Guys: Kindle is the Ticket!

[NemoTheOne]

Thanks for that Carepolice!
One question I had - and you sort of answered it - I think - are keywords as important in FICTION genres as they are in non-fiction?

And not sure if you can offer insight into this trend or not - but it seems, with EROTICA, short stories sell well, and often times, as reported here - BETTER than longer stories - do you see the similar results with Fiction?
Thanks,nt1

*with 'non-erotic' fiction, that is.
On that note, also I am having some success with my first non-fiction book that I published. Seems like will be simply aiming to do the following:
Rinse and Repeat, with regard to what was done with this past book.

 

[Talyn]

Hi all,

I've just read that the KOLL payout of $1.33 for October, and $1.39 for november.

Not so good.

Are you planning to remove your books of this ?

 

[Carepolice]

Thanks for that Carepolice!
One question I had - and you sort of answered it - I think - are keywords as important in FICTION genres as they are in non-fiction?

And not sure if you can offer insight into this trend or not - but it seems, with EROTICA, short stories sell well, and often times, as reported here - BETTER than longer stories - do you see the similar results with Fiction?
Thanks,nt1

*with 'non-erotic' fiction, that is.
On that note, also I am having some success with my first non-fiction book that I published. Seems like will be simply aiming to do the following:
Rinse and Repeat, with regard to what was done with this past book.

Keywords are absolutely one of the most important factors in both fiction and non-fiction. They will literally make or break your book.

If you're getting a steady stream of sales then definitely keep doing what you're doing.

 

[Kaliber45]

Been publishing my first eBook on amazon.de (germany) last week. I was doing absolutely no promotion at all in a very competitive niche, so far 1-2 downloads a day. But proper keyword research is a must though.

This stuff really works! Good keyword research + quality book = guaranteed money.

 

[crano]

how many words are needet for a quality looking ebook ?

 

[Carepolice]

Been publishing my first eBook on amazon.de (germany) last week. I was doing absolutely no promotion at all in a very competitive niche, so far 1-2 downloads a day. But proper keyword research is a must though.

This stuff really works! Good keyword research + quality book = guaranteed money.

Awesome! You hit the nail on the head, it's far easier to rake in sales when you're smack dab in the middle of organic traffic. Now make sure you capitalize on your traffic by retaining those readers. A simple landing page (linked from your book) is a great way to pick up subscribers in a mailing list. I like to offer free downloads of my latest books as a way to entice subscriptions.

Cheers!

 

[jaychi11]

Kindle is ok for a few months but the sales gets less and less per day until it is almost the at the last page of search results. If you have a really good book then it might sustain even without promoting.

 

[Carepolice]

Kindle is ok for a few months but the sales gets less and less per day until it is almost the at the last page of search results. If you have a really good book then it might sustain even without promoting.

It's really not difficult to maintain sales for books, the key is being where the traffic is going. Pick the right keywords, publish a good book, and you'll do well.

Tip: you may adjust keywords later if you find some that are surging with great (relevant) traffic! I think we may release a feature that alerts you when your book has better keyword options available, I know I'd find it useful and I wonder if others would as well.

 

[mustang69]

I definitely agree that ebooks are the way to go, fiction or non fiction there will always be a demand for quality stuff.

 

[Carepolice]

I definitely agree that ebooks are the way to go, fiction or non fiction there will always be a demand for quality stuff.

This is very true. To anyone who is completely new to this space, it's a great time to dive in. You can literally write a 30 page book in one day, list it for $2.99 and see sales tomorrow. Not joking, my very first experiment was a self written title that I finished in just one day and sales came in the following day. Talk about instant gratification!

If you have questions, feel free to post them here or PM me directly. I'll always reply within 24 hours.

Cheers!

 

[reffik]

Hey Guys,

i found this thread a month ago, because my old method of making money doesn't work anymore.
i have some seed money to invest and looking for a way to get a stable monthly income.
this thread is full of great tips by people, who already have success with kindle, so i thought this could be my new source of income.

