brosy
Registered Member
- May 21, 2010
- 67
- 13
I have always known that createspace gives more money than kindle. This is truly impressive.
Guys: Kindle is the Ticket!
- Thread starter GobBluthJD
- Start date
Morgadeshou
Newbie
- Apr 21, 2014
- 23
- 5
Jesus Christ pinger haha, I thought you were only pulling in 10k, that's amazing. Is it all relatively new from your new books you've been working on? or is it from years of buildup. Impressive either way wow. Createspace is pretty average for me
theconscience
Regular Member
- May 16, 2014
- 311
- 30
Well I am sick to death of Kindle pubblishing .
I published a Fifty Shades unique little mini spinoff single book and not 1 sale. It even had similar title words.
Then I published a mini kids sci fi series real mini set of ten books and the most fantastic artworks and even Createspace paperbacks and did Youtube comments on different genres and not 2 sale in a whole year. Even tried getting Publishers with all rejections.
Also Ghostwriter wrote them and I had professional editing and formatting done.
Also I am sick to death of Libraries asking for free copies
Not only that but I have some big bookseller asshole on Ebay from Australia listing 2 of the books when I unpublished them and complained to Ebay who gave som whimsy excuse that it was OK.
Pinger must have all the luck in the world, or have a fab marketing team, or use Amazon ads, or blow smoke out of ass
I published a Fifty Shades unique little mini spinoff single book and not 1 sale. It even had similar title words.
Then I published a mini kids sci fi series real mini set of ten books and the most fantastic artworks and even Createspace paperbacks and did Youtube comments on different genres and not 2 sale in a whole year. Even tried getting Publishers with all rejections.
Also Ghostwriter wrote them and I had professional editing and formatting done.
Also I am sick to death of Libraries asking for free copies
Not only that but I have some big bookseller asshole on Ebay from Australia listing 2 of the books when I unpublished them and complained to Ebay who gave som whimsy excuse that it was OK.
Pinger must have all the luck in the world, or have a fab marketing team, or use Amazon ads, or blow smoke out of ass
Last edited:
Pinger030
Regular Member
- Oct 15, 2013
- 304
- 379
Success isn't based on luck! I'm writing into this thread since I've started with CS/Kindle publishing in May 2014. I've documented when I reached my first 1,5k/month (it was in my second month), when I hit 5k (6 months later), when I made my first 100k+/year (2015) and so on. Additionally I've founded my own publishing company in 2016, registered different brands, had several TOP 500 books but also one TOP 100 book in France. I'm working 24/7 without weekends, if I'm not working actively I'm learning, I can count on two hands when I left my home during the last 6 months (and this is no joke). So no, it's definitely not based on luck. And it's also not based on fake reviews, generic books written by cheap freelancers or a marketing team. I don't use any special software or hidden keywords etc. I'm just doing what's necessary to do.
Last edited:
bambi
Junior Member
- Aug 9, 2008
- 189
- 68
Pinger030,
Congrats on the awesome success! If you don't mind me asking, are you still focusing on just nonfiction? How many pages do your books average?
Thanks!
Last edited:
MatteoMatt
Regular Member
- Sep 28, 2016
- 389
- 293
I feel your hustle here man but I do leave alot more often, I feel myself going crazy at my computer lol not because I dont like working, but because i cant stop. Im on Book 3, month 2, 6 sales, lots of learning and creating has happened and will keep happening. My goal is to have about 10 to 15 books within 1 year, because I have so many book ideas i want to write.
Also I have a question about createspace. Based on my look at their site is it affiliated with Amazon? Is it real physical books as opposed to e-books?
Pinger030
Regular Member
- Oct 15, 2013
- 304
- 379
@bambi 100 pages per book at least (non fiction) because everything less doesn't feel like a book for me. With small booklets, you risk disappointing your customers.
@ThopHayt This can be said about any business. If something is completely new, there's less competition = less quality. I know the time when people were able to make great money with cheap "How to books" with 10 pages. But with the time the competition has grown = high quality because everyone is trying to be the best. So if you don't have success, it just means that you're not meet the quality standard which is necessary to be successful. But what's the opportunity? Jumping on the next hot business where it's more easy to make money? To realize that it's no more easy after two years? But how would you become a master in any business to be able to make the big sums if you break it as soon as it becomes difficult? For me the books are not "another method" to make money and I can guarantee you that it's getting harder and harder with the time. For example: I bet that animated pictures for Kindle books are coming during the next years and ordinary eBooks won't sell so good anymore. Is it reason to give up because it's getting harder? No, I'll learn how to create such animated pictures even if it takes 3 months. I do whatever is necessary to do to be successful. I think that's the big difference: Most people would say: "If I have to learn how to create animated pictures I could also publish 10 books within this time to increase my income by $2.000/month." But I would leave this money on the table because I'm focusing on the highest quality whatever it takes. Such decision are the "extra mile" successful people are talking about.
