New author epublishing results after 8 months

DerekJCanyon · Jun 6, 2011

Kaitie,

Cover is paramount. Here are the top four marketing tools, IMO:

Cover art
Title
Description
Price
You should not skimp on cover. I found a great artist in Igor Kieryluk. I love his work, and I get many compliments on it. If you self-pub your own ebook, spend the money and get a great artist for your cover! Also, make sure that the cover looks good in thumbnail size.

Here's the cover to my best-selling book:

Amazon book page for Dead Dwarves Don't Dance.

mscelina · Jun 6, 2011

Medievalist said:
She's making a distinction between commercial epublishing and self publishing an ebook.

Yes. Exactly. In my PM response to a now-banned member who sent me a fairly snippy commentary last night because I dared to disagree with her in public--a PM that couldn't be delivered because--hey! she's not here anymore--I pointed out that part of the problem with interchanging the terms 'epublished' and 'self-published' is the application of the self-publishing stigma to genuinely e-published books. No offense to the OP, whose sales statistics are impressive, but eventually the consumer is going to get fed up with inferior electronic products and the sales for all electronic fiction will drop unless we make a concerted effort to be as precise as possible with our terminology.

An epublished book is a far different thing than a self-published book. They shouldn't be compared or equated; they are two totally different beasts.

DerekJCanyon · Jun 6, 2011

mscelina, no offense taken. I was unaware of how this forum used the terms.

Kaitie, I also found it strange that I didn't get any obvious bumps in sales from mentions of my blog in big-circulation online periodicals (Huffington Post online and Spiegel online).

At this point, I think people are buying my books by just finding them on Amazon in the subcategory lists. Being in the top 20 of SciFi HighTech, or any other category list, is very important, IMO.

shadowwalker · Jun 6, 2011

From someone who hasn't yet published, let alone sold anything, I find the whole "why do readers buy this and not that?" fascinating and intimidating, frankly. There seem to be so many variables, and what works for one (in terms of marketing) doesn't work for another.

Cyia · Jun 6, 2011

DerekJCanyon said:
Kaitie,

Cover is paramount. Here are the top four marketing tools, IMO:

Cover art
Title
Description
Price
You should not skimp on cover. I found a great artist in Igor Kieryluk. I love his work, and I get many compliments on it. If you self-pub your own ebook, spend the money and get a great artist for your cover! Also, make sure that the cover looks good in thumbnail size.

Here's the cover to my best-selling book:

V v nice. It looks comparable to some of the trade books I've seen (is it sci-fi?)

I'm curious, did your artist draw this from scratch, or is it a clip-art composite? Cover art composition is something I tend to obsess over when giving a book serious consideration (The reviews I used to have on my blog all started with impressions of the book based on the construction of the cover art.)

Mr Flibble · Jun 6, 2011

That is a great cover - it'd make me take a closer look.

Thing is, while I know what makes ME pick up a book, I'm not representative, and it's knowing what will make the most people take another look...another reason I'm happy to leave that to someone else! But you done good there Derek. *fist bump*

areteus · Jun 6, 2011

A question: When you are saying you could easily make $10,000, are you talking about from the same books by extrapolating this data or do you intend to release more in order to keep the income steady? Cos, speaking as a statistician, I know for a fact that you can rarely extrapolate trends like this (an error many futurologists make) and if things stay the same you are as likely to get a decline in sales than continuation of the same trend. Always better to assume the worst case scenario with possible outcomes

Someone once told me that it is actually better in some ways to establish your own publishing company to self publish your own work because it gives you greater tax breaks and other benefits than a single author might have. No idea if this is true or not but, as you have a successful model already for sales, you may consider it a possibility.

movieman · Jun 6, 2011

kaitie said:
It's interesting that you don't see sales spikes related to marketing.

I'm not really surprised.

I've bought books because posters on writing forums who seem to know what they're talking about link to them in their signature, I've bought books because I read a good review, I've bought books because someone told me they were good, I've bought books because I'm scanning through new releases on Amazon or Smashwords and they look interesting, I've bought books because I happened to see the author on TV and they had some interesting things to say. But book ads?

The only kind of advertising proven to work in my anecdotal experience as a reader is getting an interesting blurb about your book in the back of another book that I liked in a similar genre. I've bought numerous books on that basis, but I've never bought a book because of an ad in a magazine, on TV or on the Internet.

Maybe it works if you can plaster the book all over the media, but most of us can't afford to spend millions of dollars to do so. Similarly, ads aimed at getting the book into bookstores make sense because they're a small market, but they're irrelevant if you're putting your ebooks on Amazon yourself.

