess! She has over 16 titles and even better, she's like me! Let's write those modern, contemporary stories about love in the real world! Melodrama? Yuck. Weak females? Double yuck. Super strong females the male must "tame?" Super double yuck. June looks like it's going to be me devouring her entire Lucy Kevin line. It might be the first series I can put in my section of books I have personally read and like for my readers waiting in between my novels (check out my Catering to the Readers post)
So there is hope for my writing style. +1. I next played with the real numbers posted by one of the wonderful brains behind The Writer's Guide to Epublishing, D.D. Scott, and also by YA author Megg Jensen, writer of Anathema. At $2.99, Megg saw sales in the range of 50-150 books per month. D.D. Scott's $2.99 offerings, with a $.99 intro (Bootscootin' Blahniks) sees monthly sales between 200-290 books per month.
Why would I forecast my own writing? After all I have 0 data for my own books. True, but I can set goals. I know I will sell at $2.99 for a royalty of roughly $2.00, to make the math easy and to account for slight variations in royalty calculations between Amazon, Nook, and Smashwords. I currently have a publication schedule of two novels per calendar year. This year is only one, but it's my first year. I have Book #2 of the Red Ink Collection, PAST DUE, slated for March 2012, and Book #3 SERVED which is a sequel to CANCELLED slated for August 2012.
If I average 100 books per month, per title (yes, some months might see CANCELLED sell 150, but PAST DUE only 57, and vice-versa. Calculations are based on an average, so I can even have good and bad months and not panic, Hitchhiker's style). In 2012, I will make $5,400 on my three novels. That meets my second goal of writing when I began my fiction career: Make $5,000 in one calendar year from my fiction writing.
What if I do better than that? What if my numbers are higher, say 150 books per novel per month on average for the year? That's $8,100 in 2012.
The highest I hoped for was to average 200 books per title per month. Again, we're talking averages, so having a few outlier months that are awesome would be enough to pull the average up. This is like big dreaming. That would be a nice $10,800 for 2012. Or 5,400 books sold in the year.
Now here is where the math gets interesting. Once I have more titles, assuming I can keep the average up (which it looks like is possible given D.D. Scott's numbers on her older titles, remember just average, not every book must sell the average number each month), in 2013 I would have 5 novels (no idea what book 4 and 5 are, but I have ideas that could flesh out, too far in advance to think concretely that far. Maybe PAST DUE gets a sequel, maybe it doesn't.) Average of 100 books per month per title (5) = $10,200 for the year. Average of 150 books per month per title = $15,300. Average of 200 books per month per title = $20,400.
That's moving from intern to entry level hire.
I continued my two books per year production schedule up to 9 novels, or 2015, which is where I think a little burn out might occur. Then I stepped down to 1 novel per year. I calculated out for the next ten years because that is the length of my husband's naval career at the moment. Here's where I'm looking at this as a career path:
2021, ten years in the game. I'm 39 years old. 15 novels in the game.
100 books average per month per title = 17,800 books $35,600.
150 books average per month per title = 26,700 books $53,400.
200 books average per month per title = 35,600 books $71,200.
Over my ten year career:
At 100 books avg. I would have sold 114,000 books, made $228,000.
At 150 books avg. I would have sold 170,900 books made $341,800.
At 200 books avg. I would have sold 228,000 books and made $456,000
What's The Point? My writing, while keeping me sane, doesn't come without trade-offs. For every 30 minutes of wordmongering, that's 30 minutes I'm not hanging with my family or doing something else. Some things, my writing is way more productive over, like over me playing video games. Other things, like playing with my daughter or playing a family game I wouldn't necessarily put my writing down as more important in comparison. For the record, doing laundry does not override writing time. :)
I've been writing for 4 years (non-fiction articles). I took off considerable time when I became pregnant and had my daughter. About 14 months of maternity leave :) I made $4,000 my first year writing, $2,000 my second (I became pregnant that year after struggling for over a year with fertility issues), and $1100 my third (didn't start writing again until daughter was 6 months old). Last year I claimed a $500 profit, because as she learned to walk, I got busy. Very busy. Now that she's almost 2, there is more time she is independent.
I have to look at the monetary value of my writing and decide if it matches up with the qualitative value of my life. Does the money I make for the hours I work add to my family's well-being by giving us money to take vacations, by keeping Mommy from feeling restless/worthless, by growing a retirement fund for me to perhaps lessen the financial burden later? I think it does.
