Want to know what most people don’t know about indie authors?

We don’t get books free.

We have to order them from the publisher, though sometimes we can buy wholesale. Those are the ones we sell  when we speak or teach a workshop. From that margin the author must pay state sales taxes and file those reports once a month or once a year depending on your status. The author has to pay their own travel to and from a signing event, and provide table covers and free handouts at craft shows.

When novelist Judith Wall finally sold her first novel and was speaking to a women’s club in a neighboring city, the hostess introduced her by saying proudly they had checked out one copy of her book from the library and passed it around so each person could read the book before Judith came.  That meant there would be absolutely no sales from her time and effort to come speak to the group.  Judith said she didn’t know whether to cry or to laugh!

If selling your books on consignment, it is best to only place them in stores where you live and shop or in towns nearby. If you have to spend a full day or more driving to different stores to check your inventory and sales you’ll lose money – not just for gas – but also the time that would be better spent writing your next book.

Build a mailing list.

On your “About the Author” page, encourage readers to sign up for your mailing list. If they sign up, you’ll be able to contact them to promote your backlist titles, new releases, giveaways, price promotions, etc.

Target your audience.

Write down what you know about the core group of readers you’re targeting and think about them when you’re creating an ad, designing a cover, writing a tweet. Narrow down a list of five to seven keywords your target audience would typically search for, then be sure to include these words into the description headline, description copy, and keyword details in your author website and every time you talk about your book.

Free sample chapters can help sales.

Don’t be afraid of giving away something for free! On Amazon, users can download the first ten percent of a book for free or read it on-site via the “Look Inside” feature. You might score a sale if the reader wants to continue so be sure every sample ends on a cliffhanger.

Do the math.

When setting the price for your book you must factor in printing cost 40%, the distributors get 20% and the bookstore commission 30%. That leaves the smallest cut  for author royalty. Oh and if you have an agent they get 15 to 20%.  Sometimes an author doesn’t see their royalty check for a couple months, or maybe the royalty has to reach a certain amount before they pay at all.  Indie authors really don’t make that much on a book unless it becomes a best-seller and that doesn’t usually happen with a small press.

As indie Authors, we publish the books because it is our dream. We want to get the information out there. Our writing has to be a labor of love.  Choose the marketing that can be the most effective at the lowest cost.