My Take on Self-Publishing

[ctcrompton]

Not at all. There are literally thousands and thousands of free porn sites on the web, but people still pay for it. Say what you will about the human race, but we like our porn. Same principle applies to erotica. There will always be people just looking for a free book, but there are hundreds of thousands of more people who will pay for it.

As someone who easily can get discouraged (something I'm working through currently - I believe MJ called it deserting a project due to lack of positive reinforcement), I find this very comforting. Thanks so much @GiroudJD for all the valued insight.

 

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[RealEcon]

Yes, lists are something I wish I would've started much earlier. They require very little effort and when you get a decent sized list, with every new release you send them a link and you'll get a few buys and reviews which will help you shoot up the best-selling lists.

I do all lists through MailCheat(Chimp). I put a link at the back of each book, something like sign up for X's mailing list to receive special deals, new releases, etc etc. It can seem really slow at first, and like it's not worth it. But trust me, it is! Every person that joins your list is a potential sale for you next book, and as the releases add up and the lists grow bigger, that can become a not-insignificant boost!

GiroudJD,

Does the fact that there are literally pages and pages of free kindle erotica titles on Amazon concern you at all? Does that hurt your earnings from your erotica content? I originally thought that would be a profitable niche to get started and I may be missing something here, but after checking out the erotica bestseller list, it seems to me that someone could fill their kindle up without ever spending a dime!
Does that factor into your strategy at all for how much time and/or capital to invest in that particular category? Thanks again for doing this AMA, it's great.

Im curious as well. How do you get the initial start to your sales cycle when there are so many other books competing? I see, how it works once you get a few sales and a small email list going, you can just bump the user ratings up with an email blast for every new book, which then starts the popularity cycle, and gets the ball rolling easily for future books. But how to do it for the first book, when there's so much noise from the competition?

 

[Syc]

Hi Giroud, couple more questions if you don't mind:

1. Do you continue a series if it's losing money? E.g. Say the first book had ~30 sales, but made a loss of $10. Would you make a second book or cut your losses and move on to another topic?

2. Do you think the 80/20 principle applies to this method? As in 80% of the profits come from 20% of the books? Or is it more evenly spread?

3. Do you do any split testing with covers or titles?

4. When researching what genres/topics work and you find a successful book, do you purchase the book? Or try and figure out the story line from the blurb/reviews?

 

[Rolfp2]

Con #3: Self-publishing is not PLR friendly, is not article spinning friendly, is not black hat friendly, etc, etc. This probably also scares a lot of people off, but it's a great thing for all of us who are trying to do this right. Mess with Amazon, or the others, and it will blacklist you. But even playing by the rules has gotten me much more than black hat stuff ever did.

Can you elaborate on this particular con?

 

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[GiroudJD]

Im curious as well. How do you get the initial start to your sales cycle when there are so many other books competing? I see, how it works once you get a few sales and a small email list going, you can just bump the user ratings up with an email blast for every new book, which then starts the popularity cycle, and gets the ball rolling easily for future books. But how to do it for the first book, when there's so much noise from the competition?

I'm a big proponent of enrolling in KDP select, at least for the first cycle (90 days). Lots of authors on the web argue that Select has lost its shine and no longer works for books to get discovered, but my experience has been the exact opposite. With Select, you can enroll your book in a free giveaway for up to 5 days. This gets it out there and into the hands of readers, starts building your list, and getting the excitement for the next release ready. Then, when the 90 day enrollment period is up, I delist from Select and publish on all of the other outlets (B&N, Kobo, iTunes, etc).

 

[GiroudJD]

Hi Giroud, couple more questions if you don't mind:

1. Do you continue a series if it's losing money? E.g. Say the first book had ~30 sales, but made a loss of $10. Would you make a second book or cut your losses and move on to another topic?

2. Do you think the 80/20 principle applies to this method? As in 80% of the profits come from 20% of the books? Or is it more evenly spread?

3. Do you do any split testing with covers or titles?

4. When researching what genres/topics work and you find a successful book, do you purchase the book? Or try and figure out the story line from the blurb/reviews?

1. I do, because when I'm hiring, I hire for the entire series. So I'll hire for a 4-book series and let them complete it. Usually, between the individual books, the boxed set, the audiobook, and the print book, I end up at least making my money back, even on the lesser-performing books. So I always finish the series and release it out there. Cast a wide net, I say.