Why forecast 10 years? In ten years, my daughter will be 12. With 15 novels, I could easily take a long hiatus and still see some money come in. There's no telling what life will be like between now and then, or even after that date. I do know most likely my husband will be leaving the Navy and that will be a big transition. That extra money will probably come in handy in reducing the stress between military and civilian job.
10 years is also a good length of time to plan a career path. No one goes from grunt to manager level in one year. It's important as indie writers we seriously sit down and look at expectations. We're not all going to be Amanda Hocking, J.A. Konrath, and Dean Wesley Smith. In fact, this year, I'm the equivalent of the girl getting the coffee. I'm writing my first novel, and politely talking to those ahead of me already published. Next year, I'll be the new girl in the cubicle farthest from a window, only part-time until a full-time position opens up. :)
But, we're in a growing industry. Who knows? Maybe I sell an average of 300 novels per title in 2012, breaking my highest expectations. Maybe I go from intern to full-time employee, with benefits. It's entirely possible with the double digit growth in ebooks. Of course, that also means more competition. So maybe I won't break an average of 75 books per month per title and spend more time in the windowless corner, still being asked to make the coffee once in awhile.
I urge all of you to sit down and crunch some numbers. Have a goal. Have a realistic goal (100 books per month), a fantastic goal (150 books per month), and a super-awesome screaming from the top of the mountain goal (200 books per month). Reassess every year.
For now, my 10 year plan is going in the front of my writing notebook (a three-ring binder with sheet protectors for my goals, current project, and next project). I will see it everyday. And work towards it every time I jump in my role as a writer and publisher.
"CANCELLED" arriving Late Summer 2011. A robotics engineer asks his business partner to marry him, but a previous one-night stand is having his baby.
Which brings me to one of my favorite activities: GENRE SNOOPING. That's right. What are people in my genre writing? What are they pricing it at? What does it read like? I've mentioned Lucy Kevin before in regards to her ebook pricing strategy, and was surprised to realize why I couldn't find a ton of information about her. She doesn't exist. Okay, she does, but her main writing name is Bella Andre. No, I'm not unmasking a superhero, she plainly lists her pseudonyms on her main site.
Bella Andre is an indie publishing goddess! She has over 16 titles and even better, she's like me! Let's write those modern, contemporary stories about love in the real world! Melodrama? Yuck. Weak females? Double yuck. Super strong females the male must "tame?" Super double yuck. June looks like it's going to be me devouring her entire Lucy Kevin line. It might be the first series I can put in my section of books I have personally read and like for my readers waiting in between my novels (check out my Catering to the Readers post)
So there is hope for my writing style. +1. I next played with the real numbers posted by one of the wonderful brains behind The Writer's Guide to Epublishing, D.D. Scott, and also by YA author Megg Jensen, writer of Anathema. At $2.99, Megg saw sales in the range of 50-150 books per month. D.D. Scott's $2.99 offerings, with a $.99 intro (Bootscootin' Blahniks) sees monthly sales between 200-290 books per month.
Why would I forecast my own writing? After all I have 0 data for my own books. True, but I can set goals. I know I will sell at $2.99 for a royalty of roughly $2.00, to make the math easy and to account for slight variations in royalty calculations between Amazon, Nook, and Smashwords. I currently have a publication schedule of two novels per calendar year. This year is only one, but it's my first year. I have Book #2 of the Red Ink Collection, PAST DUE, slated for March 2012, and Book #3 SERVED which is a sequel to CANCELLED slated for August 2012.
If I average 100 books per month, per title (yes, some months might see CANCELLED sell 150, but PAST DUE only 57, and vice-versa. Calculations are based on an average, so I can even have good and bad months and not panic, Hitchhiker's style). In 2012, I will make $5,400 on my three novels. That meets my second goal of writing when I began my fiction career: Make $5,000 in one calendar year from my fiction writing.
What if I do better than that? What if my numbers are higher, say 150 books per novel per month on average for the year? That's $8,100 in 2012.
The highest I hoped for was to average 200 books per title per month. Again, we're talking averages, so having a few outlier months that are awesome would be enough to pull the average up. This is like big dreaming. That would be a nice $10,800 for 2012. Or 5,400 books sold in the year.
