Lessons in Indie Publishing: Are Bookstores Worth the Investment?
This was originally posted for my Patreon patrons on 2-23-2023
Welcome back everyone! I've been doing my homework on how I can sell more copies of my debut poetry book, If Only A Cat Could Read A Book and I have learned some interesting things along the way. I think there is, realistically, a slow progression of different steps I need to take to increase awareness around my book and the fact that I believe people should buy it.
Let's take a look at the lessons I learned this last week.
Lesson 1: To Sell in Stores, The Book Has to be In Demand
I learned pretty quickly that selling in a bookstore, even a local indie bookstore, is a lot more difficult than I had in mind when I started thinking earlier this year about how to get my work out into the world more. The first thing I realized as I began to research was that the book itself has to be in demand in order for people to want to sell it.
This of course makes a lot of sense in the world of books and all the billions of possibilities for reading, but when one is proud of one's own little book, one doesn't think of this. So there is that whole, hey, I should market this and probably start using advertising and putting other efforts in to make sure the book is popular first.
Basically, I need to create demand for this poetry book.
Lesson 2: The Miniscule Profit Probably Isn't Worth It
Selling in indie stores involves a lot less profit than other avenues for selling the book. Most indie bookstores ask for a 60/40 split on profit to cover their costs, their split being the 60%. To put this in perspective, I pay about $3.50 per book with "author's price" just to print it and ship it to myself. Market price on Amazon is $9.99. 9.99 minus 3.50 is 6.49, which, when split 60/40 comes to $2.60 as 40%. Per copy.
As you can see, not really a livable profit nor a sustainable way to sell my book. I'd have to sell 10 copies just to make ~$25. Which means I'd have to be a lot more in demand than I am now.
Lesson 3: The Effort I'm Already Putting in Can Be Used Elsewhere
I already have energy to create spreadsheets full of local bookstores (which, by the way, there are ten indie bookstores within 5 miles of my house, something I did not need to discover LOL) and think of emailing or calling and advertising... I can use that elsewhere. There are many ways that I can share my book with the world and get more readers, and they do not have to involve physical bookstores in order to get my poetry out into the world.
Conclusion on Lessons
As discouraging as all this was to realize, I was very happy that the internet had the resources to help me become aware before I dove in and started calling stores. The value of a few hours of internet research never ceases to amaze me! So that being said, this book, I think is not worth selling in stores.
Here are some of the articles I read if you are interested in the research:
But... I'm Never Done
BUT you know me. I still want to get this book out there. So as I was reading these articles and more, less well written articles on the same subject (LOL) I conjured up some ideas for marketing and sharing my book:
Always bring it up on my podcast introduction and conclusion
Do an Instagram Giveaway for followers and Shares of my book
Give free copies to Critics and Reviewers
Find Blogs to submit it to for review
Ask friends to review it on Amazon Marketplace to help me get some reviews of the book
Do holiday sales and discount codes for certain times of year in order to incentivize buying the book
Buy my own author copies and sell them through Instagram and maybe even in an online shop, so I can make more profit per copy
Sell copies of the book when I go to local poetry events
Sell copies of the book at First Friday market nights
...And I am sure I will come up with even more ideas on how to get this book out there. But in general, I am overall encouraged by the great advice and information I was able to find online. Ultimately, selling in a bookstore is not yet profitable. Maybe when I'm a "bigger" (LOL) author and more in demand, I can negotiate more profit or a better margin for myself.
In the meantime, I am still determined to do some work to share my debut poetry collection.
Thank you as always for coming along for this journey. To everyone who is here, you continue to motivate me to keep going.
Much love,
Coco
Thanks for reading!
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