@MatteoMatt You're on the right track. In the beginning it's more important to learn instead of publishing books. I know that this sounds stupid because you have the pressure to make money and it's only possible when you publish new books. But on the other hand you need a "quality standard" to earn anything. My advice: Figure out what points (on which you have an influence on) are important to sell a book on Amazon. There a just a had full of points eg. price, description, cover, keywords, look inside feature, author page and so on. Write down every point! Next you should learn about these points and use your knowledge for the next book. If you're still unhappy with the results you should reflect yourself and your book: "Hmmm, why is my book not selling? I've learned everything about keyword optimization during the last weeks. I watched tons videos about this point, read articels, talked to other people and so on. So I'm sure that my keywords are not the problem. Hmmm, but do I really know everything about how to write a description? I heard about emotional questions at the beginning. So if I'm not sure I should learn everything about it. If I do it just like I guess my results are based on luck but I know that success is based on the right decisions. So I should make sure that I'm doing it right." Next book you implement your new knowlage. If you're not happy with your results you can say: "I'm 100% sure that my keywords and my descriptions are perfect. Where could be the problem? Hmmm, my book prices are X.99. But why? Maybe X.98, X.95, X.90 are better prices. I don't know so I should learn everything about prices." And so on.
So you have to be honest to yourself and don't rely on what you think. Focus on what's working and necessary to be successful. If you don't know it you have to learn it because otherwise your results will be based on luck.
It's an exclusion procedure and with time you'll do the things right. Then your success is just a logical consequence. Now think about you're three years in this game like me and have mastered all the basics perfectly. You're still learning and implementing other details which are pushing you far away from the earnings of an ordinary publisher. For example: Last month I've paid for the synchronization of my book trailers. I've paid a professional speaker $10 for 10 seconds. But such details only paying off if you master the basics. So it's nothing for a beginner. A beginner should focus on the basics to be able to make eg. $100/book, increase his quality to make $200/book and so on. The time will come when you're focusing on $1000+/book. And if you are able to provide such a high quality you could automate some processes to scale it up to publish 5 of these books/month instead of one. But a beginner (let's say he's able to make $50/book per month in average) can't scale it up and think that he'll make 10k/month with his next books. Your results are based on your quality and your quality is coupled to your knowledge. So if you don't know something - Learn it!
About CreateSpace: It's a sub company of Amazon. They're producing paperbacks on demand. No costs but it's a little bit harder to master in comparison to eBooks (eg. the formatting is more complex). On the other hand you can sell paperbacks for up to $20-25/unit IF you're able to provide the quality to sell in this price range.
EDIT:
Just another example. Let's say you want to produce a chair. You rip off the laminate in your living room, produce 4 feets with a diameter of 1 inch and give it a pink color bevause you like pink and you GUESS other people will also like it. And then you expecting sales? But the minimum quality standard in this industry to make any sales is: oak wood, feets with a diameter of 2 inches and white color. But you're forcing to sell this pink chair. You focus on producing hundreds of these chairs because I've heard that this is a numbers game. But you fail. After one year you find out ....white is the color that customers love. Now you produce tons of white chairs and fail again because your still use your old laminate which is not the industry standard. You'll lose another year and at the end you'll give up and say: "Chairs are not selling. You can't expect to sell chairs in 2016."
No, you were just not able to reach the quality standard. You can't focus on selling tons of chairs and expect to get rich if you don't have the knowledge how to produce proper chairs.