Now here is where the math gets interesting. Once I have more titles, assuming I can keep the average up (which it looks like is possible given D.D. Scott's numbers on her older titles, remember just average, not every book must sell the average number each month), in 2013 I would have 5 novels (no idea what book 4 and 5 are, but I have ideas that could flesh out, too far in advance to think concretely that far. Maybe PAST DUE gets a sequel, maybe it doesn't.) Average of 100 books per month per title (5) = $10,200 for the year. Average of 150 books per month per title = $15,300. Average of 200 books per month per title = $20,400.
That's moving from intern to entry level hire.
I continued my two books per year production schedule up to 9 novels, or 2015, which is where I think a little burn out might occur. Then I stepped down to 1 novel per year. I calculated out for the next ten years because that is the length of my husband's naval career at the moment. Here's where I'm looking at this as a career path:
2021, ten years in the game. I'm 39 years old. 15 novels in the game.
100 books average per month per title = 17,800 books $35,600.
150 books average per month per title = 26,700 books $53,400.
200 books average per month per title = 35,600 books $71,200.
Over my ten year career:
At 100 books avg. I would have sold 114,000 books, made $228,000.
At 150 books avg. I would have sold 170,900 books made $341,800.
At 200 books avg. I would have sold 228,000 books and made $456,000
What's The Point? My writing, while keeping me sane, doesn't come without trade-offs. For every 30 minutes of wordmongering, that's 30 minutes I'm not hanging with my family or doing something else. Some things, my writing is way more productive over, like over me playing video games. Other things, like playing with my daughter or playing a family game I wouldn't necessarily put my writing down as more important in comparison. For the record, doing laundry does not override writing time. :)
I've been writing for 4 years (non-fiction articles). I took off considerable time when I became pregnant and had my daughter. About 14 months of maternity leave :) I made $4,000 my first year writing, $2,000 my second (I became pregnant that year after struggling for over a year with fertility issues), and $1100 my third (didn't start writing again until daughter was 6 months old). Last year I claimed a $500 profit, because as she learned to walk, I got busy. Very busy. Now that she's almost 2, there is more time she is independent.
I have to look at the monetary value of my writing and decide if it matches up with the qualitative value of my life. Does the money I make for the hours I work add to my family's well-being by giving us money to take vacations, by keeping Mommy from feeling restless/worthless, by growing a retirement fund for me to perhaps lessen the financial burden later? I think it does.
Why forecast 10 years? In ten years, my daughter will be 12. With 15 novels, I could easily take a long hiatus and still see some money come in. There's no telling what life will be like between now and then, or even after that date. I do know most likely my husband will be leaving the Navy and that will be a big transition. That extra money will probably come in handy in reducing the stress between military and civilian job.
10 years is also a good length of time to plan a career path. No one goes from grunt to manager level in one year. It's important as indie writers we seriously sit down and look at expectations. We're not all going to be Amanda Hocking, J.A. Konrath, and Dean Wesley Smith. In fact, this year, I'm the equivalent of the girl getting the coffee. I'm writing my first novel, and politely talking to those ahead of me already published. Next year, I'll be the new girl in the cubicle farthest from a window, only part-time until a full-time position opens up. :)
But, we're in a growing industry. Who knows? Maybe I sell an average of 300 novels per title in 2012, breaking my highest expectations. Maybe I go from intern to full-time employee, with benefits. It's entirely possible with the double digit growth in ebooks. Of course, that also means more competition. So maybe I won't break an average of 75 books per month per title and spend more time in the windowless corner, still being asked to make the coffee once in awhile.
I urge all of you to sit down and crunch some numbers. Have a goal. Have a realistic goal (100 books per month), a fantastic goal (150 books per month), and a super-awesome screaming from the top of the mountain goal (200 books per month). Reassess every year.
For now, my 10 year plan is going in the front of my writing notebook (a three-ring binder with sheet protectors for my goals, current project, and next project). I will see it everyday. And work towards it every time I jump in my role as a writer and publisher.
"CANCELLED" arriving Late Summer 2011. A robotics engineer asks his business partner to marry him, but a previous one-night stand is having his baby.
Tuesday, May 24, 2011
Self-Published Novel: I Don't Get the $.99 Pricing
This isn't about greed. This is about belief in my product and questioning the economics of the $.99 price in consideration of building a fiction writing career.
The $.99 opener. The argument goes like this: price your first novel at $.99 to grow a readership, then price future books higher. Maybe it's my experience as a non-fiction writer, but I can't stomach this. I can see offering a short period of time every month for a $.99 sale on one of my novels, but I can't see this as an effective introductory price. I do not dispute that more readers will probably buy a $.99 book. But what is the economical trade-off of this increase in readers when a writer does not have additional books, just the debut?
