Support for Indie Authors discussion

HI

I hope this is the correct section.

Does anyone have tips to make sure I have set my price correctly? I have tried searching for a similar book to mine on Amazon and found related books but not the same. The books that I have found are mostly less pages than the book I have written. I have tried to keep the price down for a professional book in order to reach more readers. However, I was recently sent an eBook as a suggestion to read. The eBook is also written by an Occupational Therapist (OT), is less pages than my printed book and selling at 3 times the price of my book. This is making me revisit my pricing.

Can anyone give some assistance?

My book does contain professional information with appropriate referencing, however it is written in a manner that is easy to read for the non-OT

I'd appreciate some guidance before I do too much on the marketing side.

Thanks for your help

Shoshanah

Oh man...nonfiction is not something I'm familiar with marketing. And because you have a very specific group for your audience that changes things up a lot too. So I'll not make suggestions for fear of giving you the wrong advice.

Does AuthorMarketingClub have a tutorial on pricing nonfiction books? Or maybe Writer's Digest?

Best of luck to you!

Amie wrote: "Oh man...nonfiction is not something I'm familiar with marketing. And because you have a very specific group for your audience that changes things up a lot too. So I'll not make suggestions for fea..."

HI Amie

I am not familiar with the AuthorMarketingClub or the Writer's Digest> Are they groups on GoodReads?

What is your area of expertise? Thanks for responding. I appreciate it.

Shoshanah

So authormarketingclub.com is a place online that offers tremendous support to authors, especially new authors. Loads of helpful tutorials and widgets, etc. You can join for free and access quite a bit. I chose a trial version of their premium service as my publisher, BookBaby offered a deep discount on the service if, after the trial, I choose it. I've really enjoyed it so far. I'm 99% sure I'll stick with premium membership. (This is just a user talking, I'm not putting in plugs here!)

Writer's Digest you can also find all their services online. The entire time I was writing my debut novel I used these guys, from querying agents, to crafting chapters, contests, webinars, etc. Love these guys. Especially in querying they helped me avoid huge mistakes many authors make.

Finally, to answer your question I'm an author of historical women's fiction. :) My book just launched in late summer.

Amazon has a tool that will show you what similar books cost. This is on your product page. Beyond that, it's up to you. There is no rule to setting book price.

Christina wrote: "Amazon has a tool that will show you what similar books cost. This is on your product page. Beyond that, it's up to you. There is no rule to setting book price."

Thanks Christina

Can you tell me more about the tool on Amazon? I have 2 books up on Amazon but have not yet figured out everything one can do in the author central. I have only found 1 book that is close to mine. Not as many pages but the closest I can find.

Thanks for your help

Shoshanah

Amie wrote: "So authormarketingclub.com is a place online that offers tremendous support to authors, especially new authors. Loads of helpful tutorials and widgets, etc. You can join for free and access quite a..."

Thanks Amie

I'll make a note to look into those. Historical fiction is quite impressive. Must take quite a bit of research. Do you have a time period you prefer? How is your book doing?

Thanks for all the info. I very much appreciate it.

Shoshanah wrote: "HI

I hope this is the correct section.

Does anyone have tips to make sure I have set my price correctly? I have tried searching for a similar book to mine on Amazon and found related books but no..."

Hi Shoshanah! I am a SLP and recently struggled with this same question. My books are children's books, but they are ultimately parent participation books for speech development. They also include professional suggestions for speech development. Books that include professional suggestions and information are typically priced higher. Especially if they are used in an educational/university setting. So if you feel as if you would like more for providing your professional services, by all means set it higher. However, the higher the price, the less you may sell. I set my books at a lower price just because of personal preference. I didn't want anyone to not buy my books because they can't afford them. It is ultimately up to you. I wish you lots of luck!

Kindle will actually suggest a best price for your book,

Shoshanah wrote: "Can you tell me more about the tool on Amazon..."

On your book's set up page, under pricing and royalties, the very first line, in bold with a yellow button, says Kindle Pricing Support (beta). Click that.

Shoshanah wrote: "Christina wrote: "Amazon has a tool that will show you what similar books cost. This is on your product page. Beyond that, it's up to you. There is no rule to setting book price."

Thanks Christina..."

you might consider downloading the raw data (an XSLX file (Excel) that you could load into your spreadsheet app) from authorearnings.com and running some spreadsheet calculations for your sub-genre of non-fiction. you could come up with a calculation similar to the following:

The sub-genres are the ones that Amazon lists, for example:


this is the link to the raw data October 2016 million-title analysis:

https://docs.google.com/uc?id=0BxgCvn...

Note: It's 88MB; surprisingly small for a million titles. However, I haven not run the data, but I plan to in the near future. ^_'

I wasn't able to download it with my high security settings (even when I enabled cookies for google.com), so I had to use a browser with all cookies enabled.

88MB might not seem that big, but it is huge for a spreadsheet app. openoffice.org 4.1.1 on my macbook pro w/an i7 2.2ghz 4-core, 8MB machine has been trying to open it for about 5 minutes now, but Excel opened it right away!

