$.99 eBook becomes biggest earner

[Catlady]

Just about the only self-published books I would buy are niche nonfiction books--like an episode guide to a TV show, or a bibiliography on some odd topic I'm interested in. That sort of thing would have such a small audience that it wouldn't be feasible for publication otherwise, and even a small sample allows me to judge the quality.

I'm considering one now, in fact, and will probably buy it, despite a steep price ($10). The main drawback is that the formatting looks a little wonky. But for fiction? There's just no incentive to even bother to read a sample.

[Elfwreck]

Originally Posted by drachasor

I would imagine if a friend of yours highly recommended a work that was self-published, then you'd be far more likely to buy it. I think such works initially sell via marketing and people taking a chance, then, if they are good, word of mouth.

I don't even need "highly recommended;" just "I liked this and I think you will too" is enough to get me to check it out; if the description sounds interesting and the price is in my range, I'll pick it up. There's so many self-published works that any rec at all is a big waving flag.

There's a problem with word of mouth recs for ebooks: because there's no legit secondary market, there's no way to say, "try a secondhand copy first" or "I'll loan you mine; if you like it, you buy one for yourself." Or buy the author's other works. With print books, people have always been able to say, "this is incredible! Oh, you can't afford it right now? Take mine; get it back to me in a week." Even if that's not time for someone to finish it, it's long enough for them to decide if they like it.

With ebooks, it's "this is great! Go pay $5 and find out for yourself!" Which is not awful (that's how we recommend restaurants), but not how most of us grew up suggesting books to new readers. The social dynamic's different, and indie ebooks are suffering because of it.

[Giggleton]

Originally Posted by Catlady

But for fiction? There's just no incentive to even bother to read a sample.

To each their own I suppose. I download all the samples I can. But I guess I'm a searcher.

[covingtoncat73]

Originally Posted by Elfwreck

I don't even need "highly recommended;" just "I liked this and I think you will too" is enough to get me to check it out; if the description sounds interesting and the price is in my range, I'll pick it up. There's so many self-published works that any rec at all is a big waving flag.

There's a problem with word of mouth recs for ebooks: because there's no legit secondary market, there's no way to say, "try a secondhand copy first" or "I'll loan you mine; if you like it, you buy one for yourself." Or buy the author's other works. With print books, people have always been able to say, "this is incredible! Oh, you can't afford it right now? Take mine; get it back to me in a week." Even if that's not time for someone to finish it, it's long enough for them to decide if they like it.

With ebooks, it's "this is great! Go pay $5 and find out for yourself!" Which is not awful (that's how we recommend restaurants), but not how most of us grew up suggesting books to new readers. The social dynamic's different, and indie ebooks are suffering because of it.

Well, I loaned a neighbor my copy of Neil Gaiman's The Graveyard Book over a year ago. I think I need to get on her case about it. It was/is a gorgeous hardcover.

As to trying out an indie eBook, I tried this book, Goblin Market, because it was only .99 and was inspired by the Christina Rosetti poem and the movie Labyrinth, both of which I love. I've read 76 pages in 2 days. It would have been more because I am really enjoying it but I've been really busy with family over the last couple of days and work. Anyway, it is certainly my flavor of mind candy and the first book I'm reading on my new Kobo.

[snipenekkid]

Originally Posted by murraypaul

According to this, Apple has paid out over $1Bn to app store developers, which would equate to a take of ~$430M for Apple. By comparison, in just Q4 of last year, they made $4.32Bn profit on $20.34Bn revenue. Of that $20Bn, ~$1Bn was iTunes store revenue.

This time last year, Apple were describing both the iTunes and app stores as at bit over break-even.

Apple views selling content primarily as a way of increasing hardware sales, the opposite of Amazon, who view selling Kindles primarily as way of increasing eBooks sales. (Hence both Apple and Amazon benefit by having a Kindle app on the iPad.)

neat info. there is little doubt the App Store is a winning investment that is certainly not a black hole in terms of revenue, or even profit.

I did have do a fast guesstimate on the total payouts vs a best guess at the number of paid apps. Anyway, there are in excess of 400,000 iOS apps in the store (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/App_Sto...pplications)so I just pared that down to a nice round 250,000 paid apps. This works out to a mere $4000/developer-app. Given that the payouts are skewed by more popular apps such as Angry Birds and a few other super $0.99 apps that makes the pot a LOT smaller for the rest of the iOS developer world.

To be honest I was surprised at such a low estimated average payout per app.

[Giggleton]

Originally Posted by snipenekkid

To be honest I was surprised at such a low estimated average payout per app.

The goal is for the distributor to break even, while the creators share the wealth. Any other model is unsustainable.

[GA Russell]

Originally Posted by Catlady

Just about the only self-published books I would buy are niche nonfiction books--like an episode guide to a TV show, or a bibiliography on some odd topic I'm interested in. That sort of thing would have such a small audience that it wouldn't be feasible for publication otherwise, and even a small sample allows me to judge the quality.

That's been my experience. I've bought two non-fiction softbacks from lulu, and although they weren't great, I'm glad to have them both.

[twowheels]

Originally Posted by altworld

Word count is not a value to how good a story is.

"I am sorry to have wearied you with so long a letter but I did not have time to write you a short one" -- Blaise Pascal

[snipenekkid]

Originally Posted by Giggleton

The goal is for the distributor to break even, while the creators share the wealth. Any other model is unsustainable.

Que? I genuinely don't understand your point as it seems to have missed mine completely.

[murraypaul]

Originally Posted by snipenekkid

neat info. there is little doubt the App Store is a winning investment that is certainly not a black hole in terms of revenue, or even profit.