Nothing else for other businesses: You can't create a perfect book and thought: "The cover doesn't matter. I'll create it with MS pain. I think my keywords are okay" and expect any sales. It's nearly impossible or just luck if you get a sale. It doesn't matter what you think. You have to do what's necessary to do to be successful. And a bad cover, random keywords, generic title and so on doesn't meet the quality standard on Amazon to make any sales. So if your books are not selling, it's not because this business is dead (customers are already there, more than before) but because you missed sonething that's necessary. So there's no reason to keep on and force sales because you'll just repeat your bad results. Be honest to yourself, figure out what's the problem, learn about it even if you have to read 10 books for the next weeks, publish your next book, reflect yourself again, find the problem, publish the next book and so on. That's the only way
@ThopHayt This can be said about any business. If something is completely new, there's less competition = less quality. I know the time when people were able to make great money with cheap "How to books" with 10 pages. But with the time the competition has grown = high quality because everyone is trying to be the best. So if you don't have success, it just means that you're not meet the quality standard which is necessary to be successful. But what's the opportunity? Jumping on the next hot business where it's more easy to make money? To realize that it's no more easy after two years? But how would you become a master in any business to be able to make the big sums if you break it as soon as it becomes difficult? For me the books are not "another method" to make money and I can guarantee you that it's getting harder and harder with the time. For example: I bet that animated pictures for Kindle books are coming during the next years and ordinary eBooks won't sell so good anymore. Is it reason to give up because it's getting harder? No, I'll learn how to create such animated pictures even if it takes 3 months. I do whatever is necessary to do to be successful. I think that's the big difference: Most people would say: "If I have to learn how to create animated pictures I could also publish 10 books within this time to increase my income by $2.000/month." But I would leave this money on the table because I'm focusing on the highest quality whatever it takes. Such decision are the "extra mile" successful people are talking about.
@MatteoMatt You're on the right track. In the beginning it's more important to learn instead of publishing books. I know that this sounds stupid because you have the pressure to make money and it's only possible when you publish new books. But on the other hand you need a "quality standard" to earn anything. My advice: Figure out what points (on which you have an influence on) are important to sell a book on Amazon. There a just a had full of points eg. price, description, cover, keywords, look inside feature, author page and so on. Write down every point! Next you should learn about these points and use your knowledge for the next book. If you're still unhappy with the results you should reflect yourself and your book: "Hmmm, why is my book not selling? I've learned everything about keyword optimization during the last weeks. I watched tons videos about this point, read articels, talked to other people and so on. So I'm sure that my keywords are not the problem. Hmmm, but do I really know everything about how to write a description? I heard about emotional questions at the beginning. So if I'm not sure I should learn everything about it. If I do it just like I guess my results are based on luck but I know that success is based on the right decisions. So I should make sure that I'm doing it right." Next book you implement your new knowlage. If you're not happy with your results you can say: "I'm 100% sure that my keywords and my descriptions are perfect. Where could be the problem? Hmmm, my book prices are X.99. But why? Maybe X.98, X.95, X.90 are better prices. I don't know so I should learn everything about prices." And so on.
So you have to be honest to yourself and don't rely on what you think. Focus on what's working and necessary to be successful. If you don't know it you have to learn it because otherwise your results will be based on luck.
It's an exclusion procedure and with time you'll do the things right. Then your success is just a logical consequence. Now think about you're three years in this game like me and have mastered all the basics perfectly. You're still learning and implementing other details which are pushing you far away from the earnings of an ordinary publisher. For example: Last month I've paid for the synchronization of my book trailers. I've paid a professional speaker $10 for 10 seconds. But such details only paying off if you master the basics. So it's nothing for a beginner. A beginner should focus on the basics to be able to make eg. $100/book, increase his quality to make $200/book and so on. The time will come when you're focusing on $1000+/book. And if you are able to provide such a high quality you could automate some processes to scale it up to publish 5 of these books/month instead of one. But a beginner (let's say he's able to make $50/book per month in average) can't scale it up and think that he'll make 10k/month with his next books. Your results are based on your quality and your quality is coupled to your knowledge. So if you don't know something - Learn it!
About CreateSpace: It's a sub company of Amazon. They're producing paperbacks on demand. No costs but it's a little bit harder to master in comparison to eBooks (eg. the formatting is more complex). On the other hand you can sell paperbacks for up to $20-25/unit IF you're able to provide the quality to sell in this price range.
EDIT:
Just another example. Let's say you want to produce a chair. You rip off the laminate in your living room, produce 4 feets with a diameter of 1 inch and give it a pink color bevause you like pink and you GUESS other people will also like it. And then you expecting sales?
But the minimum quality standard in this industry to make any sales is: oak wood, feets with a diameter of 2 inches and white color. But you're forcing to sell this pink chair. You focus on producing hundreds of these chairs because I've heard that this is a numbers game. But you fail. After one year you find out ....white is the color that customers love. Now you produce tons of white chairs and fail again because your still use your old laminate which is not the industry standard. You'll lose another year and at the end you'll give up and say: "Chairs are not selling. You can't expect to sell chairs in 2016."No, you were just not able to reach the quality standard. You can't focus on selling tons of chairs and expect to get rich if you don't have the knowledge how to produce proper chairs.
