Charnell's eBook Progress Thread [Here we go, it's getting serious!]

[Charnell]

An update.

This month isn't going as great as I wanted it to, only going to barely clear $2,000. To prepare for the summer when I'm out of classes, I've hired a few more freelancers and a VA to help me scale up.

I've also decided to take my early (dead) books out of KDP Select where they aren't getting any benefit and putting them on other platforms. Learning how to do the Smashwords formatting. At the end of June they will be all on Smashwords and the countless other storefronts they publish to.

 

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[icey502]

Curious to know how your Smashwords experience goes

 

[Charnell]

Curious to know how your Smashwords experience goes

Hopefully as smooth as possible! If it's too difficult, I'll probably just go through Draft2Digital which I've gone through before.

 

[Funke]

Hello Charnell, What are you strategies for promotion for each book?

What do you do with each one after you publish it? Do you invest in marketing later on?


If books do not sell you may try changing them price to be permanently free to lead more readers into your work and then put links to other books inside those permafree books, or just gather emails there.

 

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[Charnell]

Hello Charnell, What are you strategies for promotion for each book?

What do you do with each one after you publish it? Do you invest in marketing later on?


If books do not sell you may try changing them price to be permanently free to lead more readers into your work and then put links to other books inside those permafree books, or just gather emails there.

Right now all of my books are in KDP Select, so I do the 5 day free promotion and that's all for most of them. I have a few Facebook ads running that don't seem too effective. I have a mailing list for each pen name that I get a few signups a week.

I'm working on marketing on a new platform, but I've only just began so it's too early to see if there will be a positive effect. As far as I can tell there aren't many or any authors on it, so it's either a bust or an untapped market. I'll give it around 2 months before I bring it up again to see if it's worth it.

 

[Funke]

I have 21 non-fiction books and I'm doing 5 days free promotion on each of them every 3 months. During those 5 days I've been getting reviews, posted the book on a few sites and facebook groups. Each book could get 500 to 1500 downloads and few email signups.


However, it looks like those free downloads no longer affect sales after the promo ends as it did before. Someone said that 100 downloads translates to 1 sale, as for positioning of the book in Amazon's catalogue.

Have you tried Kindle Countdown or simply reducing the price to $0.99 and with that doing any kind of paid promotion?

 

[Charnell]

I have 21 non-fiction books and I'm doing 5 days free promotion on each of them every 3 months. During those 5 days I've been getting reviews, posted the book on a few sites and facebook groups. Each book could get 500 to 1500 downloads and few email signups.


However, it looks like those free downloads no longer affect sales after the promo ends as it did before. Someone said that 100 downloads translates to 1 sale, as for positioning of the book in Amazon's catalogue.

Have you tried Kindle Countdown or simply reducing the price to $0.99 and with that doing any kind of paid promotion?

Kindle Countdowns, in my experiences, are useless. Of course none of my books are bestsellers/cult classics which I'm sure countdowns help out immensely.

 

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[Charnell]

Shout out to the holidays.

 

[icey502]

Just curious, what are those unit numbers?

 

[Charnell]

Just curious, what are those unit numbers?

They ended up being 39 sales, 38 borrows.

 

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[kph200]

Fantastic thread...for now I don't have any plans to get into self publishing gig but I like what you are doing.

 

[doncruz]

How many books have you published so far ?

 

[Charnell]

...

 

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[GuestUser113]

Keep up the good work @Charnell

 

[kph200]

@Charnell Time is most important factor for me so a quick question approximately how many hours do you spend on this business per month???

 

[Charnell]

@kph200 At the moment probably around 30-40 hours a month. I get a story, edit and make sure its not plagiarized, and design a cover. In 1 month I'm going to jump it up due to summer between semesters.

 

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[KennyJA]

Hi Charnell!

I am impressed and inspired by your thread, I've been self publishing since the last day of March and have written my own books. No ghost writing.

It seems you've had success since you've started. I don't even make half of what you shown on your first graph on page 1. Did the sales and KOL's come through somewhat easily or did you put hard effort into advertising since day one?

I'm trying get my books out there and thus my sales. I'm working on my third book (all non-fiction). Any tips on how to bridge the gap from nothing to something? By that I mean actually earning at least a 100 bucks a month because I'm not even there yet lol

You've made 85 dollars in your first month if I'm not mistaken, what resources and steps did you take and use?