I don't think Apple would put up with something running at a loss for any significant amount of time.

I did have do a fast guesstimate on the total payouts vs a best guess at the number of paid apps. Anyway, there are in excess of 400,000 iOS apps in the store (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/App_Sto...pplications)so I just pared that down to a nice round 250,000 paid apps. This works out to a mere $4000/developer-app. Given that the payouts are skewed by more popular apps such as Angry Birds and a few other super $0.99 apps that makes the pot a LOT smaller for the rest of the iOS developer world.

To be honest I was surprised at such a low estimated average payout per app.

A more recent estimate of app store revenue is $1.78Bn. But yes, I would imagine that a relatively small number of apps are taking the bulk of that. Worth remembering though that many developers may be making more from in-app advertising revenue than from app sales. Even free apps may actually be making them a lot of money. They can also make a significant amount of money from in-app purchases.
I'm not sure this is a huge surprise though, I think you will always get a long tail in these sorts of situations.

[murraypaul]

Originally Posted by Kali Yuga

Actually, I suspect that's only a short-term decision. Originally the plan was for both the hardware and content to separately earn profits. However, the price war over the devices may have temporarily suppressed their ability to profit off the 7" devices. I'm going to guess the DX is still earning a small profit, but could also be out there just to make the price of the 7" seem like a deal.

I agree that Amazon would be looking to earn some profit off the actual hardware, my point was that they would be more concerned with how the hardware can help leverage their content profits. With the increase in the number of tablets and other devices out there, Kindles will over time become a smaller proportion of the market, while they would look for Kindle eBooks to grow to all those new platforms.

[Giggleton]

Originally Posted by snipenekkid

Que? I genuinely don't understand your point as it seems to have missed mine completely.

What was your point? That the app store is massively skewed towards distributing the wealth to the top 1% of the top apps? Even though it is the presence of all the apps that draws everyone to the store in the first place?

I'm a fan of a system that shares all revenue between all apps, it just makes sense to me. That way everyone can become an earner, There might be less apps or books available on the marketplace, but the marketplace would be nicely filtered, which is a requirement for some.

[queentess]

Originally Posted by Elfwreck

But once they've done that, they don't charge more for the exquisitely well-written, lingers-in-your-mind-for-decades books. The ones that will change the lives of readers and the ones that will be read once, pondered for fifteen minutes, and then forgotten, are side-by-side on the shelf, with the same sticker price if they came off the press at the same time.

The publisher doesn't know how each individual person is going to react to the book. I may find some book incredibly moving, but you may see the same book as dreadfully boring.

Originally Posted by Giggleton

While it might seem a bit restrictive to limit your content provider's pricing options, mandating that all authors sell their books for 1 dollar might be an interesting option for booksellers to consider.

How is this different from agency pricing??

Originally Posted by Steven Lyle Jordan

After reading the article yesterday, I've been considering whether or not this experiment might work for me. I'm currently debating either:

• Picking a book (or maybe even the three Kestral books) and dropping the price to .99;
• dropping my entire catalog to .99; or
• pricing my next new and re-released book(s) at .99.

I would suggest lowering the price on your older books (and especially any books first in a series) to bring people in, then they'll be more willing to pay more money for your new work because they'll have some faith in the content. I discovered Robin Hobb's Farseer series from a freebie almost 2 years ago, then I promptly bought the rest of the series and have read many of her other series as well.

Originally Posted by Giggleton

Amazon mandated a 9.99 price for all books and the idea was rejected, so I suppose a 0.99 mandated price would be rejected as well.

Amazon didn't mandate anything. It offered items on the NYT Best Seller list at a discounted amount of $9.99 until agency pricing took over.

[drachasor]

Originally Posted by Elfwreck

I don't even need "highly recommended;" just "I liked this and I think you will too" is enough to get me to check it out; if the description sounds interesting and the price is in my range, I'll pick it up. There's so many self-published works that any rec at all is a big waving flag.

There's a problem with word of mouth recs for ebooks: because there's no legit secondary market, there's no way to say, "try a secondhand copy first" or "I'll loan you mine; if you like it, you buy one for yourself." Or buy the author's other works. With print books, people have always been able to say, "this is incredible! Oh, you can't afford it right now? Take mine; get it back to me in a week." Even if that's not time for someone to finish it, it's long enough for them to decide if they like it.

With ebooks, it's "this is great! Go pay $5 and find out for yourself!" Which is not awful (that's how we recommend restaurants), but not how most of us grew up suggesting books to new readers. The social dynamic's different, and indie ebooks are suffering because of it.

Well, that's one argument in favor of why setting a self-published price low ar 3 bucks or less is a good idea. Makes it a lot easier to pick up.

Btw, if you go via Barnes and Noble's Nook, you CAN lend an ebook to a friend (and I believe you maintain access to it during this time, but I am not sure). They get to look it over for a week.

[drachasor]

Originally Posted by Catlady

Just about the only self-published books I would buy are niche nonfiction books--like an episode guide to a TV show, or a bibiliography on some odd topic I'm interested in. That sort of thing would have such a small audience that it wouldn't be feasible for publication otherwise, and even a small sample allows me to judge the quality.

I'm considering one now, in fact, and will probably buy it, despite a steep price ($10). The main drawback is that the formatting looks a little wonky. But for fiction? There's just no incentive to even bother to read a sample.

Even if a friend recommended a work of fiction to you?

I'd think wasting money on an episode guide would be a lot worse. What show doesn't have some website run by fans that does that for free? No reason to buy an ebook for that.