Nothing else for other businesses: You can't create a perfect book and thought: "The cover doesn't matter. I'll create it with MS pain. I think my keywords are okay" and expect any sales. It's nearly impossible or just luck if you get a sale. It doesn't matter what you think. You have to do what's necessary to do to be successful. And a bad cover, random keywords, generic title and so on doesn't meet the quality standard on Amazon to make any sales. So if your books are not selling, it's not because this business is dead (customers are already there, more than before) but because you missed sonething that's necessary. So there's no reason to keep on and force sales because you'll just repeat your bad results. Be honest to yourself, figure out what's the problem, learn about it even if you have to read 10 books for the next weeks, publish your next book, reflect yourself again, find the problem, publish the next book and so on. That's the only way
Last edited:
bambi
Junior Member
- Aug 9, 2008
- 189
- 68
@Pinger030 I have a couple more questions, if you don't mind:
1. How many books contributed to your success in October?
2. Were they part of a series?
Thanks so much!
1. How many books contributed to your success in October?
2. Were they part of a series?
Thanks so much!
MatteoMatt
Regular Member
- Sep 28, 2016
- 389
- 293
I finaly read the whole thread and also have ramped up my e-book production factory. I had a question that this place might be the best to find an answer.
Lets say I have an image that is relevant to my book, it is a mental health problem and I am using a chart released online by the CDC that is relevant to my content. It is a picture other people are using as well, my question is: is it ok to include this picture in my book as long as I give credit to the original creator? Or do I have to have my own completely self made pictures?
Lets say I have an image that is relevant to my book, it is a mental health problem and I am using a chart released online by the CDC that is relevant to my content. It is a picture other people are using as well, my question is: is it ok to include this picture in my book as long as I give credit to the original creator? Or do I have to have my own completely self made pictures?
zikooamalou7
Newbie
- Apr 7, 2015
- 16
- 1
$2.99 vs higher price, which do you find is more profitable overall?
MatteoMatt
Regular Member
- Sep 28, 2016
- 389
- 293
Damn guys im sure some of you noticed by now but KDP seems to be rolling out a Paperback publishing feature.
It seems really cool, I have not added any yet but it is very seamless, there is the option to create paperback under the book. I know createspace already does this too, but I am still so early in my kindle part of my marketing plan so I havent even got there yet.
Im pretty excited about this, I still only have 3 books on KDP but I plan to have alot more, and having paperback as an option will be awesome!
What you guys think of this?
It seems really cool, I have not added any yet but it is very seamless, there is the option to create paperback under the book. I know createspace already does this too, but I am still so early in my kindle part of my marketing plan so I havent even got there yet.
Im pretty excited about this, I still only have 3 books on KDP but I plan to have alot more, and having paperback as an option will be awesome!
What you guys think of this?
kekmaw
Junior Member
- Dec 19, 2014
- 147
- 55
A question to people who are doing a lot of books with images illustrations.
Do you still publish those books through Createspace? The prices gets so high when you add a few images, especially with colors, which makes it impossiible to realese books with a lot of images etc. Just looking for other peoples experience on this.
I hope you all are crushing it, November and December has been good to say the least for paperback sales!
Do you still publish those books through Createspace? The prices gets so high when you add a few images, especially with colors, which makes it impossiible to realese books with a lot of images etc. Just looking for other peoples experience on this.
I hope you all are crushing it, November and December has been good to say the least for paperback sales!
- Dec 26, 2013
- 5,947
- 5,395
I have not commented on here for a while as there have been tons of posts and so it took me a while to catch up.
Glad to see Pinger is making good money on CS.
But, after reviewing this thread, in my opinion, there is a massive trick everyone is missing about how you make money in online publishing.
Look at any large publishing company - it is magazine style - not books that make the serious money. And the books that do make good money are in series ie: Harry Potter. That's because getting ongoing interest and ultimately subscribers is key.
To do this my business model is pretty simple:
1. Check out Amazon for what sells.
2. In my case I outsource a similar product.
3. Post that onto KDP - (you used to be able to cream money even at this point, but Amazon has moved the goal posts a while back)
Now these are the things people don't do, but this is what makes the real money...