Otherwise put together a good book with a good description and a decent cover and you'll be ahead of 95% of the ebook market. That's about the best advertising most people can do.

kaitie · Jun 6, 2011

Your cover is amazing. Love it.

scope · Jun 6, 2011

I wish you the best of luck, but I don't see what the big deal is. Hey, it's your life and if you want to do everything yourself, more power to you. But don't delude yourself, you don't know whether or not you could have gotten an agent. And you don't know whether or not your book would have sold (ebook and/or paper) to a trade house. You've built a case for what you are doing, and that's fine, but I think it will serve you best to keep things in perspective.

And I don't understand your dollar numbers. In your first post you said that over a period of 8 months you sold 7500 total units of 4 books with a total gross of $6300 and a net of $2000. That's about $250 a month--$62.50 a week. Later on you said something about $10,000?????
Look, I'm not knocking a profit of $62-$63 weekly, that's for you to decide, but if you are into writing for a living, well, that's seems to be a problem I think you will agree that won't do it. Even a profit of $10,000 a year doesn't buy very much. And remember that the sale of ebooks generally peaks early and then declines (at least that's what I've been told -- I'm primarily a trade published guy). Just curious, and there's no need to answer if you don't want to, do you have another job from which you earn a living? And assuming you want to continue epublishing, why?

ResearchGuy · Jun 6, 2011

mscelina said:
. . . An epublished book is released by a publishing house, like Samhain or Ellora's Cave. . . .

I disagree with how you are using the terminology.

In my lexicon, e-publishing is publishing in digital form, regardless of who is the publisher. Self-publishing is publishing by the author, regardless of whether in print form, digital (e-) form, or both. I do not understand privileging the term "epublishing" exclusively for commercial publishers. Nor, for that matter, privileging the term "publishing" itself for commercial publishers. To publish is to make a work (whether an announcement or an article or a book) available to the public. The dictionary definition (American Heritage 3/e, for example) refers to printed material, but with the rise of the Internet, digital form has become the functional equivalent.

We shall have to agree to disagree. C'est la vie.

Be that as it may, the original poster appears to be doing a very fine job. Kudos.

--Ken

Capital · Jun 6, 2011

Love seeing an excellent SP cover. Keep up the good work.

Sydewinder · Jun 6, 2011

mscelina said:
You aren't e-published. You're self-published. Why would you want to move?

mscelina said:
Point still remains; the OP is self published, not epublished. Period.

mscelina said:
I pointed out that part of the problem with interchanging the terms 'epublished' and 'self-published' is the application of the self-publishing stigma to genuinely e-published books.

An epublished book is a far different thing than a self-published book. They shouldn't be compared or equated; they are two totally different beasts.

What in the world are you talking about????

e-published = electronically published

as opposed to print published.

You can electronically publish anything you want. The medium is not something tied to the vetting process involved. The op stated his point correctly. Mac correctly pointed that the two were not synonymous, not that he used the term wrong.

DerekJCanyon · Jun 6, 2011

All, thanks for the praise for the cover. I did the text layout. The art is all Igor’s work. I just gave him foreground, midground, background requests. He then did a mockup and we iterated from there.

Cyia, Igor draws his art from scratch. Check his stuff out at www.igorkieryluk.com.

Areteus,

My $10,000 net royalties estimate is based on selling my current 4 books at the same rate as they have been selling since January, on average. This estimate is assuming no further growth in sales and no additional books published. If you want the equation here it is:

(Average daily royalty so far this year) x 365.

Yes, you are correct: extrapolation and prediction is hazardous. However, I did say “_IF_ my sales continue at this rate…” It is definitely possible that my sales could peter out. However, if things stay the same I don’t expect a decline in my sales. There are around 10-20 million ebook devices out there and that number continues to grow. I’ve sold to 7500 of them. I don’t think I’ve even scratched the surface of my potential customers.

Scope,

I’m basing my skepticism of finding an agent on the anecdotal evidence of authors, agents, and publishers. From what I have read, escaping the slush pile is a lottery. Plus, I don’ t believe that any agent or publisher would pick up a cyberpunk novel from an unknown author. I just don’t believe it. It’s not a popular genre right now.

I shopped Dead Dwarves Don’t Dance out to agents and publishers in the 90s. No bites. It loitered on my hard drive for more than a decade doing nothing. I published it myself in November and it’s made over $4000 in those 8 months (about $2300 profit). (Two of my books are still in the red, two are in the black.)

