How many self published books have you sold to date?

ONLY 9,500 copies? Ha!

ASeiple said:

Alright, quick amendment. Found out I'd made an error in my Kindle Unlimited calculations. From 2015 to now, I've only sold about 9500 copies.

Give me a month, should fix that if things stay to trend...

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Only 9,500? You should just quit. Seriously, you're embarrassing yourself

Well at least my Mom thinks I'm cool!

140 since Oct. 10th for my first/only book, 'bout 6 months ago, an even split between kindle and paperback, strangely.

100+ copies effective today after nearly six months. It's going to be a long and painful process.

Almost 41,000 since March of 2015.

Hi Dragonwriter, that is a fantastic number. Can I ask what do you do to promote your books?

A combination of things--Facebook ads, Twitter (not as much these days), BookBub ads, and lately I've been trying some AMS (Amazon) ads to see how they go. The BookBubs were a huge help, numbers-wise. And the old adage about your next book being the best marketing tool has worked well for me. I've got 9 out now and the next one will be released in June.

That number is just Amazon, I realized - Smashwords only goes back 360 days, and there's another 3,000 or so in that period but since my first BookBub was before that, I suspect it's more like 5,000.

I need to stop coasting, though, since I've noticed my sales are down a bit over the past couple months. I need to refresh my ads, and I'm thinking about switching to Kindle Unlimited, as I've heard that's potentially more lucrative in my genre (urban fantasy) than wide.

Thanks Dragonwriter. I will try BookBub when I get enough reviews. Amazon KDP advertising gets me a sale a day, but it was a lot of effort to get there. Royalties and KENP revenue exceeds the cost, so there is a small profit. What I really need to do is write more. Nine books is a fantastic effort. I only have two (totally different genres). I think I might try Facebook advertising too.

Bookbub don't necessarily have a minimum review requirement, so might as well start trying now. (I think I had seven reviews on Amazon and maybe 20 on Goodreads when I got mine.)

When I got my first one for my box set, I think it had one review (though the books that were part of it had more).

Interesting regarding Bookbub. I was under the impression it needed at least 10 reviews for consideration. I've just looked and it doesn't, so I will give them a try. Thanks for the advice.

From what I've heard, it's a bit of a mystery how Book Bub goes about choosing books.

I've heard from various self-pub writers that BookBub is getting increasingly difficult to get into. Trade publishers are using it heavily now, so there are fewer slots and more competition.

Definitely try (always submit to new opportunities!) but keep your hopes tightly in check.

Bookbub is the perfect example of an advertising service that you should not rely on. It's the cherry on top of the marketing strategy that you can control.

Haven't figured out how to market yet so I'm feeling like a noobie loser.

Daffyjkl said:

100+ copies effective today after nearly six months. It's going to be a long and painful process.

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Hey, that's more than I sold in a year with a trade book deal. Be happy! You're doing great.

Those aren't typical sales for a good trade publisher, andiwrite. It sounds like you were either very unlucky, or you signed with a rotten publisher. Either way, I'm so sorry you had such a poor experience.

Thanks andiwrite. Keep on trying. In the last week I dropped my price from about $3.70 to $2.99 on Amazon US. Straight away I saw an increase in sales. I managed 6 in one day, which is a record for me. Unfortunately, the KDP advertising is limited to Amazon US so I the adverts are only running on the US site. It would be great if I could have them run on the UK, AU and CAD sites. Also, the reviews seem to be regional. We just have to keep trying and most importantly, keep writing. Good luck.

Digitally speaking, my current numbers are (since my first release in August 2014):
Total sold: 11,562