 

[JaxAttacks]

Very inspiring thread. @Charnell , thanks for the info. I'm just now finishing writing my first book and looking forward to the whole process.

 

[Liz Be]

This thread is inspiring! Thank you!

 

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[KennyJA]

...

Could you at least answer this: Have you chosen the "best" keywords since the start of your ebook business or was it flooding the market with fiction every month how you earned your money? I lost count at 88.

 

[Charnell]

Hi Charnell!

I am impressed and inspired by your thread, I've been self publishing since the last day of March and have written my own books. No ghost writing.

It seems you've had success since you've started. I don't even make half of what you shown on your first graph on page 1. Did the sales and KOL's come through somewhat easily or did you put hard effort into advertising since day one?

I'm trying get my books out there and thus my sales. I'm working on my third book (all non-fiction). Any tips on how to bridge the gap from nothing to something? By that I mean actually earning at least a 100 bucks a month because I'm not even there yet lol

You've made 85 dollars in your first month if I'm not mistaken, what resources and steps did you take and use?

The sales didn't begin coming in until I had 5+ short books out. I did very little advertising, would submit to a few niche facebook pages.
Do you have a mailing list setup? That's the best way to get a boost upon release, as those that liked book #1 and #2 will most likely buy #3.
Are your 3 books going to be in the same genre? If they are, I would recommend setting them up into a bundle. Combine all 3 into a new book and sell it for a bit more. So if the 3 single books are $3.99 each, set the price of the bundle to $5.99 or so.

I noticed big boosts early on when I would release more books at once. Instead of releasing as soon as they were finished, I'd have the entire 3 part series and the bundle released on the same day.

...

Could you at least answer this: Have you chosen the "best" keywords since the start of your ebook business or was it flooding the market with fiction every month how you earned your money? I lost count at 88.

Flooding? I wouldn't consider it flooding the market. I have, at times, had 10 ghostwriters bringing me a book a week. I'm not an author, I'm a publisher.

As far as keywords go, I starting using software to help me out towards the end of December and my monthly revenue quadrupled from December to January. Since I'm not a dirtbag marketer, I'll tell you that that could be attributed to Christmas. After using the software, if I recall correctly, I had at least 5 titles per page for a search result that had over 100k queries.

 

[KennyJA]

I'm not an author, I'm a publisher

I am sorry if my choice of words offended you. Hell, I would do the same to get my books out there. I am still very impressed and I use your thread as a guide, you're successful. I'm planning to do a bit of publishing too and see how it goes, under a pen name. Three books in three months took a lot of effort, personally. I just can't think of ideas for non-fiction.

Do you have a mailing list setup?

I do not. From what I've learned I need a website of my own, and have people give me their e-mail. If I can't get much traffic to my books, how do I expect to get it on my website was what I was thinking. I know quitter talk doesn't fly around here, but that's a legitimate concern. I would love to have an e-mail list, or at least use someone else's.

Are your 3 books going to be in the same genre?

They aren't. One is an autobiography about living in Brazil (I'm an American living abroad) writing about its various crappy flaws. The other was about propaganda, and the last a summary on self help launched yesterday. All short books 5,000-6,000 words.

From what I've learned from your post, publishing a 3-part short story series is more profitable than a single book every time. No wonder you have so many books then. See my 'flooding' comment was misguided! You publish several series. I think that will be the direction I will head to. I've paid people on Fiverr to do keyword research, one gave me bonus material to read on.

Unrelated: I spent 10 bucks so far on keywords, 15 total for covers, 10 for smashwords, and 10 for advertising. 45 bucks out...

 

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[Charnell]

I do not. From what I've learned I need a website of my own, and have people give me their e-mail. If I can't get much traffic to my books, how do I expect to get it on my website was what I was thinking. I know quitter talk doesn't fly around here, but that's a legitimate concern. I would love to have an e-mail list, or at least use someone else's.

