Here are my notes on the presentation made by Jim Hanas. Jim is the author of the short story collection When they Cried. He wanted to give some actual number of where his book actually sold.
Started as journalist and trade writer. Director of Social Media for NYC tourism agency and so obsessed with metrics.
1999, first short story published in print. $750 is total amount made writing fiction in his lifetime. Threat 0f not having readers is hollow threat. Threat of not having readers is more real.
2006 did first ebook stories and gave them away for free. The stories are an asset and regular publishing would want you to “save’ it until it can be published in a journal, etc..
For first ebook: Used Manybooks, Wattpad, Scribd, Bookglutton,Feedbooks and Smashwords.
Manybooks (2007), 500 downloads by 9/09 12 downloads/month; Bookkglutton (2008), 819 BookGlutton (2009)downloads by 9/09; 529 Stanza downloads 112 downloads/month
Wattpad (2007) 1,934 views by 9/09 but no stats on downloads
Scribd (3008) 3,259 views by 9/09, 29 downloads
Feedbooks (2009) 997 downloads by 9/09 142 downloads/month They win in discoverability and portability. Feedbooks was fastest to 1000 downloads
Smashwords, (late 2009) 75 downloads/month
2010 to date gives a total of 3,103 downloads with Feedbooks giving the most at 1,857, Bookglutton second with 657 and Smashwords third 467
If want to charge for it recommends that go to Amazon.
Led to ebook being published by ECW, a Canadian publisher, and a $500 advance, 10% of gross sales and retail price is $9.95. They only bought digital rights and he retains print rights. Spent $1997 in marketing the book and revenues were $940 in whole for about $1,000. Lessons learn: Google ads are tough for books, expect of pay $.30 to $.50 per click on Facebook and Goodreads, hunt for value with direct ad buys. HTML Giant was best marketing outlet.
Audience comments:
Smashwords not done well but Barnes & Noble done the best for kid’s joke books
One user having a difficult time tracking what his marketing is doing. B&N picked up his ebook to market it and he thinks it was because the book had a good cover design. Getting success with Apple iBookstore
Apple, Amazon updates sales stats on regular basis and can’t get this out of most publishers.