I have sold thousands of dollars (not many, but still, it's thousands) worth of non-fiction articles since October of 2007 when I fell into writing. I make either 65%-90% of my price, depending on if I sell it straight to the customer or go through a type of gallery site. After 4 years, I'm bored writing about real estate, finance, taxessssssssssssss....oh I'm sorry. I fell asleep talking about it. :)
But here's one axiom I learned: there's a buyer for every price. It's just a question of time, assuming the writing is of a good quality. On the gallery type site, that isn't an issue, as all articles are approved by an editor before going up for sale. However, my articles sit indefinitely until they sell. A 1,000 word piece on shopping addiction priced at $150 sat for 6 months before I sold it. In terms of $.99 books, that's 325 books sold in the same 6 months that article sat. (I sold it for full rights, meaning I cannot resell it.) But, it takes a great deal longer for me to write a book than a 1,000 word article. You're comparing hours to months.
Price and perception of quality. I used to be a casual game addict. I bought games for $4.99 a piece, sometimes spending nearly $100 in a month because I would beat them so quickly. I played them on my computer, so I didn't have to fight my family for the TV like my video games on the Xbox 360 or Wii, even though those are a better deal ($30 or less for used RPG games I easily log over 60 hours on).
I justified my spending by the number of hours of enjoyment I received for the money. 3 hours of fun for less than $2 an hour? Sign me up! Guess what? At $5 a piece, and every seventh game free (thanks to a stamp card you filled through the month), I didn't buy less than 6 games a month. That's a $30 monthly budget, or about half of a percent of our after tax monthly income.
I never played all 6 games to completion. One unplayed game was $5 wasted. Who cares? I'm a frugal, but comfortable, stay-at-home-Mom with a husband who makes more than $50,000 but less than $80,000 who has limited avenues of escape. I was well within our monthly "entertainment" budget, and even a waste of $5 was far less than the overages associated with gas to drive to a store or other entertainment venue and extra spending on snacks or impulse items that plays to my gatherer instincts.
My reader. I know not every reader is in this category, but based on my research into my target audience, these are men and women with a healthy monthly allowance for their own escapes. They don't generally have time to waste on failed avenues of lowering stress. It's not about the money, it's about the time. Most of their time isn't theirs to give. They have careers themselves, children, and other responsibilities.
I buy ebooks to read on my computer. My limit is again, about $4.99 but that's more of a guideline. I do splurge on bestsellers because it's worth the extra money than driving 30 miles round-trip, kids in tow, to buy a book. It's never the price alone that gets me to buy a book. It's the cover design. The description. Occasionally, the reviews (I don't put too much stock in them, but they can make or break a borderline decision).
After the cover and title grab my attention, I read the sample. If I get to the end and didn't see many mistakes, and want to read more, if it's $4.99 or less, I buy it. Again, I'm a Mom. Dragging my 2-year-old who won't sit in a stroller and browsing books in a book store is not fun for me. I can browse e-books while Mickey Mouse Clubhouse blares in the background. If I was still working outside of the home, I would buy them on my lunch break and read on my lunch break, etc.
The consumer in me doesn't identify with this mantra that readers who buy $.99 can't afford anything more and won't buy a book priced higher. Maybe a handful of them won't, but if that was true, why are these readers buying the author's next titles for $2.99 and $3.99? I know when I buy a $.99 book, I don't think "great deal," I think cheap. To me, all ebooks technically are a great deal just in convenience!
The trade-off: readers for dollars. But here's the meat of the issue, and readers might be surprised about this: How much is an author truly giving up to increase the number of purchases by pricing at $.99?
Let's just look at Amazon. Amazon pays royalties after 60 days of publication from what I can tell. My goal is to sell 100 books in those 60 days. If I price at $.99, I make roughly $.30 per book. There is a small charge I believe for the size of the file. Selling 100 books, I make $30. I make that much selling two short and sweet non-fiction articles that I write in about 2 hours. Even the argument of the infinite shelf life isn't selling me on this idea. I understand YA books using this price because their general audience, teens, have much more limited disposable income than my audience, grown women and men. But other genres, especially those aimed at productive adults?
Any book priced $2.99 to $9.99 is paid a 70%, not 30%, royalty. Same 100 books, higher price, I make $209. In fact, to make more than the $30, I only need to sell 15 books. In two months.
