Today’s post is by book marketing industry expert, Kelly Schuknecht.
Amanda Hocking has become an indie and digital publishing super star. The author of 17 books, she began self-publishing them as e-books in April 2010, and what a year it has been! She has earned over a million dollars in royalties and landed a traditional publishing contract for her next series.
How did she do it? Amanda writes young adult paranormal romance, and prices her books with a marketing strategy in mind. She published the first book in each series with a price of just $.99 to encourage sales. Once readers were hooked, the price of her second book in the series was just $2.99. She would set the price of the final book in the series at about $8.99. When readers would purchase all of the books in the series, Amanda would make “a pretty decent profit.”
Hear about Amanda’s road to success in her own words in this Associated Press video:
DISCUSSION: How do you use marketing strategy when you set your pricing?
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ABOUT KELLY SCHUKNECHT: Kelly Schuknecht works as the Director of Author Support for Outskirts Press. In addition to her contributions to the Outskirts Press blog at blog.outskirtspress.com, Kelly and a group of talented marketing experts offer book marketing services, support, and products to not only published Outskirts Press authors, but to all authors and professionals who are interested in marketing their books and/or careers. Learn more about Kelly on her blog at http://kellyschuknecht.com. |
[...] So does that mean that if you want to make money as a writer, just self-publish at the right price point? Well, no. The number of people making a living from self-published books, electronic or otherwise, is tiny, as are the number of traditional authors who make a living (though a larger number I suspect). Hocking writes ‘paranormal romance’ (think Twilight), which is a popular area read by a lot of people, one that has a strong appetite, which means they will try new authors to fill it as no one writes fast enough to keep up with consumption. Add this to the price point, and a lot of self-promotion and you start to see why Hocking’s books were a success (Hocking was certainly aware of writing for a market, see her describe her success on video). [...]
[...] still aren’t seeing the results you were hoping for. You’re not aiming to be the next Amanda Hocking, but you do want to at least earn enough to nicely supplement your [...]