How a few hundred sales makes economic sense
He said he’d sold a little over 100 copies and that one day last week he’d made more money from selling books than his ‘day job’.
I was chatting with the author of our debut title From Burnout to Balance in Four Weeks the other day and enquired about how first month sales had gone from his end. (More later about why I wouldn’t already know this information as his publisher.)
He said he’d sold a little over 100 copies and that one day last week he’d made more money from selling books than his ‘day job’. That’s a good day in my books….
The title’s launch has been a soft one and we won’t ramp this up until the New Year, so sales, while modest, are not entirely unreasonable (particularly given the time of year).
Importantly the author, Dr Paul Lanthois from The Work Life Balance Foundation, is well on his way to recouping his initial investment. From then on it’s 87.5% of revenue in his pocket, which for a $40 title in this case is about $35. (Obviously less for those sold through a distributor but we haven’t gone there yet.)
We’ll happily collect our 12.5% royalty for continuing to work on the title’s marketing and development (but not until Paul has recouped his investment).
And why wouldn’t I know how many books Paul has sold? They’re his books; he warehouses them and sells them, with our support and involvement yes, but he is the one doing the real sales work.
It’s a new business model that I believe is good for authors and will ultimately be good for us as a publisher.