After reading this thread, i published my first ebook. it was 3 weeks ago. erotic niche - 5000 words, just for testing reasons.
the first day i got 4 sales and i was like "wow, that really works." i didn't even expect to get more than 10 sales per month.
But then it dropped
first week i've made 6 sales in total and 10 borrows. (one sale was for a fake review to be fair)
2nd week 5 sales 5 borrows
3rd week 0 sales 1 borrows

I was searching for workers, that are willing to write 10.000+ word erotic stories for 50€, but it's really hard to find someone for that low amount of money in my country (germany).
I finally found someone and got my book 3 days ago, 14k words. i released it yesterday and got only 1 sale and 1 borrow for now.
Maybe it's the cover, maybe it's the way that its written, maybe it's the time i released it, maybe it's because amazon completely messed up the price and i can't change it (3,06€ instead of 2,99€).
It just doesn't sell.

Yesterday i've read the new posts in this thread and i think pinger is completely right with his thoughts about erotica.
I think i will change to non-fiction now, but i found out that it's very hard for me to find a good niche.
Amazon has nothing like google, where you can just enter a keyword and see how many monthly searches it gets, are they?
I think it is very hard to find good niches, if the only source (the kindle shop itself) is made for buyers and not for sellers.
How can i find good niches? Do i just have to find out what sells good and look how many competitors are in this niche? how can i see if they are really successful? is there a way to find out how many sales they got approx.? I'm a bit confused how you find good niches and i have so many questions. It's just not like other methods, where you have 100s of tools and can analyse 100s of stats to find a good niche, which makes it hard for me, because i am not used to it.

I would be interrested in buying some of your books, that sells good, translate it and sell it in germany.
If someone is interrested, please PM me.

Thanks to all of you, who keep this thread up with your storys and usefull tips! you guys are awesome!

 

[dsavior]

I will jump into this thread and add my experience, as I feel I am one of the most successful on the board so far. I published my first book on Amazon a little more than a month ago. You can look back in the thread and see that I was struggling for a while.

Anyway, I'm now averaging 250 sales/borrows per day. I've published in Non-Fiction, Fiction, and Erotica.

I will debunk/share my opinion about some things in this thread that I agree and disagree with.

1. Longer works do better... much better... and perform consistently. My first book was close to 20k words and has only rose in the ranks over time, while tiny 5k books usually start out strong when they are a new release and then a week or two later they die down. They are far more inconsistent.

2. Outsourcing will not get you my kind of results any time soon. I tried outsourcing and blew about $1000 on writers. All of the writing was SHIT or average! Out of all the ebooks I got only 1 was something that I would want to read myself. And this is very important- Make sure that whatever you publish is something you would want to read. I can't stress this enough. That is the key to developing your pen name. Publishing shitty books will get you some sales, but people aren't going to favorite your pen name, download your other books, sign up for your mail list, etc. That's not saying you can't be profitable with outsourcing, and make a baby income... It's just you're probably not going to get the same quality books outsourced than if you were to create content yourself.

3. Investing $150 into a book and then getting 15 sales per day and saying "Omg Im going to make my money back in 10 days" is not a good way to calculate. Most books sales will die down over time unless it's very high quality book with a lot of interest.

4. One quality book is better than 10 low quality books. In fact, if you have one quality book you can market the books in book channels. This is where the real money starts rolling in. Want to get 100 sales per day? Produce a high quality novel and get it out to the book advertising channels to rock n' roll. They aren't going to accept a shitty 5k erotica tho. Lol

5. Bundling works, but don't overbundle. So far I have one bundle and I'm doing fine... Customers don't want to see someone who has only 10 books but 10 bundles. Try to have 1 bundle for every 5 or so books you make to avoid watering yourself down.


What did I do? Well, I quit outsourcing to random people who wanted me to give them $150 for shit, and started writing like crazy every day. It was taking me just as long to read/edit the trash books than to just write really good shit to begin with. I do have an advantage, since I am a pretty good writer and it's not hard for me to create high-quality content. Also, I quit "keyword research" ... This I found was wasting my time majorly. Instead I looked for areas that were lacking good content and created content to fill the gap, and just entered in keywords that were relevant to the book. Keyword research doesn't really work this way because there isn't anything to show you demand for something that isn't really there already. EVERY niche sales well for me, because I am putting in the time to make every book I publish the top book in that niche.

