Indie Authors Monthly Magazine For Authors and Readers discussion

Hi, any advice on how to price my first book?

In my opinion; don't price it too low. Also unless you write another book or a series I don't believe in giving my book away. I have an old saying "elephants work for peanuts, I DON'T".

We priced out first few books very low- 99 cents- It was my son's books- (paranormal romance). In the beginning he sold lots of books. When it slowed down, it kept him in the lower ranks of his genre so it guaranteed some sales per month. A lot of people feels it cheapens a book to keep it so low. Recently, I raised all his books to 2.99. He has stayed under 400 in rank. While it's not in the top 100,, it's not way out there either. Price it where you are comfortable and watch your rank. If you see the rank is climbing, lower the price until you get some sales, then raise it up again.

I have read quite a few articles that non-fiction is typically priced a little higher than fiction.

I have one non-fiction travel book out and plan for more. I have priced it relatively low, with a 10% free preview available and a couple sneak peeks downloadable from my website. These all are in attempt to reduce the reader's risk of buying something they don't like.

eBook: US$3.20
Paperback: US$15.00

Good advice Nancy. My book is pretty close: ebook US $3.99 and paperback at $14.99 and using Amazon ads it works pretty well for me. All my proceeds go to charity but if I had to make a living off of 1 book, that would be very difficult.

Good to hear William, thanks!

Its early days for me, but I feel comfortable with this approach and figure as my paperback edition and more books roll out, it will generate a slow but powerful build.

Written Word Media (the folks who run Freebooksy and Bargain Booksy) just published this excellent analysis on optimal ebook pricing. It is not just about prices during promotion but also regular book prices for best results.

Written Word Media: How to Price Your book for Maximum Results During a Promotion

Great article- I love the summary- I copied it here-

If you are looking to sell a lot of books in order to build an audience, price your book at $0.99.
If you are looking to make money off of a promotion (and your books are highly professional with good reviews) price your book at $3.99. But note that readers are less likely to take a chance on a book with no reviews or with a poor cover at the $3.99 price point.
Readers have different pricing expectations for different genres. Find what works for your audience.
The industry is changing rapidly and things that worked last year may not be working this year. So never stop testing.

Great article. Thanks for sharing.
Yes, there's such a thing as placing value on your books too.
I have done free deals before, and got many downloads from them, but many go unread.

For my new release I have my first duology:
Book 1 - 99c (but free on KU)
Book 2 - $2.99

I'm hoping to do a Cuntdown deal for halloween (as it's about vampires & witches). After that I'll be pulling it from KU, I think. Not sure yet.

It is a very difficult thing to get right. I'm 4 years in, and still learning.

Thanks you guys. I'm struggling to get more more money while trying to share the world my stories. No matter how I try to spread the word about my book, I don't get much in my pocket. So I guess increasing the price a bit can help a lot :)

Hi thanks for all these comments! I definitely like the idea of increasing the price with a series, with a cheap book 1 which hooks people in....but right now only book 1 of my series is out!

I am going to try $2.99 for now because of the royalties, but then get involved in as many sales offers as possible.

See how it goes though I may have to price it lower!

Book 1 99p a few decent reviews mainly from people here
Book 2 £1.99

Low sales on both (one book a month if I'm lucky.) It's just the way it is.

I'm rubbish at promoting. My hands are tied money wise at the moment. (Plus erotica-difficult but not impossible to find places to promote) I paid for covers. I've bought the only paperback copies of my books apart from a school friend who bought the first book in paperback form. I gave away 700 copies of the first ebook recently for free and am awaiting the reviews and sales of the second (I'm grinning, I'm not expecting anything lol)

Best of luck to you too.

I'm in a 'yeah whatever' mood at the moment which means that if I get reviews from the giveaway I do, and if I don't, oh well. At least I tried, but nothing in life is guaranteed.

