grayworld's self-publishing journey, in black and white

Moldy said:

It's still sunny and warm outside, just wait till October The summer-doldrums can't be underestimated; even ebay business crashes and dies in the summer for a lot of people. I tried selling some craftwork from a friend this summer and it was impossible to move, when every other season was fine.

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Thanks for the encouraging and informative words, Moldy. I released my first ebook around Thanksgiving last year and racked up some impressive (to me) sales numbers. Those numbers stayed consistent through February, then dropped off the table when the weather warmed. As much as I despise shoveling snow, I'm hoping the colder weather attracts more readers

SunshineonMe said:

Hey doubling a month is something to celebrate! Here's to every month doubling from now on! Congratulations!

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Thanks, SunshineonMe. I wish the same on you!

Ann Joyce said:

Hi Gray, I haven't been around for awhile, but I decided to pop in to see if anyone had anything at all to say - good, bad, or indifferent about KU (I think that's right).

Anyway, I'm glad to see you're still here. For sure, I see more unfamiliar names than familiar ones now. I wanted to let you know that I'm still anticipating that sequel to Signal Fire. Are you doing any writing on it? I remember you saying it would be coming out this fall, and I want to be sure and get it when it does.


I hope things pick up for you soon. You're a good writer. Things have been moving slow for me too, lately. A few sales here and there; nothing to write home about (pun intended). Blessings!

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Hi, Ann Joyce! It's nice to "see" you too I still can't thank you enough for your generous review of Signal Fire, and I'm honestly shocked to hear you're still interested in its sequel. High praise, indeed.

Amazingly, you just predicted the topic of this weekend's blog post. Unfortunately, the past six months or so have been brutal on the financial front, and I've had to push the release dates of both I Like Mike (original release scheduled for Summer, 2014) and Rift Valley (Thanksgiving-ish, 2014) forward indefinitely. I'll be updating my various author profiles to reflect this...

Mike is done (circa 2012). I just need to save enough cash for a decent cover. Sadly, my usual cover provider (who I was more than happy with) has ceased operations until 2015, at least. So I'll be shopping. On the actual writing front, Rift Valley is still a work in progress. It's been slow going, but I'm ten chapters in. Unfortunately, that translates to about 25% of a first draft.

Realistically, RV'll be done in early 2015 at the earliest. But its release date is predicated upon a) my financial status and b) my ability to locate solid (and cheap) cover art. Same for Mike (though I'd hoped to time its release with the mid-term elections in the US. Grrr...).

I honestly don't know how KU has affected my sales. I released my first book around Thanksgiving last year and had decent sales which evaporated as the weather warmed. So I'm not quite sure if it's a KU thing, a weather thing, or what.

Thanks so much for the interest and the complements, Ann. They really mean a lot to me. Best of luck (and many sales!) to you, too.

October Sales Review

Thanks, Ann Joyce, for all the support. You're just awesome!

I've stolen the "April is the cruelest month" line more than I care to admit, so I'll just lead off with this: October Sucked. In capital letters.

Suckitude is subjective, of course, and I'm probably being melodramatic (surprise, surprise), but I failed to sell a single book in October. I'm no expert, but I think thems qualify as sucky sales. This is my first month-long shutout, so forgive me if I'm a little devastated. Miraculously, I'd managed to ward off the "Big 0" for nearly a year. This past month? Not so much.

On the plus side, I received my first review for Like Life Itself. It was on Amazon's UK site and it was four-star. So it goes without saying that's awesome. I also managed to attract 250-ish Twitter followers. That's also awesome.

So it was a win-lose type of month. Mostly lose. But I'll keep on keeping on. It's pretty much what I do.

November Sales Update

Celeste Carrara said:

Sorry about the lack of sales in Oct. Just focus on that awesome review & more followers on Twitter
I'm sure Nov will be much better! Keep on keeping on is a great attitude to have.

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Thanks so much, Celeste. I truly appreciate the support .

November went a little better than October, which isn't saying much. I sold two copies of A World Gone Gray, both at Amazon, one each in the UK and the US. As always, I'm grateful for every sale I can muster. At least two readers out there are more adventurous than I am when it comes to unknown writers . Many thanks to them. And I hope I didn't disappoint you too much...

I'm still lagging with my blog, but I've been active on Twitter. I'm safely over the seemingly-arbitrary 2,000-follower threshold. For the time being, at least.