There is no real trick or secret sauce to Amazon. You put out a great book and the sales will come. You put out a shit book and shit sales will come. Larger books offer better long-term ROI if they are done well.

 

[Talyn]

I definitely agree that ebooks are the way to go, fiction or non fiction there will always be a demand for quality stuff.

And have a ton of comments like these within a few weeks :

"It should at least be a little more than 30 pages long, surely!

Sadly, nothing new, original, or remotely interesting written in here.

Thankfully I read a free copy, but feel I wasted my time reading it."

Or

"another poor overview book about the subject"

Stop saying that 30 pages (or 5k words) is enough, it's not.

 

[Pinger030]

@dsavior
Nice to see that it's working for you. 250 sales/borrows per day within a month in awesome.

If you enjoy to write your own high quality books it's fine. For long term success it makes sense but your output rate is limited. That's why I have different pen names with different quality classes. I have one pen name for high quality books (some are written by me), middle class books and lower class books.

I've tested 30+ different ghostwriters and found just 3 good writers. But I don't wasted my money because I got every investment back within 1 or 2 two month (even for really bad books). And yes, sales are dropping down with the time but even if one bad book makes 1 sale for $2.99 and maybe 1 borrow you'll make about $80, $90, $100 with such a book. So if you have 10 books + 2 bundles you can make $1000 easily. Sure, it's not the best way for long term success but there is no better way to find some really good writers (it's a trail and error game). And again: You'll get your money back even if it takes 3, 4, 5 month. So there is nothing to lose.

Maybe you know a head of a conventional business outside of the Internet. I bet he can tell you a lot of stories about stupid workers, wasted money and time and so on. He'll tell you the craziest stories. So it's not easy to find good workers but it's absolutely necessary because that's the sense of EVERY business (automation).

It makes no sense to sit on the money. Investing to automate all process is the key to grow. You can also write your own books but I also suggest you (and everyone) to search for good writers. If you know that such good quality books are working ...pay the price for the writing of good quality book!?

And the theory that 10 average books are worse than 1 high quality book is not right. Sure, you CAN make more money with a hq book but it can also be that no one is buying it. Then you lost a lot of time and effort and at the end you get nothing. With 10 lower quality books you can spread the risk (lower quality has nothing to do with shit).

You said that you've published your first book just one month ago and you had less success with it. I don't know how many books you've published within this month and where you get this strange experiences from... . When I started I was happy to publish 5 books within my first month and made about $1000 (and I worked hard day by day). So I dont know how it's possible to outsource for $1000, write your own books and make 250 borrows/sales per day, set up an email list and so one. And on the one hand you say that sales of lower quality books are dropping fast but on the other hand ...it's your first month ...you have no experience if your high quality books are dropping too in the next time. Again: You said that you've struggled the first time ...so you published you "high quality books" after this. Maybe one in your second week, one in your third week and one in your fourth week. If it is your first month your books are not live for a long enough time to say something like:

"I feel I am one of the most successful on the board so far."


Nothing against you but this sounds very very strange.

 

[Tenizen]

And have a ton of comments like these within a few weeks :

"It should at least be a little more than 30 pages long, surely!

Sadly, nothing new, original, or remotely interesting written in here.

Thankfully I read a free copy, but feel I wasted my time reading it."

Or

"another poor overview book about the subject"

Stop saying that 30 pages (or 5k words) is enough, it's not.

You are taking the opinion of the people who don't know what they want? The fact they are noticing that its 30 pages long, means that the quality or information they are getting isn't keeping them entertained. You need high quality/originality to counter the complacent pump&dump methods that thousands of others like yourself are doing.

Quality over quantity.

 

[onnelbro86]

Many people seem to speak what kind of books for sale on the Kindle.

 

[dsavior]

.

I published about 1 book every 2 days, but I was writing about 7k words per day on average. It wasn't easy... I didn't go outside much. My books are around 15k length on average, but a few times I published only every 3 days when I wanted to do some 20k books. I also took a few days to test 5k books. I ended my first month with with 13 books and one bundle. Editing outsourced stuff from bad writers was taking me just as long really, and was costing me money.

