Sales Figures for Book Proposal

[BrianTubbs]

A book proposal is supposed to include sales figures of competition titles. Where do you go to get that information?

I've found this site...

http://www.thebookstandard.com/bookstandard/resources/single_title_lookup.jsp

But they charge you for a report.

Not to be cheap, but is there a FREE way to find out how sales figures for particular book titles?

If this has been asked before, I apologize.

[veinglory]

Re: specific titles only the author can really say. It is more important to ask around so that you know what that publisher considers enough, and what is typical for the genre.

[K1P1]

Re: specific titles only the author can really say.

Well, if they're paying the author royalties, the publisher really has to know how many copies have sold as well.

[underthecity]

Are you sure you have to include sales figures? I wrote a proposal for my first book years ago, and didn't include sales figures. I am writing a proposal for one right now. While I'm including competing titles, I'm not mentioning sales figures because I don't have access to them.

At the very least you can mention amazon sales ranks, but that's not all-conclusive.

I've been using Jenna's model here (http://www.absolutewrite.com/novels/book_proposal1.htm) for a nonfiction book proposal, and she doesn't mention sales figures, either.

If I were you, I'd leave it out.

allen

[veinglory]

Well, if they're paying the author royalties, the publisher really has to know how many copies have sold as well.

I say 'can say'. Personal earnings are confidential and so under most circumstances a publisher cannot in fact share specific sales figures without the author's consent.

[veinglory]

Sometimes they ask for projected sales figures, Blackwell did in my case. I did as I suggested here and it worked fine.

[JennaGlatzer]

Yeah, I don't include sales figures unless I happen to know them-- for instance, if the cover of the book says "More than 500,000 copies sold!" or "1 million copies in print!", or if it happens to mention the figure on the author or publisher's website. If you happen to know a nice editor with access to Bookscan, they can give you an idea of how well the book is selling, too.

[K1P1]

I say 'can say'. Personal earnings are confidential and so under most circumstances a publisher cannot in fact share specific sales figures without the author's consent.

Right - got your point. But "earnings" and "copies sold" are not the same thing. Earnings depend on the terms of the contract (royalty %, cover or wholesale basis), cover price, and withholding for returns and royalties for sales of other rights. Copies sold is just the number of books.

My publisher puts the number of copies in print in its catalogs, which is also an indication of how the book is doing, if you know how many printings it's gone to.

This is also where having an agent can help you, because they may have access to information that you don't--they want to know what's selling and how well it's selling.