Also, I have my first year-over-year numbers available for crunching. AWGG went live around Thanksgiving last year. Incredibly, it sold 20 copies during the final ten days of November, 2013. Then it predictably nose-dived from there.

I recorded one sale of the aforementioned ebook during the same time period in 2014. Clearly, there's been a fall-off since then. I'm not sure if it's due to random fluctuation, Kindle Unlimited, Amazon's algorithms, my crappy writing, or what. Only time will tell. Or not.

This month marks my one-year anniversary in the self-publishing game. Honestly, I still have no idea what's going on. Check back next year. I might (but probably won't) have a clue. Until then, keep on writing .

December 2014 Sales Review

One is typically the loneliest number. Case in point? My sales number(s) in December. One intrepid reader risked $3.99 of their hard-earned cash on an unknown author. Whether that reader was rewarded or horrified, only time will tell. Here're the gory details:

A World Gone Gray: 1 (AmazonUS)

Thems that, as far as numbers are concerned. On the plus side, I attracted about 150 Twitter followers. Other than that? Umm, well. Yeah. It's looking a bit bleak on the self-publishing front.

That's prompted me to drop the price of each of my humble offerin's to $0.99 at Amazon and Smashwords (and friends, if/when they catch up). Through January, for now. Depending upon sales, more changes will be a-comin' anon.

January 2015 Sales Review

I realize I'm a bit late with my monthly report, and I apologize. I place all blame squarely on the excessively-padded shoulders of the National Football League. Whose brilliant idea was it to schedule the Super Bowl on Groundhog Day Eve, anyway? Needless to say, my early-February routine is all out of whack...

Last month, I decided to lower the price of each of my humble offerings to 99¢ in an attempt to increase sales. The result? I sold more ebooks in January than I had in the previous four months combined. Although it sounds impressive, it really isn't, in the grand scheme of things. But it did warm my heart significantly to see a crooked number as the 31st morphed back into the 1st. Here are the easy-to-follow details:

A World Gone Gray: 6 (all at Amazon, US)

Nothing follows.

Though my just-over-one-year of self-publishing sample-size is decidedly small, some constants are starting to emerge: ninety percent of my sales thus far have been via Amazon (mostly US), and 90 percent of my sales have been AWGG. This tells me I should probably concentrate 90% of my marketing efforts on hocking AWGG on Amazon. So, reluctantly, that's what I intend to do in the coming months.

The plan is to unpublish my stuff on Smashwords and Friends in the coming weeks and go exclusively with Amazon. This will give me access to KDP Select's alleged benefits (marketing, KU, etc.). Of course, I'll bump my books' prices back up to their pre-2015 levels beforehand in anticipation of any potential lending/borrowing revenues surpassing actual sales. It might sound like I know what I'm doing, but trust me, this is all theoretical. I'm officially entering uncharted (by me, anyway) territory.

In other news, I'm still plugging away at Twitter and lagging away at my blog. On the plus side, I've probably written more new fiction already this year than I did all of last year. That sequel to Signal Fire may actually see the light of day before year's end. I'm also seriously considering offering AWGG in print (through Createspace) later this year, and my semi-trunked political satire thing might make an appearance in ebook form before the next guy or gal announces his or her candidacy for president. Maybe.

Ann Joyce said:

I'm so glad to see you're still hanging in there, Gray. I haven't been around for quite some time, but just thought I'd pop in and see what's going on. I didn't get a single thing published in all of 2014. It was really an off-year for me in so many ways. I am glad to say I am starting to write more again now, in fact, am working on two novels on and off. it would be a delight to get them both out there in 2015. We'll see how that goes.

Anyway, still keeping my eyes open for that sequel. Meanwhile, write on and continue to keep us posted on your progress. Blessings!

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Thanks so much, Ann. Rift Valley has been comfortably in my head for about three years now, but life keeps getting in the way of me putting it on paper (or, these days, digital...).

I'm actually making some major progress on the writing front, though. I've been averaging 1,000-2,000 words per day recently, which gives me hope my writer's block is, well, cleared. That said, my best guess for Rift Valley's release is early- to mid- summer, 2015.

I guess the key is to keep on writing, and I'm glad to see you're doing that, too. It's so easy to give up, but so hard to keep on keeping on. Best of luck to you, too. Your support and interest in my books means a lot to me.

