How many self published books have you sold to date?

Diane

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Thaaaaat maybe difficult. I'd like to see them too--I'm an MG author--but it's a really rough market until you hit YA.

Several of my YA friends have mentioned it's still rough-going with teens and ebooks (whether trade or self) -- despite nearly everyone carrying a smartphone these days, teens prefer to read on paper, not their phones or tablets.
 

JournoWriter

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I've assumed that's because kids and teens typically don't have their own Amazon or credit-card accounts, and their parents don't want them to have access to all *their* stuff.
 

plumone

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My website has been up for around three weeks now, and I just received all of my books from my book printing company. (Going the self-publishing route)

I have so far sold 0 books. So everyone in this thread is officially doing better than me. Congrats!

I printed 100 copies of my book. If I could sell all of them by the end of the year, I would be happy.
 

RikWriter

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So I had a bad case of insomnia last night and I sat down with a calculator and figured it out. I've sold right around 42,000 books since August of 2011 when I put my first two titles online.
 

benluby

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So I had a bad case of insomnia last night and I sat down with a calculator and figured it out. I've sold right around 42,000 books since August of 2011 when I put my first two titles online.

You have won major bragging rights!! Congrats!
 

RikWriter

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Thanks. It feels good to have sold that many, but the sobering part is, about 30,000 of those were my two 99 cent first novels. The two sequels I wrote haven't come close to those numbers, which is a bit aggravating for me considering IMHO they're much better written, and they're longer and took me a long time to write.
 

HistorySleuth

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So I had a bad case of insomnia last night and I sat down with a calculator and figured it out. I've sold right around 42,000 books since August of 2011 when I put my first two titles online.

Excellent job! Any tips in selling other than obviously writing damn good books? :)
 

RikWriter

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Excellent job! Any tips in selling other than obviously writing damn good books? :)

For me, it was the combination of writing books in a genre with a good market for self-published work (science fiction and in particular military science fiction) and networking on a couple websites that had a lot of readers and an interest in that sort of fiction. I've noticed just from listening to others here and elsewhere on other message boards that self-published works in genre fiction are often more successful than mainstream fiction, and science fiction/fantasy is one of the more successful ones, along with the whole action/adventure/end of the world type genre.
 

aikigypsy

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I've sold 45 of the first title I published (novella, Dec. 2012) and 292 of the second (historical romance, published Nov. 2013). About half of the later were sold on 99 cent sale days. I'm still in the red, and I typically sell a copy or two a week.
 

AdamNeymars

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So I had a bad case of insomnia last night and I sat down with a calculator and figured it out. I've sold right around 42,000 books since August of 2011 when I put my first two titles online.

Congrats on the 42,000 sales!

Have you ever consider getting new covers for your books?

Some self-publishers have found success with new covers. It might be worth the investment to make your covers look indistinguishable from trade covers in your genre.

The first thing a potential reader notice is the cover. Make the best first impression.
 

Old Hack

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If RikWriter has sold 42,000 copies I doubt his covers are putting anyone off, Adam. It sounds like they're doing a good job for his books.

Great sales, Rik.
 

RikWriter

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Congrats on the 42,000 sales!

Have you ever consider getting new covers for your books?

Some self-publishers have found success with new covers. It might be worth the investment to make your covers look indistinguishable from trade covers in your genre.

The first thing a potential reader notice is the cover. Make the best first impression.


LOL, you should see the original covers I had for my first two books! I was a total newbie three years ago when I self-published the first two books and the covers were HORRIBLE!
Ironically, that was when I had most of my sales.
I actually like the covers for my Duty, Honor, Planet books---I think they fit well with the subject matter---but I've kind of been dissatisfied with my cover for Birthright...I had changed it recently to the one in my sig, but I still didn't like it.
After reading your post and another thread about covers, I went over to iStock---I sell stock photography there and I had a $20 balance since my last cash-out, so I used it to buy some credits and downloaded a good illustration and came up with a new cover for Birthright.
Thanks for the advice.
 
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benluby

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Well, I just went live yesterday. So far I've sold one copy in the US and one in the UK. So I am off to a slow start, but two sales is two more than I would have had if I had simply stuck the story in a drawer again!!
Tomorrow I will order my proofs for the paperback edition after it passes Amazon internal reviews.
 

Jazen

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Rik, when I grow up I want to be like you. :D 42,000 that is awesome!!!!

My book went live in April and to date I've sold 38 books.
 

AdamNeymars

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Re. mailing lists, I'd heard a while ago from one of the most successful self-publishers in my genre that her mailing list has been a key part of her success, but not really knowing how to go about building one, I hadn't done much about it. With my last couple of releases, however, I have started to include details of how to sign up for the mailing list at the back of each ebook. I include a page with links to my other books, my website, and so on, and now it has a link to the mailing list sign up. I don't call it a mailing list, I simply say 'If you would like to be informed when my next book is released, please sign up here.' (I don't send out mailings except when I have a new release.)

My mailing list is still pretty tiny (two figures), but I've been surprised nevertheless at how many readers are signing up for it. The real bonus, I think, when the mailing list gets bigger, is the boost to sales it can provide when a book is released. You announce it directly to everyone who has read and enjoyed your books well enough to sign up for your list and, hopefully, a good number of them will buy the new book all at the same time, thus boosting your rankings and visibility. It's win-win!

I do also have a sign up form on my website and occasionally mention it on my FB page etc, but I think the end-of-book link is the key to getting sign-ups from readers who actually want to buy your next book.

ETA: I also strongly recommend signing up for a mailing service to make sure your mailings are (a) legal, (b) less likely to get marked as spam, and (c) don't exceed your email limits. I use MadMimi, but Mailchimp is popular too. They'll give you templates to make your mailings look more professional too. Here's my most recent mailing.

This thread on the kboards provides a lot of useful information for authors who are looking into a mailing list

http://www.kboards.com/index.php?topic=124433.0
A very quick, short, and dirty guide to slowly building sales

I highly recommended it.
 

benluby

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Okay, an update. And a caveat. I SUCK at marketing. I mean, Helen Keller directing rush hour traffic kind of suck at it, too.
I have sold... four ebooks. Two in the US, and two in the UK.
Paperbacks I have 55 currently ordered that people have requested, and I have discovered, currently, I am about a dozen short of the real correct number I need.
 

RevanWright

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Helen Keller directing rush hour traffic kind of suck at it, too.

I'm not laughing at you, but at that analogy. I've got to write that down.

As of this moment (having been on Amazon for 2 weeks), I've sold 23 ebooks straight up, and 7 more through their Kindle Unlimited thingy. I only know of 2 that were bought by people I know, because my family, friends, and co-workers are all waiting to get a hardcover at the end of this month. Most of those sales came in the 2 or 3 days after it came off the free period, and I'm pretty sure that this had something to do with it:
nMXXw6d.png

A screencap of an email sent to me by a friend. My mother and brother got the same one. Apparently my book was at the top of a weekly or monthly email by Amazon for urban fantasy suggestions or something. But sales have dipped in the last few days and I'm down to 1 a day now. I've done pretty much zero marketing, and I'll probably just keep laying low until my Kirkus and IndieReader reviews come in.