More On Numbers

Monday there was a guest post by Mark Terry on A Newbie’s Guide To Publishing.  He talked about his own experience with ebooks–which was VASTLY different from Joe Konrath’s.  From September to February, count ’em, SIX MONTHS, Mark made a whopping $10.92 cents in royalties.  His Amazon page needed work, he’s apparently done no marketing to speak of, the link to the book was buried on his website, and it was priced at a weird price point ($1.49).

As of this morning, I’ve made $10.96 in 15 days with my unknown novella, priced at a conservative $1.

Okay, yeah, I admit it, there’s a little bit of competitor satisfaction there, but really he’s not a competitor with me.  I write romance.  He writes suspense (I think).  But still.  It made me happy. Just over two weeks, man.

And I haven’t even REALLY started marketing yet.  My sum total marketing thus far has been to get everything out, have fantabulous friends who have bought and rated it highly, make it very visible on my home page on my two blogs, and make a few small posts on Kindle discussion boards mentioning my bargain buy.  I can attribute MOST of these 26 sales to family, close friends, and most of all Twitter.  How I love my Twitter peeps!  They’ve been marvelously enthusiastic and supportive.

That’s probably the biggest advice I can offer to people who want to do this indie publishing gig.  MAKE FRIENDS.  Don’t do it in a calculating kind of way–I’m just friending you and talking to you so you’ll let me guest blog or something–that would be uber rude.  But take the time to develop RELATIONSHIPS with people.  Other writers.  Readers.  And do it BEFORE you have something to release.  Whether it is Twitter or Facebook or MySpace or Livejournal (speaking of which, I have just started a livejournal group, Bright Evening Stars, for writers if you would like to join me), or something else, make an investment.  You can’t do everything, but pick ONE and develop some relationships.  It’s the best thing you can do because books do not exist in a vacuum without readers and everyone you meet is a potential reader someday.

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