WriterBN said:

Good luck, grayworld. January was the worst month ever for me (and I've heard a few other who've said that as well). No place to go but up, right?

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I've been doing the self-publishing thing for over a year now, and I still can't figure out a pattern as far as sales are concerned. Your guess it as good as mine. But I'm with you. Upward bound.

February 2015 Sales Review

Despite the unbearable weather (or perhaps because of it), I managed to convince eight awesome readers to spend 99¢ on A World Gone Gray in February. As per usual, all sales were recorded at the American incarnation of Amazon.

I finally said goodbye to Smashwords a few weeks ago. I'm a fan of their business plan and their distribution channels, but I hadn't recorded a sale there in almost six months. It just made sense (in my case) to go exclusively with Amazon and KDP Select and take my chances there. We'll see how it goes.

I'm still active on Twitter, and I'm still impressed with the amount of talent out there. Social media can be a double-edged sword, but it also gets a lot of people out there who wouldn't ordinarily be, well, out there. As far as my blog goes, not so far. I'm still lagging in that department.

My writing is still hit-and-miss. I'll put down 1,200 words one day, then half a paragraph the next. Still struggling to get into that all-important groove. But here's to March thawing those words out.

March 2015 Sales Review

So this is the price I pay for posting my monthly sales thingy a day late — bleeding retinas I'm kidding of course. I love AW's traditional April Fool's Day page. So through tears not of sadness but of necessity, I present March's numbers.

I didn't sell a single book last month, but I'm not crying about it. Quite an accomplishment, considering the color scheme and font I'm presently squinting into.

Seriously, though, the lack of sales didn't bother me because I managed to convince six KDP Select subscribers into risking a borrow on my books. Better yet, two of my books were "checked out" in three different countries, effectively ending A World Gone Gray's reign of terror at AmazonUS. Here are the encouraging details:

A World Gone Gray: 4 (3 at AmazonUS, 1 at AmazonUK)
Signal Fire: 2 (1 at AmazonUK, 1 at AmazonCA)

Certainly not record-breaking numbers, but close to what I saw sales-wise in January and February when I was offering my works for 99¢ apiece. The KDP Global Fund thing will probably bump my "income" (keep in mind we're talking peanuts here) up a bit. That's nice, of course, but I'm clearly not doing this for the money at this point. I figure any and all exposure is worth more than a few bucks in the ol' bank account right now.

I'm still tweeting almost daily and blogging almost never. I'm also writing fiction almost never, which is problematic when you're trying to pass yourself off as a writer of fiction. Pretty sure my inter-office emails saw a higher word-count than my WIPs did last month. I'm really hoping the warming weather wakes my writerly mind in April. Then I hope it tells me to cut down on the alliteration.

April 2015 Sales Review

Well, the crooked-number streak continues, sales-and-borrows-wise. Not nearly as encouraging as last month, but encouraging in its own right. Here are the mixed results:

A World Gone Gray: 1 sale, 3 borrows, all at AmazonUS.

I also had a mysterious phantom sale of Like Life Itself. There's no mention of a sale/return in my records, but the collection's ranking got a bump. Sadly, I'll take that.

More (probably most) importantly, someone took the time to buy/borrow, read, and review AWGG at the American incarnation of Amazon. For those of you keeping score at home, it was of the three-star variety. It was also the first review of any of my stuff in at least six months, and it's greatly appreciated.

I'm still hanging in there on Twitter and still neglecting my blog. I plan on test-driving one or more of KDP's promotional tools this month, and I'm leaning heavily toward uploading the political satire manuscript I've been messing around with for the past few years.

Dhewco said:

I'm curious...how much does it cost to self-publish on Amazon? I think I missed the part on the Amazon page that had anything about money. It says free, but then I read posts where someone was talking about costs. What costs? Marketing?

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Exactly what Abderian said. Uploading your work to Amazon is completely free. The cost of accessories via outside sources (covers, formatting, professional editing, etc.), should you choose to go that route, can range from reasonable to exorbitant. As a member of the non-percent myself, I've spent less than $200 on my self-publishing venture thus far, exclusively on covers.

Over the years, Absolute Write has taught me there are plenty of unscrupulous folks out there willing to take your money. My best advice to you is to just do your research. A lot of what you're looking for can be found right here. Bewares & Background Checks is an invaluable tool.

Best of luck to you.