Amy wrote: "I'm rubbish at promoting. My hands are tied money wise at the moment. (Plus erotica-difficult but not impossible to find places to promote) I paid for covers. I've bought the only paperback copies ..."
You are your own best promoter- You are so funny- Just get on as many blogs as you can and let people hear your "voice," they will buy your book. I did!!

I do them constantly. I will write for anyone who requests it. Ask to be on blogs. Check out older threads- we list a lot of good blogs, like the Long and Short Review. Google your genre and find blogs that feature it.

Join Bookworks and see if they'll do an article about you. Indie Author's Monthly- our magazine is always looking for articles- look at it and contact RL-

Check out Shelf Media, too.

Denise wrote: "Amy wrote: "Best of luck to you too.

I'm in a 'yeah whatever' mood at the moment which means that if I get reviews from the giveaway I do, and if I don't, oh well. At least I tried, but nothing i..."

I truly believe you constantly have to promote. It's exhausting. I am in emotional, promotional hell right now, promoting my son's book. Even though he was published by a small press- we have to do the bulk of the promotion. I have booked 10- 20 blog tours- some costing as little as 10 dollars, the most 500. We found inexpensive giveaways- One of them is custom pencils- which cost me 13 cents each- a bargain. We have done gift card promotions like- 5 dollar starbucks card for keeping the reader up all night with his book. You only have to giveaway one- to get people talking about it and your book- sharing the information.My younger son came up with a great promotion- he printed a limited number of the iconic cover of my older son's book. We filmed him signing them and we are giving away a limited number of them. We did a rafflecopter for them, and I am thrilled with the outcome. He's getting a lot more interest than I am with my Going Back to School backpack- lol

I don't mind this part. I like promotion. It's interactive and you actually get to see people respond to your writing. Many get excited when they interact with the author online. I get a kick out of taking something and building a recognizable brand- knowing we hit a spot where people have heard of it.
I wrote to another children's author about something and he responded "Oh, you're THAT Carole P. Roman." Let me tell you I floated on that one for a loooong time.

Carole maybe you can hire out your awesome promoting skills to more of us - you sound amazing at it!

I am working on it a bit, and I have hired my niece to do parts that I just can't face...so I guess we just have to see....it is so hard to not get my hopes up to crazily high while I release my first book though.

I usually "lend" my promoting skills to people here by telling them what worked for me. Take a look at Julie's and my book- Navigating Indieworld- This is not a bid for you to buy it, you can PM me and I'll send it to you. We outlined a whole bunch of tips in there. We list places to review your book- people we've had success with.

Carole wrote: "I usually "lend" my promoting skills to people here by telling them what worked for me. Take a look at Julie's and my book- Navigating Indieworld- This is not a bid for you to buy it, you can PM me..."

Wow well how lovely! I will PM you now :)

Carole wrote: "I usually "lend" my promoting skills to people here by telling them what worked for me. Take a look at Julie's and my book- Navigating Indieworld- This is not a bid for you to buy it, you can PM me..."

I can't see how to pm you on your page!
I am new to Goodreads...haha you can probably tell.

[email protected]

Carole wrote: "I usually "lend" my promoting skills to people here by telling them what worked for me. Take a look at Julie's and my book- Navigating Indieworld- This is not a bid for you to buy it, you can PM me..."

it's a great book..

Thanks, Judy!!

Mark wrote: "Carole wrote: "I usually "lend" my promoting skills to people here by telling them what worked for me. Take a look at Julie's and my book- Navigating Indieworld- This is not a bid for you to buy it..."

Haha thanks Carole!

I would keep it low. I ran mine as free for awhile, but it mostly hovers at $2.99. I do run promotions for $0.99 as well. I know I will not but ebooks for very much. I would say with print books that $10.00 isn't unreasonable. Most publishers run higher than that.

Alyson wrote: "I would keep it low. I ran mine as free for awhile, but it mostly hovers at $2.99. I do run promotions for $0.99 as well. I know I will not but ebooks for very much. I would say with print books th..."

Thanks, that is pretty much exactly what I am trying now. $2.99 with $0.99 promotions...so let's see what happens!