2. Definitely. You can't predict which 20% will take off, but the 80/20 principle applies, at least to me (and most other authors I talk to).

3. I haven't split tested, per se. I have ordered completely new covers and changed titles slightly if a book was lagging or underperforming, in my eyes. New covers are definitely the most helpful first step to try, if things aren't selling. No matter what your mother told you, people most certainly DO judge a book by its cover, so you need a good one.

4. I don't purchase the book. I'll read the descriptions, reviews, and the "look inside" sample. After doing that with a handful of them, I'll have a pretty great idea about why they're selling so well.

 

[Erock87]

G can you shed some light on what the starting process was like?

What were your first couple months like, how long did it take you to get our of the red, and how many books did you start off publishing vs. where you are now?

I can see this being a big initial investment, and maybe taking five to six months to start generating profit from it.

 

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[ped89]

Hey,

I've been publishing on Kindle for a month or two now and I;m seeing good progress/success. I stick mainly to cookbooks though because of how easily they can be made and the demand is huge.

After reading this thread I'm tempted to go down the erotica route as well but I have a question first...

What price point do you do? Do you go for the 2.99 in order to get the 70% royalty? Are people willing to pay that for the genre? Or is 99c the more common price point?

For my books I always do. Free Promo> 99c > 2.99 (when enough have been sold and I have solid number of 5 star reviews) do you do somethng simialar?

 

[ctcrompton]

I've been publishing on Kindle for a month or two now and I;m seeing good progress/success. I stick mainly to cookbooks though because of how easily they can be made and the demand is huge.

Just out of curiosity, how do you make cookbooks easily? I feel like they'd be frustrating and tedious, trying to come up with recipes and list ingredients, and then perhaps include pictures.

 

[Bodie]

Thanks for the continuous great info.

Got a few more questions please:

1. Do you use any particular method for writing out your plots/sub-plots, character backgrounds, etc?

2. How do you go about writing the project brief that you send to your writers? Is there any particular format that you use?

Thanks!

 

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[ped89]

Just out of curiosity, how do you make cookbooks easily? I feel like they'd be frustrating and tedious, trying to come up with recipes and list ingredients, and then perhaps include pictures.

I find them easy enough to write. I follow the exact same research process as mentioned already in this thread. Once I have the topic I'm going to do I hit google for a few hours. Find recipes, rewrite them and change ingredients slightly (I'm a good cook so I know what I can add/subtract from recipes to improve etc.).

It can time time but it's also not difficult so I usually do it whilst watching a movie or TV show or something. Hope that answers your question

 

[Blueskies4me]

OK. After reading everyone's posts I am starting my first book in an indefinite series, this week. I should probably start a progress thread but I'm not sure if I'm ready for that yet... Yikes. I had done SEO research previously and there are at least 45,000 searches for this niche term per month so I'm hoping it will have a nice start. I've already gotten some quotes on the illustrative portion of it, secured the domain name and hired someone to design the cover. Keep your fingers crossed. Wish me luck and speed, literally...

 

[GiroudJD]

G can you shed some light on what the starting process was like?

What were your first couple months like, how long did it take you to get our of the red, and how many books did you start off publishing vs. where you are now?

I can see this being a big initial investment, and maybe taking five to six months to start generating profit from it.

The first month or two were...slow. One might even say disheartening. But, at the time, I was working full-time, so this was more of a hobby that I was trying to see if I could get a little extra income every month to throw towards my student loans and a nice bottle of Rioja. I started by publishing a few immigration guides that I had written for my practice, and a Spanish/English dual language reader that my wife (who is from Argentina) and I worked on together.

So at the beginning, I didn't outsource anything, thus I wasn't in the red, necessarily (unless you count time, which I wasn't, since it was a hobby). The first month I think I sold about $200 worth of books. Not Earth-shattering, but it was more than I was expecting and I was pleasantly surprised. I wondered if I could scale up the process and take the huge time chunks (writing, covers, etc) out of my hands.

So I outsourced a cookbook (saw someone mentioned cookbooks above!). I had researched a niche (gluten-free) and did a twist on it to my book stand out, then I gathered the recipes myself, but paid someone to rewrite them into original words, change a few ingredients here and there, write new titles, and format it all in a word doc. I think I paid someone from Thailand $50 for the whole thing. I had no idea if this was high or low at the time, so I was just gambling on it working out. The work wasn't terrible, but I had to spend a LOT of time cleaning up English, so that was my last foray into non-native English workers.