My $10,000 estimate is a prediction of my 2011 net royalties. Royalties have increased each month so far. I earned $4 in Oct/2010 and $2900 in May/2011. If my sales remain at my current daily average for the year, I’ll net about $10k on my current 4 books.

I have a day job. I’m a technical writer. That provides enough income so that I can spend money on covers and editing for my fiction. I do not expect to quit my day job any time soon. I’m hoping that in 5 years or so I can do that after I have a dozen or so novels published and earning e-royalties.

I have not seen any evidence that ebooks suffer the same peaking as print books do. But I’ve only been in the ebook game for 8 months. However, print books generally sell the bulk of their numbers in the first 3 months, right? Because of bookstore shelf life and remaindering and all that?

My ebooks will be on the eshelf forever. That’s a long time. 20 years from now, someone who searches for cyberpunk on Amazon will see Dead Dwarves Don’t Dance and they can buy it for $2.99 (or its future equivalent).

My ebook revenue has increased each month for 8 months. Will that continue? I sure hope so. No way for me to know for sure. What I do know is that I’m in control of my career. I’m not sitting on my hands waiting months for some intern to pick my manuscript out of a slush pile. I’m not signing away all my rights. I’m not waiting 18 months for a publisher to get my book on a shelf. And I’m making a profit 8 months into my adventure. From my point of view, that’s a success. How much of a success I’ll eventually achieve is unknown.

Here’s the cover art for my most recent book, a Young Adult action adventure. It’s also done by Igor Kieryluk. I’m also self-publishing this through CreateSpace in paperback form.

The Elemental Odyssey Amazon book page.

Mr Flibble · Jun 6, 2011

ResearchGuy said:
I disagree with how you are using the terminology.

In my lexicon, e-publishing is publishing in digital form, regardless of who is the publisher.

In your lexicon, I agree

However, as there is a difference between e-self-pub and pub-e-pub ( in exactly the same way that there is a difference between 'published' or 'trade/legacy/whatever we're calling it this week lol) and print self-pubbed it doesn't hurt to make the distinction.

While I have nothing against self-pubbing, and a great respect for those who do it well, there is a difference (in expectation from readers of nowt else) and as writers we should be distinct. Some self-e-pubbers put out some really nice stuff. And they deserve credit for doing it themselves, but if they don't say so, I won't assume they've self pubbed (yes, I know I do try self pubbed stuff, I'll probably try Derek's. But I'm hoping Derek pushes the bar for what came previously.). .

By saying /inferring/leaving out that e-pubbing =/= e-self-pubbing you are doing a lot of people (on both sides) a disfavour. Because if they did all that themselves they need people to know they did it themselves because that id sodding impressive afaic. I couldn't (not without expensive help)

It's like the distinction in my town of 'People from the Needles' and 'Townies'. To the outside, that means nothing, right? They look almost the same. Sound almost the same. To me it's the difference between a bit of hassle and a kick in the teeth.

Words and how you use them matter. If a writer (not Derek, he used it not knowing. But once you know) can't be bothered to be distinct*...

Clarity is king. And now I shall obsess over the post to see if it said what I thought it did....

*I have my indistinct moments. I mean overall, in such a basic thing.

mscelina · Jun 6, 2011

IdiotsRUs said:
In your lexicon, I agree

However, as there is a difference between e-self-pub and pub-e-pub ( in exactly the same way that there is a difference between 'published' or 'trade/legacy/whatever we're calling it this week lol) and print self-pubbed it doesn't hurt to make the distinction.

While I have nothing against self-pubbing, and a great respect for those who do it well, there is a difference (in expectation from readers of nowt else) and as writers we should be distinct. Some self-e-pubbers put out some really nice stuff. And they deserve credit for doing it themselves, but if they don't say so, I won't assume they've self pubbed (yes, I know I do try self pubbed stuff, I'll probably try Derek's. But I'm hoping Derek pushes the bar for what came previously.). .

By saying /inferring/leaving out that e-pubbing =/= e-self-pubbing you are doing a lot of people (on both sides) a disfavour. Because if they did all that themselves they need people to know they did it themselves because that id sodding impressive afaic. I couldn't (not without expensive help)

It's like the distinction in my town of 'People from the Needles' and 'Townies'. To the outside, that means nothing, right? They look almost the same. Sound almost the same. To me it's the difference between a bit of hassle and a kick in the teeth.

Words and how you use them matter. If a writer (not Derek, he used it not knowing. But once you know) can't be bothered to be distinct*...