Sell 100 books. Choose to make $30 or $200.
How is this even a choice? $.30 is almost such an insult, I don't want a reader who only values my hard work at providing them an escape as worth slightly more than a quarter. A quarter. You can't even buy bubblegum at the machine in the grocery store for a quarter any more. No, a big, sugary ball of bubble gum costs $.50. My book would be worth less a piece of gum.
To be honest, I was seriously considering making $2.99 or $3.25 as my introductory price, advertising that once the honeymoon period of 60 days was over, the price will go up to $3.99. I make $.70 more per book, and more importantly, since some back listed romance novels are coming out at $3.99, with a professional cover, description, and author photo, it will be more difficult for a reader to distinguish me from a traditionally published contemporary romance writer. That's what it's all about. Look professional, be treated like a professional. Give the reader a great story to lose the stresses of reality.
But Elizabeth, what about losing readers because of the price point that's $1 more than $2.99?
If I sell 10 books at $2.99, I make $20.90. I only have to sell 7.5 books to make that same $20.90 at $3.99. So, I would have to lose more than 1 reader in every 4 seriously considering purchasing my novel to make less at $3.99 than $2.99. With so many other variables, such as the description, reviews, or sample turning readers off, I don't know that the difference of $1 will cause a mass exodus.
There are bargain shoppers. People like my Aunt Sandi won't buy anything unless it's on sale. Those people will click the "Add to Wish List" link that Amazon so helpfully provides. When I advertise my book going on sale, they will snatch it up.
The bottom line is price alone has never made me decide to not buy a book. I read the description and sample, and from that information, decide if I think the book is going to be worth the money. Price is only a tie-breaker vote.
For me, my job as an author isn't to play games with my pricing, but to write a book and meta data that makes a reader think "This writer is worth the money." Now, if I had a "large inventory", I will happily price older novels at $.99 just to move titles. Then, it would make sense as a gamble on a $.99 price, or throwing that quarter at me, because when the reader buys one or two of my other books at regular price, it was worth the loss of $2.49 in royalties on the first book to possibly get two or three times the $2.09-$2.79 from the future purchases.
Now, I don't want to make it sound like I see readers as dollar signs. I don't. I don't want to insult readers by believing that they really see our hard work as worth slightly more than a quarter per book for a royalty. I know these $.99 book buyers, they are not people who walk around playing Fred Mertz. I've bought books at $.99 cents. I am not a cheapskate, but it was the price the author set. The books that were great, which I had a good idea would be from the description and sample, I would have gladly paid more.
By pricing my work at an affordable price for the months of work and investment, here is what I can offer my readers:
The $.99 opener. The argument goes like this: price your first novel at $.99 to grow a readership, then price future books higher. Maybe it's my experience as a non-fiction writer, but I can't stomach this. I can see offering a short period of time every month for a $.99 sale on one of my novels, but I can't see this as an effective introductory price. I do not dispute that more readers will probably buy a $.99 book. But what is the economical trade-off of this increase in readers when a writer does not have additional books, just the debut?
I have sold thousands of dollars (not many, but still, it's thousands) worth of non-fiction articles since October of 2007 when I fell into writing. I make either 65%-90% of my price, depending on if I sell it straight to the customer or go through a type of gallery site. After 4 years, I'm bored writing about real estate, finance, taxessssssssssssss....oh I'm sorry. I fell asleep talking about it. :)
But here's one axiom I learned: there's a buyer for every price. It's just a question of time, assuming the writing is of a good quality. On the gallery type site, that isn't an issue, as all articles are approved by an editor before going up for sale. However, my articles sit indefinitely until they sell. A 1,000 word piece on shopping addiction priced at $150 sat for 6 months before I sold it. In terms of $.99 books, that's 325 books sold in the same 6 months that article sat. (I sold it for full rights, meaning I cannot resell it.) But, it takes a great deal longer for me to write a book than a 1,000 word article. You're comparing hours to months.
Price and perception of quality. I used to be a casual game addict. I bought games for $4.99 a piece, sometimes spending nearly $100 in a month because I would beat them so quickly. I played them on my computer, so I didn't have to fight my family for the TV like my video games on the Xbox 360 or Wii, even though those are a better deal ($30 or less for used RPG games I easily log over 60 hours on).