At any rate, that book made me back my investment in the first week, and everything after that was pure profit, so I realized it was completely doable to scale up the idea. I researched niches and started about 4 different projects at once. By the end of the third month, I probably had 15-20 books, and added about 5-10 per month.

I guess the point is, you don't need a huge money investment at first, if you can't. There are ways to put in a little blood, sweat, and tears up front, and it'll pay off later.

 

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[GiroudJD]

Hey,

I've been publishing on Kindle for a month or two now and I;m seeing good progress/success. I stick mainly to cookbooks though because of how easily they can be made and the demand is huge.

After reading this thread I'm tempted to go down the erotica route as well but I have a question first...

What price point do you do? Do you go for the 2.99 in order to get the 70% royalty? Are people willing to pay that for the genre? Or is 99c the more common price point?

For my books I always do. Free Promo> 99c > 2.99 (when enough have been sold and I have solid number of 5 star reviews) do you do somethng simialar?

Cookbooks are great. I still do them every once in awhile, but it's more like the hobby portion of my business, since I love cooking so much. They are a bigger time investment, like you said though.

There are a million different ideas for pricing in erotica, specifically. Here's mine:

First, I only publish series. Stand-alones do well for some people, but to me, series are such a better use of time/money, and have a much bigger earning margin. For anything over 5,000 words, I price it at $2.99, initially. When the second book in the series releases, I set the first to $0.99 (and perma-free, eventually), but every other installment from 2 onwards is priced at 2.99. Then, when the series is finished, I bundle everything together and sell it as a collection for anywhere from $4.99 to $9.99, depending on how many installments there are.

The thing with erotica is, if people are "hungry" enough for it, they'll pay $2.99 no matter what. People are weird and they love their kinks, so I haven't had any problems with this pricing model yet!

 

[GiroudJD]

Thanks for the continuous great info.

Got a few more questions please:

1. Do you use any particular method for writing out your plots/sub-plots, character backgrounds, etc?

2. How do you go about writing the project brief that you send to your writers? Is there any particular format that you use?

Thanks!

1. I don't write that detailed of outlines. No character sketches, sub-plots, etc. I generally just give an overarching idea and tell the writer to go crazy with their creativity. They are the writer, after all. So say it's for a romance series. I'll tell them, "the female lead is a washed up pop star. She goes back to her hometown to get re-inspired. She sets out to record some new material with her old bandmate (and former boyfriend). Sparks and drama ensue. Make it happy ending. Go."

That's about it. And even that is more detailed than most of my prompts. By the way, that was off the top of my head, but now that I read it, I bet people would buy that book Feel free to take it and run, anyone.

2. I have, after much trial and error, finally hit upon a great hiring ad that I post, which serves as the project brief. I change the terms and specifics for each gig, but the main shell remains the same. I would say look around on sites like Elance and Guru and just spend some time reading the ads that are posted. You'll quickly see what are terrible ads and what are great ones.

 

[ped89]

Cookbooks are great. I still do them every once in awhile, but it's more like the hobby portion of my business, since I love cooking so much. They are a bigger time investment, like you said though.

There are a million different ideas for pricing in erotica, specifically. Here's mine:

First, I only publish series. Stand-alones do well for some people, but to me, series are such a better use of time/money, and have a much bigger earning margin. For anything over 5,000 words, I price it at $2.99, initially. When the second book in the series releases, I set the first to $0.99 (and perma-free, eventually), but every other installment from 2 onwards is priced at 2.99. Then, when the series is finished, I bundle everything together and sell it as a collection for anywhere from $4.99 to $9.99, depending on how many installments there are.

The thing with erotica is, if people are "hungry" enough for it, they'll pay $2.99 no matter what. People are weird and they love their kinks, so I haven't had any problems with this pricing model yet!

Thanks for reply! Appreciate it. Going to finish up the next 3 books I'm writing just now and then check out the erotica area.

Shot you over a PM as well! Cheers for the thread!

 

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[COSenior]

Can you elaborate on this particular con?