I only published one of the outsourced books because the others were embarrassing. The other thing to be careful about is publishing really bad stuff... It has been noted on other forums where Amazon has pulled down entire pen names of authors who have posted really bad non-fic stuff where the person doesn't know what they are talking about. It's unknown if those pens had their account banned, but all their books just vanished off of the market. I'm constantly monitoring my refund rate on sales to make sure they stay under 5%.

Don't get me wrong... my 5k books are making me money, but the ROI is not nearly as good. For example my 5k books might get 5 sales per day while my 20k book will get 20-25, and a higher ratio of sales rather than borrows... Nor have they suddenly fell off in the rankings. Also, I only have to do formatting 1 time and buy/make covers 1 time. Therefore all that cover time and money investment is saved as well. It just doesn't make financial sense for me to do 5k books.

My first book did not do well, because I didn't know what I was doing. I tried to keyword research, and look at books that were in the "Best sellers"... tried to publish something like the best sellers. I was pulling my hair out wonder what I was doing wrong.

Sorry if you thought that "I feel I am one of the most successful so far" is strange. I just read some posts from people who were struggling to get a few sales per day while I am already going to be pulling close to 10k this month as a newbie warranted the statement.

Anyway, just wanted to offer my opinion... Feel free to disregard my strategy, as I am fully willing to admit that I'm a newb and have took the road less followed. My strategy is vastly different than everyone else, but I will continue to follow it since my sales are only growing every day. Yesterday I almost hit 300 sales/borrows. I'm getting 5-10 mail list signups each day. My primary pen name is inking closer and closer to hitting the Kindle All Star list. Things are going good for me right now.

I'll report back after month 2 to advise if my sales have tanked. My goal is 350 per day by the End of Feb, so I'm not counting on it.

And a very gracious thank-you to the person who started this thread. I would've never started writing again if I hadn't stumbled across it.

 

[Talyn]

I published about 1 book every 2 days, but I was writing about 7k words per day on average. It wasn't easy... I didn't go outside much. My books are around 15k length on average, but a few times I published only every 3 days when I wanted to do some 20k books. I also took a few days to test 5k books. I ended my first month with with 13 books and one bundle. Editing outsourced stuff from bad writers was taking me just as long really, and was costing me money.
rate on sales to make sure they stay under 5%.

Yes I'm struggled, Yes I failed. I published 45 books (5k to 45k words) on kindle since the last 2 months, I used zon sidekick. One week-end I had 17 sales per day, but a normal day is 2 to 4 sales and 2 to 4 borrows.

I'm impressed by you and pinger, you seems to have a massive succes, great for you !

Perhaps some day I'll understand why I'm struggled and why I only made 500$ in 2 months.

 

[ForgottenProdigy]

Yes I'm struggled, Yes I failed. I published 45 books (5k to 45k words) on kindle since the last 2 months, I used zon sidekick. One week-end I had 17 sales per day, but a normal day is 2 to 4 sales and 2 to 4 borrows.

I'm impressed by you and pinger, you seems to have a massive succes, great for you !

Perhaps some day I'll understand why I'm struggled and why I only made 500$ in 2 months.

But how many of those books would you say are really good quality? Unless you've outsourced a lot of work I can't imagine being able to produce 45 high quality books in only 2 months by yourself.

 

[Talyn]

But how many of those books would you say are really good quality? Unless you've outsourced a lot of work I can't imagine being able to produce 45 high quality books in only 2 months by yourself.

I can write a 5-7k words cookbook, formated with cover, within a day.
I published about 20 cookbooks (bundle included) with an average of 40 recipes per book.

I published 10 books (and 2 bundles) in finance and business, with an average of 10k words, proofread, with good content, half outsourced, half wrote by myself

7 books in french, which are just a translation of my cookbooks (5) and 2 geniune fiction fantasy book (one 20k words, one 45k words)

The rest are just crappy books at 99c in fiction/erotica, fully outsourced.

I compared some "high" ranked books with mine, and these books are just bullshit.