Clarity is king. And now I shall obsess over the post to see if it said what I thought it did....

*I have my indistinct moments. I mean overall, in such a basic thing.

Exactly.

You guys can quibble over semantics all you want to. But this "e-published" book was published by the author, and not a publishing company. Therefore, for the purposes of identification within the industry ( as in, for example, review sites that will not review self-published books) e-published is the wrong term to use for self-published books.

DerekJCanyon · Jun 6, 2011

For those of you who want to know, here's what I've done to self-publish my own ebooks:

1. Hired a professional editor to do line and dev edits on my books.
2. Hired professional artist to do the cover art.
3. Formatted the interior myself.
4. Did the cover layout myself.
5. Did minimal marketing myself.

So, I've done two things that trade publishers do: professional editing and cover art.

I've done everything else myself. I have no problem with the 'self-published' term being applied to my work. I think my books speak for themselves, and hopefully someone who buys them will enjoy the content.

I do agree that some people have lower regard for self-published books. That is, of course, the reason that I don't advertise on my Amazon page that my books are self-published.

And for people who want to know more about my novels, here are the descriptions:

Dead Dwarves Don't Dance, ebook $2.99
Gritty, action-packed cyberpunk
74,000 words

Noose, a genetically engineered dwarf mercenary, barely survives a terrorist attack on a neohuman dance club. Injured and alone, he embarks on a brutal quest for vengeance into the squalid underbelly of the Regional Atlanta Metroplex, through the desert wasteland of the not-so-pristine wilderness, and to the peerless towers of elite society.

The year is 2134. The nations of previous centuries are gone, consumed by the United Globe government. Citizens are confined to vast metroplexes while the rest of Earth is restored to wilderness. Neohumans are grown in vats, each type genetically engineered to serve humanity – flawless pleasers for gratification and ecstasy, hulking goons for war and violence, accidental psykers wreaking havoc, and more of any shape and size imaginable.

An action-packed, hard-boiled science fiction novel of redemption and revenge.

The Elemental Odyssey, ebook, $2.99
Young adult action/adventure/fantasy
Soon available in paperback for $14.99
96,000 words

There are all sorts of fun and exciting things to do in South Dakota: hike the mountains, see the monuments, explore the caves, watch the wildlife. But what’s not on the travel brochures is getting abducted by magical aliens!

While vacationing in the Black Hills, twelve-year-old Kyle Morgan and his new friends, Susie, Veeksha, and Jurgen, are hauled on board a strange alien ship and forced to help the animal-like Zurans!

Whisked around the world on a perilous quest, the children solve riddles to find mystical elements for their fierce captors. Scheming against the aliens, military, powerful elementals, and even each other, the kids must escape before the Zurans can complete their mysterious mission.

Mr Flibble · Jun 6, 2011

BTW, if anyone feels looked dopwn on cos they are self pubbed, remeber this

I am not self published - certain Rah Rah self pubbers think I have sold out to the Man, oh and if I really believed in my work I'd self publish, apparently with the money I get from loving my words so much. Also apparently, my name is more noticeable than 'imprint of Harlequin'...possibly not I feel - they got it into places I didn't even know existed. Book reviews form places I'd never heard of. Beacuse they are better at marketing than I . There are many reasons I, personally, choose not to self pub.

My latest book is not in print, not in bookstores. It is not self-pubbed either. (It is a sodding good book though. The only one I'm actually proud of) If it isn't in print, it isn't 'really published'.

I write fantasy - enough to get me funny looks in certain circles. At the least, in many places I get an eyeroll.

I include romantic subplots./some romance in my novels - some SFF readers /writers look down on me. Romance is easy, right? Shit they get so looked down on, they have to find someone to look down on. At least they don't write romance. ( I reiterate, in places, this isn't all/or maybe even a majority. But it's there.)

I'm at the bottom of the 'look downable at' from my POV.

DerekJCanyon · Jun 6, 2011

IdiotsRUs,

I actually don't understand the enmity between those who prefer trade publishing to those who prefer self-publishing.

I like self-publishing because Amazon has made it possible to earn a profit and find a fanbase all by myself.

However, if some trade publisher approached me and made me an offer, I certainly wouldn't turn my nose. I'd review the contract and decide if it was worth it.

My goal is to have a career as a novelist. To achieve that goal I will keep my options open for both self- and trade publishing. They are not mutually exclusive.

At this point, though, I have no desire to expend energy in the querying game.