Forgive me for stepping in if this question has already been answered; if so, I didn't see it. The con in question had to do with PLR and article spinning. The answer, Rolfp2, is that for Amazon and I presume most other distributers, you must publish original work. It's their policy, and you should be able to see why. They don't want to crowd their catalog with hundreds of copies of essentially the same work published under as many different names. People would return those in droves, and that doesn't make money for anyone. That isn't to say you can't emulate a plot line and write your own story around it. But don't start with someone else's work and just try to change it enough to look unique. Won't work. If you've ever seen a spun article, you'll know it sticks out like a sore thumb.

 

[Rolfp2]

Forgive me for stepping in if this question has already been answered; if so, I didn't see it. The con in question had to do with PLR and article spinning. The answer, Rolfp2, is that for Amazon and I presume most other distributers, you must publish original work. It's their policy, and you should be able to see why. They don't want to crowd their catalog with hundreds of copies of essentially the same work published under as many different names. People would return those in droves, and that doesn't make money for anyone. That isn't to say you can't emulate a plot line and write your own story around it. But don't start with someone else's work and just try to change it enough to look unique. Won't work. If you've ever seen a spun article, you'll know it sticks out like a sore thumb.

Oh, ok. That makes a lot more sense. Thanks for taking the time to explain it!

 

[Bruh]

Thanks again for your great help @GiroudJD! I outsourced and published my first ebook in December. It's doing somewhat well for my first book, but your strategies really change things. If you could answer these questions, that would be great!

1. Do you think the book's topic and cover/title are the most important parts?

2. How much importance do you place on competition? I used to look for (nonfiction) topics with less than 15 competitors.

3. Do you prefer Odesk to Elance? I had some problems on Elance.

4. Have you found it better to put the email subscription link at the end of the book vs the beginning? I put mine at the beginning, but I think I will bring it up again at the end. I have two subscribers so far .

Thank you

 

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[Bruh]

Do backlinks play a large role in ranking on amazon to your knowledge?
Also, do having customer reviews with additional keywords in it help your rank? I hit spot #1 and spot #3 on two medium sized keywords, but am currently sitting on page 2 for my "big keyword"

I can't say. I've never bothered with or worried about backlinks as they relate to Amazon. Same with keywords. Maybe they help, maybe they don't - I honestly have no idea.

What has worked for me is making sure I release a quality product, that is well-edited and formatted, that tells a good story or gives good information. After that, it's up to the audience.

I know another person who is successful publishing through Kindle, but he focuses a lot on keywords. Maybe it's unnecessary. Who knows...

In my experience, changes in the 7 standard keywords have helped slightly. I haven't experimented with keywords in titles or reviews. But CATEGORIES are definitely important.

 

[Erock87]

I'm excited to say that I have two finished outsourced books (just got covers back today, they look phenomenal), and will publish tonight. I don't want to hi-jack G's thread (you've been amazingly helpful, and I think we all are grateful for your openness), so I may start my own thread in here documenting the outsource progress from Book 1.

Thanks G!

 

[Jordi]

Hi Giroud, greeat thread! there is so much useful info in here.

I have 2 questions for you:

1)Do you determine the work quality of your freelancers for yourself? Or you publish the ebook and then, based on sales and reviews, you decide if he/she is good or not?

2)How many hours per week average do you work with your system?

Thanks!

 

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[pcharles]

Well, the way I outsource varies greatly based on what I'm trying to get accomplished. I've got books in non-fiction and fiction, and spread across all kinds of genres, including cheesy romances, explicit erotica, young adult zombie series, foreign language instruction, and legal guides, just to name a few. So depending on which genre I'm aiming for, things can vary a lot.

For some, especially non-fiction, I'll draw up a pretty detailed outline, with chapter ideas at a minimum, and sometimes even more in-depth. With fiction, and especially if I'm using an outsourcer that I've already used and trust, I oftentimes just give them maybe 2 or 3 sentences of an overall plot and let them work their creative mind to come up with the rest.

I have about 3 or 4 freelancers that I've worked with on multiple projects that I trust to work like that. But I'm constantly looking for new freelancers, and posting new ads, running trials, etc. That's probably the most time-consuming part of the process, now that I think about it. I'm thinking of writing a guide on how to find great freelancers, so if I do, I'll post it here for free to share.

GiroudJD,
Great thread going here.
If you do create that guide, PLEASE do post a link here. I've been interested in writing a book for a while but have no idea where to get started (putting the carriage before the horse)

 

[pcharles]

I'm excited to say that I have two finished outsourced books (just got covers back today, they look phenomenal), and will publish tonight. I don't want to hi-jack G's thread (you've been amazingly helpful, and I think we all are grateful for your openness), so I may start my own thread in here documenting the outsource progress from Book 1.