I justified my spending by the number of hours of enjoyment I received for the money. 3 hours of fun for less than $2 an hour? Sign me up! Guess what? At $5 a piece, and every seventh game free (thanks to a stamp card you filled through the month), I didn't buy less than 6 games a month. That's a $30 monthly budget, or about half of a percent of our after tax monthly income.
I never played all 6 games to completion. One unplayed game was $5 wasted. Who cares? I'm a frugal, but comfortable, stay-at-home-Mom with a husband who makes more than $50,000 but less than $80,000 who has limited avenues of escape. I was well within our monthly "entertainment" budget, and even a waste of $5 was far less than the overages associated with gas to drive to a store or other entertainment venue and extra spending on snacks or impulse items that plays to my gatherer instincts.
My reader. I know not every reader is in this category, but based on my research into my target audience, these are men and women with a healthy monthly allowance for their own escapes. They don't generally have time to waste on failed avenues of lowering stress. It's not about the money, it's about the time. Most of their time isn't theirs to give. They have careers themselves, children, and other responsibilities.
I buy ebooks to read on my computer. My limit is again, about $4.99 but that's more of a guideline. I do splurge on bestsellers because it's worth the extra money than driving 30 miles round-trip, kids in tow, to buy a book. It's never the price alone that gets me to buy a book. It's the cover design. The description. Occasionally, the reviews (I don't put too much stock in them, but they can make or break a borderline decision).
After the cover and title grab my attention, I read the sample. If I get to the end and didn't see many mistakes, and want to read more, if it's $4.99 or less, I buy it. Again, I'm a Mom. Dragging my 2-year-old who won't sit in a stroller and browsing books in a book store is not fun for me. I can browse e-books while Mickey Mouse Clubhouse blares in the background. If I was still working outside of the home, I would buy them on my lunch break and read on my lunch break, etc.
The consumer in me doesn't identify with this mantra that readers who buy $.99 can't afford anything more and won't buy a book priced higher. Maybe a handful of them won't, but if that was true, why are these readers buying the author's next titles for $2.99 and $3.99? I know when I buy a $.99 book, I don't think "great deal," I think cheap. To me, all ebooks technically are a great deal just in convenience!
The trade-off: readers for dollars. But here's the meat of the issue, and readers might be surprised about this: How much is an author truly giving up to increase the number of purchases by pricing at $.99?
Let's just look at Amazon. Amazon pays royalties after 60 days of publication from what I can tell. My goal is to sell 100 books in those 60 days. If I price at $.99, I make roughly $.30 per book. There is a small charge I believe for the size of the file. Selling 100 books, I make $30. I make that much selling two short and sweet non-fiction articles that I write in about 2 hours. Even the argument of the infinite shelf life isn't selling me on this idea. I understand YA books using this price because their general audience, teens, have much more limited disposable income than my audience, grown women and men. But other genres, especially those aimed at productive adults?
Any book priced $2.99 to $9.99 is paid a 70%, not 30%, royalty. Same 100 books, higher price, I make $209. In fact, to make more than the $30, I only need to sell 15 books. In two months.
Sell 100 books. Choose to make $30 or $200.
How is this even a choice? $.30 is almost such an insult, I don't want a reader who only values my hard work at providing them an escape as worth slightly more than a quarter. A quarter. You can't even buy bubblegum at the machine in the grocery store for a quarter any more. No, a big, sugary ball of bubble gum costs $.50. My book would be worth less a piece of gum.
To be honest, I was seriously considering making $2.99 or $3.25 as my introductory price, advertising that once the honeymoon period of 60 days was over, the price will go up to $3.99. I make $.70 more per book, and more importantly, since some back listed romance novels are coming out at $3.99, with a professional cover, description, and author photo, it will be more difficult for a reader to distinguish me from a traditionally published contemporary romance writer. That's what it's all about. Look professional, be treated like a professional. Give the reader a great story to lose the stresses of reality.
But Elizabeth, what about losing readers because of the price point that's $1 more than $2.99?
If I sell 10 books at $2.99, I make $20.90. I only have to sell 7.5 books to make that same $20.90 at $3.99. So, I would have to lose more than 1 reader in every 4 seriously considering purchasing my novel to make less at $3.99 than $2.99. With so many other variables, such as the description, reviews, or sample turning readers off, I don't know that the difference of $1 will cause a mass exodus.