4. Drive subscribers to your website.
5. Get them to subscribe direct through your site.
Oh look that is what Amazon do with Prime/KDP unlimited!
For example:
My cheapest subscription is for a weekly ezine that I originally published on Amazon, it made me about $250,000 per year on KDP.
Now I charge $1.49 per week, I have 10,000 subscribers. That is $15,000 per week or about $750,000 per year. No reliance on Amazon, no waiting months to get your money or any of that BS!
You can even license them out or offer advertising, which I do, for even more money.
My most expensive subscription is for a highly targeted niche is $30 per month. I have about 1000 subscribers for that.
I have many publications, both fiction and non fiction that I have done this with, but the key to getting subscriptions is you have to create a series.
Hope that gives you all something to think about.
Glad to see Pinger is making good money on CS.
But, after reviewing this thread, in my opinion, there is a massive trick everyone is missing about how you make money in online publishing.
Look at any large publishing company - it is magazine style - not books that make the serious money. And the books that do make good money are in series ie: Harry Potter. That's because getting ongoing interest and ultimately subscribers is key.
To do this my business model is pretty simple:
1. Check out Amazon for what sells.
2. In my case I outsource a similar product.
3. Post that onto KDP - (you used to be able to cream money even at this point, but Amazon has moved the goal posts a while back)
Now these are the things people don't do, but this is what makes the real money...
4. Drive subscribers to your website.
5. Get them to subscribe direct through your site.
Oh look that is what Amazon do with Prime/KDP unlimited!
For example:
My cheapest subscription is for a weekly ezine that I originally published on Amazon, it made me about $250,000 per year on KDP.
Now I charge $1.49 per week, I have 10,000 subscribers. That is $15,000 per week or about $750,000 per year. No reliance on Amazon, no waiting months to get your money or any of that BS!
You can even license them out or offer advertising, which I do, for even more money.
My most expensive subscription is for a highly targeted niche is $30 per month. I have about 1000 subscribers for that.
I have many publications, both fiction and non fiction that I have done this with, but the key to getting subscriptions is you have to create a series.
Hope that gives you all something to think about.
Last edited:
theconscience
Regular Member
- May 16, 2014
- 311
- 30
What was the ezine about?
Can I do this with kids book series?
Do you use Paypal for subscription?
bambi
Junior Member
- Aug 9, 2008
- 189
- 68
@GringoMonkey I have a few questions, if you don't mind.
Do you have a members area with content or do subscribers just get new content once a week? How is the content delivered?
Do you use a landing page to get them to subscribe?
How much content per week is sufficient for a membership?
Thanks!
Last edited:
- Dec 26, 2013
- 5,947
- 5,395
To try and answer all your questions:
What was the ezine about?
I have a lot and they fall across the following niches:
B2B
Beauty and Fashion
Entertainment
Food & Dining
Health & Fitness
Home and Family
Investing
Market Research
News & Education
Non profit
Personal Finance
Retail & eCommerce
Social
Travel
Work Opportunities
Do you use Paypal for subscription?
Yes you can use Paypal.
Can I do this with kids book series?
As you can see from above you can do this in any niche, the only issue with Kids books is you have to target parents, as they buy.
Do you have a members area with content or do subscribers just get new content once a week? How is the content delivered?
Other than the creation of the content my system is 100% automated. For most that is payments are collected and subscribers automatically emailed a download link.
Do you use a landing page to get them to subscribe?
YES
How much content per week is sufficient for a membership?
It really depends on the niche and what you are charging. That is easier to do with Non Fiction, but you will make more money if you can crack fiction.
What was the ezine about?
I have a lot and they fall across the following niches:
B2B
Beauty and Fashion
Entertainment
Food & Dining
Health & Fitness
Home and Family
Investing
Market Research
News & Education
Non profit
Personal Finance
Retail & eCommerce
Social
Travel
Work Opportunities
Do you use Paypal for subscription?
Yes you can use Paypal.
Can I do this with kids book series?
As you can see from above you can do this in any niche, the only issue with Kids books is you have to target parents, as they buy.
Do you have a members area with content or do subscribers just get new content once a week? How is the content delivered?
Other than the creation of the content my system is 100% automated. For most that is payments are collected and subscribers automatically emailed a download link.
Do you use a landing page to get them to subscribe?
YES
How much content per week is sufficient for a membership?
It really depends on the niche and what you are charging. That is easier to do with Non Fiction, but you will make more money if you can crack fiction.