Alex G wrote: "Shoshanah wrote: "Christina wrote: "Amazon has a tool that will show you what similar books cost. This is on your product page. Beyond that, it's up to you. There is no rule to setting book price."..."

Thanks. That looks complicated. Is it easy to use?

i just opened it in excel, but didn't look at it in any depth. i was planning on doing it over the winter break, but you've piqued my interest more, so maybe this month i'll give it a go for horror and let you know.

but don't be afraid to try it first. then you can be the trailblazer. ^_^

Christina wrote: "Shoshanah wrote: "Can you tell me more about the tool on Amazon..."

On your book's set up page, under pricing and royalties, the very first line, in bold with a yellow button, says Kindle Pricing ..."

My book is a print book via CreateSpace. Have not yet decided if I am turning it into Kindle. Will there still be the pricing support?

Alex G wrote: "i just opened it in excel, but didn't look at it in any depth. i was planning on doing it over the winter break, but you've piqued my interest more, so maybe this month i'll give it a go for horror..."

Is there a like button here or a way to do a smiley?
I have a few tasks to complete then can give it a try. But no promises.

Shoshanah wrote: My book is a print book via CreateSpace. Have not yet decided if I am turning it into Kindle. Will there still be the pricing support?"

Yes KDP has a beta pricing suggestion thing. You don't have to take their suggestion, but they will suggest one to you. Mine was erotic sci-fi 200-300 pages and the suggested price was £2.39 or something similar. It's based on the type of book and what they sell for in your area, which in the UK appears to mean they sell for peanuts.

I hear, but I am not on Kindle at this point.

Shoshanah wrote: "I hear, but I am not on Kindle at this point."

Ah, no, the pricing tool is for Amazon books. With Createspace, your only guide truly is what you will accept as a low end royalty. For me, I selected expanded distribution and priced my books to where I'd make roughly a $1 royalty on an ED purchase. This put my fiction titles of 50k to 100k words priced from $9.99 to $13.99 respectively.

Take a look at similar sized books in your genre, and aim around there.

The crazy thing about this whole debate is that I thought much like you all at first too! I set my prices at 0.99 and didn't do any better than I did at $2.99 then I read something here and decided to up my prices! Crazy I know, but I have had increased sales since I upped my prices to 3.99! Just food for thought!

Ember wrote: "Crazy I know, but I have had increased sales since I upped my prices to 3.99! Just food for thought! "

I did have one person tell me that unless a book was listed as at least £3.99 they passed it by because they were under the impression there must be something wrong with it if it was so cheap. A couple of people agreed with that. TBH sales are so slow I could up the price and no-one would notice anyway. So I may even consider doing that.

In fiction, normally the recommendation is $2.99 to $4.99 depending on length, which allows you to compete with the traditionally published books that are often priced at $8.99 to up to $14.99. Since you're writing nonfiction, from what I've seen general market nonfiction (nonfiction such as historical narrative novels and how-to guides) are about $4.99 at average book length, but specialized nonfiction is usually higher. You could go up to $9.99, if it's for a niche market that you know will pay for the book. Nonfiction is not my genre (I write YA, action adventure, and survival fiction), so I can't help you much, but from what I've seen, this is the pricing I'd consider if I were you.

Christina wrote: "Shoshanah wrote: "I hear, but I am not on Kindle at this point."

Ah, no, the pricing tool is for Amazon books. With Createspace, your only guide truly is what you will accept as a low end royalty...."

My book is not fiction, hence pricing is a bit more difficult.

C.L. wrote: "Take a look at similar sized books in your genre, and aim around there."

Thanks. I have only found one that is similar and yes it is more than the price I have set.

Similar to most people on this thread, I'm not too familiar with non-fiction pricing. However, a quick Goole of "how to price your non fiction book" does generate a lot of advice online.

The big factor is making sure you've priced it to cover the cost of production through Createspace. I wanted my first novel to be cheap and accessible, but I had to bump the price up or I would have gone into debt. As I recall, Createspace was good about red flagging any price lower than the cost of production.

I'd be curious to know a little bit more about why you're going print only. Kindle is obviously a whole other beast, but pricing is a bit easier because there's no production cost.

Shoshanah wrote: "HI

I hope this is the correct section.

Does anyone have tips to make sure I have set my price correctly? I have tried searching for a similar book to mine on Amazon and found related books but no..."

Hi there,

Non-fiction has its own set of rules because NF is solving/preventing problems (instead of entertaining, although a NF book might have elements of entertainment as well). As such, you can price according to the amount of knowledge you are sharing as well as the length. I price my shorter NF ebooks around $2.99, and my more meaty and longer books $6.99 or higher (depending upon release date, the number of pages, and ultimately, the benefits I provide to the reader. For print books, you'll take those same things into consideration (newer books priced higher than older ones, print length, and the amount of content. How much would someone pay to get the same information via a consultation, meeting, or private coaching session? I price my print books at the very lowest $9.99 all the way up to $19.99.

I hope this is helpful.