Mr Flibble · Jun 6, 2011

DerekJCanyon said:
I actually don't understand the enmity between those who prefer trade publishing to those who prefer self-publishing.

Neither do I - and here, there are just writers, all looking for info or imparting i, all with their own views.

All that other stuff is just silly. And important too - your words should convey what you want them to. Research what you want to do folks. It's really that simple. And hard.

profen4 · Jun 6, 2011

DerekJCanyon said:
Here's the cover to my best-selling book:

Very nice cover! Eye catching!

kaitie · Jun 6, 2011

IdiotsRUs said:
Neither do I - and here, there are just writers, all looking for info or imparting i, all with their own views.

All that other stuff is just silly. And important too - your words should convey what you want them to. Research what you want to do folks. It's really that simple. And hard.

Ditto this.

Cloud Eight · Jun 6, 2011

Derek, thanks for posting your numbers and your journey. Well done.

I've been on sub for a long time, didn't sell, and my agent and I decided to take my book to the Kindle. Early days for me, but it's both scary and exciting.

And I agree with everyone here who has said we're all writers, looking for info, hopefully helping one another, and all of us likely want the same thing at the end of the process: readers who connect with our work.

Luck to you in the future!

scope · Jun 6, 2011

DerekJCanyon said:
IdiotsRUs,

I actually don't understand the enmity between those who prefer trade publishing to those who prefer self-publishing.

I like self-publishing because Amazon has made it possible to earn a profit and find a fanbase all by myself.

However, if some trade publisher approached me and made me an offer, I certainly wouldn't turn my nose. I'd review the contract and decide if it was worth it.

My goal is to have a career as a novelist. To achieve that goal I will keep my options open for both self- and trade publishing. They are not mutually exclusive.

At this point, though, I have no desire to expend energy in the querying game.

By enmity I assume you mean hostility. Speaking for myself, which is all I can do, at this point in time I will continue to try and be published (e and paper) by trade houses, although to see what it's all about I may try e-publish one of my out of print books.

SP of paper books has been around for many years in many guises and has been quite unsuccessful, at least not for writers. Today, we see a combinaion of the old and some new (e.g., SP companies, ebook publishing companies, the opportunity to SP ebooks or paper on your own). Yet to me it all seems like one giant mess where nothing has been developed to a point where it's resonable for a writer who engages in same to envision a reasonable degree of success, beyond small ball. And if a writer is conent with small ball, than nothing more needs to be discussed.

Will things ever develop as we would like them to be? I have my doubts, and one of the biggst drawbacks to such developments is the apparent fact that many (not all) who are now folowing this path do so in order to avoid the laboroious and time consumng tasks of trying to find an agent and/or a publishng house for their works, and who don't really want critiques from professionals.

But intrinsicly I don't as yet find fault with these alternate attempts to publish and sell one's work. What I do find fault with are writers who espouse this as the "next coming" and accordingly companies sprouting up without the knowledge, credentials, connections, promotion, marketing capabilities, and more, to capitaize on a writers work for the good of the company and the writer. In time, I believe in a short amount of time, the big boys will alter their position on e-books so that writers will have no true excuse for not trying to publish with them. But we will see.

movieman · Jun 6, 2011

scope said:
SP of paper books has been around for many years in many guises and has been quite unsuccessful, at least not for writers.

Because you can't get self-published novels into bookstores; at least not in the numbers required to make any money. Nor can you get self-published novels reviewed in dead tree media.

So far publishers have no such lock on ebook sales and I don't really see how they could get one; Amazon don't care whether a book is trade published or self published so long as they make money from it. Nor do publishers have a monopoly on online reviews, as Joe Horror-Fan's blog may well be more important to ebook readers than the New York Times.

New author epublishing results after 8 months

DerekJCanyon

mscelina

Teh doommobile, drivin' rite by you

DerekJCanyon

shadowwalker

empty-nester!

Cyia

Rewriting My Destiny

Mr Flibble

They've been very bad, Mr Flibble

areteus

movieman

kaitie

With great power comes

scope

Commonsensical Maverick

ResearchGuy

Resident Curmudgeon

Capital

Doomthayer

Sydewinder

DerekJCanyon

Mr Flibble

They've been very bad, Mr Flibble

mscelina

Teh doommobile, drivin' rite by you

DerekJCanyon

Mr Flibble

They've been very bad, Mr Flibble

DerekJCanyon

Mr Flibble

They've been very bad, Mr Flibble

profen4

kaitie

With great power comes

Cloud Eight

scope

Commonsensical Maverick

movieman