When I first started thinking about pricing for "The Strangest of Places," my goal was to make it available for the lowest price possible to ensure it's accessible to the broadest possible audience. I was originally thinking I'd like to set the price around $5.99. As publishing costs started to accumulate, I upped that target price to $9.99, thinking that might be sufficient to recoup costs and still turn a small profit.
Reality, however, is rarely in line with what you think it will be.
Now that I have the manuscript and cover artwork loaded into Amazon's publishing tool, I'm able to play around with their pricing calculators to get my first concrete look at different pricing vs. royalty scenarios. As it turns out, not only would Amazon not allow me to sell below $10.58 per book, selling that low would mean I'd only make around $0.25 per book. As much as I'd love to believe that the sheer volume of sales I can expect will mean that's an acceptable return on investment, I just don't think that will be the case for a debut novel from an unknown author.
I'm not going to break down the full cost for each phase of development, but suffice it to say that I did hire a professional editor and cover designer, and neither of them were cheap. Beyond the monetary investment, I've also invested countless hours in writing, proofreading and editing it on my own, as well as researching all I could learn about self-publishing as an independent author. For as much as has gone into this, I do have to be practical when it comes to pricing. For the sake of full transparency, here's the breakdown, so you know why the book is priced as it is.
NOTE: Pricing is based on page type, ink color and number of pages -- I'm using the most inexpensive option of the first 2, but the latter just is what it is. All of the screen shots below were taken from Kindle Direct Publishing, showing the paperback cost (hardcovers are pricier to produce; you can extrapolate the info below to understand why that cost is what it is).
Here's what it looks like if I were to sell at $10.99 -- I'd earn $0.25 per book:
Here's what it looks like at $14.99 per book -- I'd earn $2.65 per book:
Here's the $19.99 list price I will be using -- of that, I will make $5.65 per book:
I know you're probably wondering why I'm using Amazon, when they're going to take such a large cut. The truth is, I was originally going to go with another publishing platform, which also would have distributed my book to several other platforms beyond Amazon. That option, however, would have meant several thousand dollars more in publishing and printing costs (and Amazon still would have taken a cut).
I've also been networking with other independent authors to learn what their experience has been, and of those that used those other multi-distribution platforms, most say that 95%+ of their sales come from Amazon alone anyway, so it wasn't really worth it to use the platforms that promise expansive distribution, given the increased costs.
So, where Amazon has a corner on the book-buying market and it's significantly cheaper to work directly with them get my book out there, doing so means I can publish it sooner than later. It's already been almost a year since my editor sent his feedback on my original draft, and I feel like if I don't publish it soon, I'll just keep tweaking it forever.
That said, I am also offering a limited number of books here, on my web site. The difference between ordering from Amazon vs. from here is that the books will come to me before they get shipped out to you. That does mean an increase in shipping costs in comparison to ordering from Amazon directly (more on that below), and it will take a bit longer for the books to make their way to you. For what it's worth, yes, I do get slightly more money per book for those sold here, but I'm not really concerned with who bought what where. If you'd like to read the (f#*king) book, please use whatever method makes the most sense for you.
I originally set out with the goal of offering the book at the lowest possible price. Now that I've gone through the process to get it right to the finish line, I now know what that lowest possible price is. I wish it were $5.99, or even $9.99, but the printed paperback copy has to be $19.99... at least for now. That said, ebook versions are always cheaper, given that there are no printing costs. If you have a Kindle, you can get that version for just $9.99, and it's free if you subscribe to Kindle Unlimited.
Now that I've covered the cheapest possible ways to get the book, let's go into why signed copies are pricier, and how to get one as cheaply as possible.
Signed Copies
The reason why signed copy prices are higher has nothing to do with the fact that you have my John Hancock on it -- I'm not that vain, I swear.
In order for me to send you a signed copy, I have to pay Amazon for both printing and shipping costs for your copy to arrive at my house. Once signed, I then have to pay to ship the book to you. The shipping cost that's added to your order is only covering the trip from my house to yours; I'm paying for the printing and shipping from Amazon to my house. The extra couple of bucks on signed copies is how I'm hoping to recoup some of those costs.
If you'd like a signed copy for the cheapest possible price, your best bet is to buy an unsigned copy and then get in touch with me about possible opportunities for us to meet up. I'm local to the NH Lakes Region, so if you're nearby there, easy enough. If not, we can certainly compare notes on show plans for the coming months and see if there are any where our paths will cross.
Looking to the future, I will be at the 3 TAB + Goose shows in ME, MA and CT next month, but I won't be at any of the Phish NYE shows. I will most likely have a table set up at a PhanArt event at some point (though probably not until sometime in 2023), so that would also be an option, if you don't mind waiting an indefinite amount of time.
So, now you know why my pricing is what it is -- I hope you feel it's worth whatever price you paid for it. Hopefully, I'll make enough to cover costs for the next book.
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