You can setup a mailing list and put links to signup in the beginning and ending of your books. That is probably one of the easiest ways to reach out to people who enjoy your writing. Even if only 10% of your list actually buys a book and you have 100 mailing list subscribers, that's 10 sales on day 1, guaranteed. Depending on the categories that could put in the top 100 and gain new readers and mailing list subscribers, increasing the effect with each new release.

From what I've learned from your post, publishing a 3-part short story series is more profitable than a single book every time.

They don't necessarily have to stories either. You could do it with nonfiction as well. Look at something like this http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00OS96EYU/?tag=tff-amazonparser-20. 3 different authors joined up together to give their readers a great deal.

 

[HardWorker]

Hey Charnell, do you mind sharing what keyword software you use? Thank you.

 

[KennyJA]

You can setup a mailing list and put links to signup in the beginning and ending of your books.

Nice, I will try that. New to the whole thing though. Is that what you did?

And I'd like to ask you something that I will take very seriously. Is outsourcing writing a sure way to success? Do you think I can be successful with that?

I've run out of ideas on what to write for non-fiction. I've seen another successful author/publisher here do outsourcing and made it nicely (income of around 1,000 euros a month). It really does seem like a faster way to rise to the top in fame.

EDIT: Just created my own website and MailCheat(Chimp) account. I guess there was no friggin' way around the website since MailCheat(Chimp) demanded one. It's pretty damn ugly too but I worked through it. Now to figure out how to get people to give me an e-mail, through my book link which I have yet to provide, to create an e-mail list so I can advertise new books to them.

I think things are going normally.

 

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[Charnell]

Nice, I will try that. New to the whole thing though. Is that what you did?

And I'd like to ask you something that I will take very seriously. Is outsourcing writing a sure way to success? Do you think I can be successful with that?

I've run out of ideas on what to write for non-fiction. I've seen another successful author/publisher here do outsourcing and made it nicely (income of around 1,000 euros a month). It really does seem like a faster way to rise to the top in fame.

EDIT: Just created my own website and MailCheat(Chimp) account. I guess there was no friggin' way around the website since MailCheat(Chimp) demanded one. It's pretty damn ugly too but I worked through it. Now to figure out how to get people to give me an e-mail, through my book link which I have yet to provide, to create an e-mail list so I can advertise new books to them.

I think things are going normally.

I didn't in the beginning, but after seeing it so much I started to. There is a definite noticeable difference on days you send out an e-mail blast to subscribers.

I think it works for some people, depending on their situation. It's definitely not something I plan on doing forever, but as a low overhead, 0 inventory side hustle/business while I'm in school it is a great way to learn and grow capital. The people that fail are the ones who are easily discouraged. You're already working on your third books, so the discouraged part does not apply.

As far as MailCheat(Chimp) goes, you didn't need to create your own website.

1. Login
2. Click 'Lists' at the top
3. Click your list
4. Click 'Signup forms'
5. Click whatever signup form you created, probably general
6. There should be a link, something like http://eepurl.com/XXXXXX. You can use that link in your books and it will take the reader to a MailCheat(Chimp) signup form page.

 

[KennyJA]

Nice, thanks a lot for your continued replies, I appreciate it.

In total my expenses have been around $100 for stock photos, and $120 for outsourced writing.

Amazing, I don't know how you found such cheap writers, I predict outsourcing will be very expensive for me even for a small amount of books because I offered $25 for a 5,000 word romance story and only got 1 decent writer. I knew I should've reread your thread on how much you pay freelancers. Aghhh

I'm pretty far past being discouraged in this path of entrepreneurship. I don't even feel it anymore. I just see challenges and how I'm going to complete them.

I've got MailCheat(Chimp) set up (and the website I spent 2 hours on) and my 3rd book is on a promo with a fiverr promo coming too. The last formula I need to learn or create is how to get consistent sales, and many of them. I drop off the radar without a new book or promo. This will humble the shit out of me but:

The attached is what I got till today, I started on March 31 so you can't see it but my first book did the best.

 

[FeaRxUnLeAsHeD]

Charnell, where do you go to school?

PM me.

 

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[Chazmania]

I am aware of one guy who's scaled it up with non-fiction books to the point where he has 2000 books published.

How much $ is coming in from 2000 books? Any idea?

 

[Gymjunkie]

How much $ is coming in from 2000 books? Any idea?

Think he was doing 7figs a year..