There are bargain shoppers. People like my Aunt Sandi won't buy anything unless it's on sale. Those people will click the "Add to Wish List" link that Amazon so helpfully provides. When I advertise my book going on sale, they will snatch it up.
The bottom line is price alone has never made me decide to not buy a book. I read the description and sample, and from that information, decide if I think the book is going to be worth the money. Price is only a tie-breaker vote.
For me, my job as an author isn't to play games with my pricing, but to write a book and meta data that makes a reader think "This writer is worth the money." Now, if I had a "large inventory", I will happily price older novels at $.99 just to move titles. Then, it would make sense as a gamble on a $.99 price, or throwing that quarter at me, because when the reader buys one or two of my other books at regular price, it was worth the loss of $2.49 in royalties on the first book to possibly get two or three times the $2.09-$2.79 from the future purchases.
Now, I don't want to make it sound like I see readers as dollar signs. I don't. I don't want to insult readers by believing that they really see our hard work as worth slightly more than a quarter per book for a royalty. I know these $.99 book buyers, they are not people who walk around playing Fred Mertz. I've bought books at $.99 cents. I am not a cheapskate, but it was the price the author set. The books that were great, which I had a good idea would be from the description and sample, I would have gladly paid more.
By pricing my work at an affordable price for the months of work and investment, here is what I can offer my readers:
- I can invest in newer technologies as they come along for "enhanced" ebooks.
- I can continue my education in the writing craft, producing a better book with each release.
- I can use my success to pay-it-forward to other writers, bringing more and more quality and affordable books to the market.
- I can afford to donate books and time to those who truly cannot pay even a penny.
- I can justify my work to my husband and the IRS as a legitimate business, letting me stay in business and keep writing.
But time will tell. I publish Cancelled in August, the first book in my planned Red Ink collection. I will see my first royalty check in October. I will publish my sales figures like the many awesome writers who have come before me, just as I gladly shared my pricing strategies and sales with new freelance non-fiction writers over the years (my sales figures were public already). And when that first royalty check is more than $30, I will be very thankful I held onto my bravery in this new world of fiction.
"Cancelled" arriving Late Summer 2011. A robotics engineer asks his business partner to marry him, but a previous one-night stand is having his baby.
"Cancelled" arriving Late Summer 2011. A robotics engineer asks his business partner to marry him, but a previous one-night stand is having his baby.
Monday, May 16, 2011
Self-Published Novel: Investigate Your Genre
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| Courtesy of Dmitry Maslov from Dreamstime.com |
Okay, okay enough fightin' words. Recently I was part of a good-natured debate about the pricing of ebooks, especially indie books. It pays to research your genre before deciding on a firm pricing structure...
It's easy, really. Go to Amazon, search in your genre. For example, my book will be labeled a contemporary romance. The main storyline is about who the main character will or will not end up with, his fiancee or the mother of his baby. It has a happy-for-now ending like most chick-lit/women's fiction titles, but deals with love and romance in an urban and contemporary context.
My awesome news is that my genre has strong showings by indie authors in the top 10 and top 20 downloads. Also, pricing varies from $0.99 to $9.99 (traditionally published). There are many indie authors in the $3-$5 range. I plan to price my first book at $3.25. I have a couple of reasons for this:
- It's my birthday (A gimmick I will use and abuse)
- It will grab attention in a list of prices all ending with $.99 (don't believe me, check yourself, read down the list of prices and see if you aren't paused by $4.67 or some other ending...)
- It's good price point to offer sales from without dramatically impacting my profit, at first.
- It's the earliest full price of a movie ticket I can remember buying with my own money.
I am not a big fan of the $.99 pricing while a title is in what I call "first-run." First-run meaning it's the newest ebook offering an author has. I'm not terribly crazy about the $.99 pricing forever, either. I am interested by the strategy author Lucy Kevin is employing. She has one book offered for free, "Spark Fly." Then the next two in the series "Falling Fast" and "Seattle Girl" are both priced at $2.99. Her "box set" of all three is priced at $4.99.
This is very smart to me, and I love the idea of packaging my books together. People can buy books individually, or for less than the price of two, can get all three! I might try to contact her and see how that pricing strategy is going, maybe after I have a few more followers here.
Regardless of what you price your self-published novel at, make sure it is a price that falls well in your genre. I noticed most of the books at the $.99 price point in my genre listing were published over a year ago.
"Cancelled" arriving Late Summer 2011. A robotics engineer asks his business partner to marry him, but a previous one-night stand is having his baby.
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