Thanks G!

Erock87,

Post the link to the new thread here so we can see your progress. Good luck!

 

[jbruning]

Quick question, how exactly is copyright handled in your system? Do you ever register a copyright with the government?

 

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[Bodie]

Thanks for the info Giroud! I can't believe how simple your outlines are to your Freelancers

Erock87 - I would love to see your progress, please set up a thread!

 

[Rawr]

Cookbooks are great. I still do them every once in awhile, but it's more like the hobby portion of my business, since I love cooking so much. They are a bigger time investment, like you said though.

There are a million different ideas for pricing in erotica, specifically. Here's mine:

First, I only publish series. Stand-alones do well for some people, but to me, series are such a better use of time/money, and have a much bigger earning margin. For anything over 5,000 words, I price it at $2.99, initially. When the second book in the series releases, I set the first to $0.99 (and perma-free, eventually), but every other installment from 2 onwards is priced at 2.99. Then, when the series is finished, I bundle everything together and sell it as a collection for anywhere from $4.99 to $9.99, depending on how many installments there are.

The thing with erotica is, if people are "hungry" enough for it, they'll pay $2.99 no matter what. People are weird and they love their kinks, so I haven't had any problems with this pricing model yet!

How did you fare after dropping first title from 2.99 to perma free and making money off the other 2 titles? My book 1 is doing well, so I am hesitant to make it free.


What things do you absolutely consider a must to include in the NDA? Something about absolutely no claim for any reason, etc?

 

[pcharles]

Well, the way I outsource varies greatly based on what I'm trying to get accomplished. I've got books in non-fiction and fiction, and spread across all kinds of genres, including cheesy romances, explicit erotica, young adult zombie series, foreign language instruction, and legal guides, just to name a few. So depending on which genre I'm aiming for, things can vary a lot.

For some, especially non-fiction, I'll draw up a pretty detailed outline, with chapter ideas at a minimum, and sometimes even more in-depth. With fiction, and especially if I'm using an outsourcer that I've already used and trust, I oftentimes just give them maybe 2 or 3 sentences of an overall plot and let them work their creative mind to come up with the rest.

I have about 3 or 4 freelancers that I've worked with on multiple projects that I trust to work like that. But I'm constantly looking for new freelancers, and posting new ads, running trials, etc. That's probably the most time-consuming part of the process, now that I think about it. I'm thinking of writing a guide on how to find great freelancers, so if I do, I'll post it here for free to share.

GiroudJD,

Based on your experiences, how much does a good outsourcer cost you for a book?

 

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[pcharles]

I'm excited to say that I have two finished outsourced books (just got covers back today, they look phenomenal), and will publish tonight. I don't want to hi-jack G's thread (you've been amazingly helpful, and I think we all are grateful for your openness), so I may start my own thread in here documenting the outsource progress from Book 1.

Thanks G!

Erock87,

What site(s) did you use for the outsourcers. Thanks in advance & best of luck!

 

[Bruh]

GiroudJD,

Based on your experiences, how much does a good outsourcer cost you for a book?

He has already answered that. Twice. Read below...

Price totally depends on genre and word count. Every ad I post has a specific word count though. I wouldn't leave it up to the freelancer because then you get people who will just start padding the word count to make a few extra bucks and the quality of the work suffers. I make the ads as specific as possible, because you want writers who will understand and stick to your vision without too much back and forth.
When I first started, I didn't have much capital, so I would only offer like $25 for 5,000 words of erotica. It worked though, and I would make that money back in a few weeks or less. Now that I have income every month that I can reinvest, I pay more for writers I've worked with, but generally on oDesk or Freelancer, the ranges are from $0.03 to $0.20 per word. For good writers. You can still find new writers or writers from other countries who will gladly write 5,000 words for $10. Caveat emptor with work at those prices though.

Totally depends on niche/genre and if I've worked with the writer before. I start off lower, with a promise to pay more if work is satisfactory. I also have like a 99% positive feedback and people can see I've spent like $5k total on freelancers, so they usually know I'm going to pay and I'm good to work with. That helps a lot of people take a chance and write for me at the lower price first, and then if it works out, I'll pay more the second time around.