We have decided to share with you, our ideas, methods & tips learned throughout our work, and especially by observing & keeping track for hours each month of what is happening around the world. We are members on dozens of Facebook groups and online authors websites, constantly observing what works & what needs improvements.

The ideas featured here are not suitable for everyone and not for every niche, it’s important for you to read, understand & choose if it’s suitable.

General

Do you have a digital book? You can turn it into a printable version and start selling it through the ‘Print On Demand’ platform.
Do you have a printed book? You can turn it into a digital version and start selling it in another sales channel. This way you will significantly increase your chance for meaningful book sells.

A digital book stays on the web forever, unlike a physical printed book that stays on shelves and after a certain period moves on to storage. Remember that when you can’t decide where you should publish & promote your book.

You can have a perfect book in English even if you don’t speak or write English well. Learn to work with outsourcers abroad. Once you have a team of writers, illustrators, translators & proofreaders as well as another outsourced profession you might need, it will make it easier for you with your next book publishing.

An Independent author sets his own book price, size, cover and any other given option. Anyone can become an independent writer with no dependence on the goodwill of publishers with significantly reduced cost.

Amazon

Put time & effort into finding the best suitable categories for your book. You only have 2 category options to choose and you shouldn’t choose lightly, it is highly recommended to find 2 different main categories for your book, this way it will be exposed to a larger reader audience.

For Israeli citizens, Amazon pays by check once sales reach $100/Euro & up. In case you have an abroad bank account info Amazon will transfer the sales sum monthly without any minimum earnings.

While your book is being published, review & learn the acceptable pricing for books under your category. If you are not a well-known author you might not manage to sell with a higher price than the ones offered in your niche. On the other hand, there is no reason to be significantly low priced than the average pricing of your book subject & niche.

When running a major sales campaign on Amazon, it’s important that your book will have at least five good reviews, it influence well on readers & increase your chance to sell more copies.

Amazon has different languages websites for specialized sales in countries such as Germany, France, England, Australia & more. Holland is the last to join. Your book will be featured there automatically and your sales royalties will come from each region separately. This is an opportunity for you, the author, to translate your book & reach a larger target audience.

Digital Books

The cover is one of the essential aspects of the digital book. It’s important to remember that the reader only see a thumbnail image of your book and it should be captivating enough to make him pause and look at your book. When choosing the font size, amount of words & the image for your cover, remember that.

If you feel that the book is not selling as much as you expected, try changing the cover or the price. It’s free, fast and can bring a substantial change.

You wrote a children’s book in English & spent a lot of money on illustrations. If your story can relate to children across the world, think about translating your book to additional languages such as French, German, Spanish etc. you already have your illustrations so the only additional cost will be for translation. This way you can reach more readers worldwide in a relatively small investment fee.

Another major influence on book sales is the book description, the ‘marketing paragraph’ written on a book back cover. In the world of digital books, the description can be changed easily in minutes in case you feel it is not satisfyingly sold or for any other reason.

Promotion & Marketing

We recommend joining the KDP program on Amazon, it is a great platform that offers your new book exposure to thousands of new readers through the KDP free or Countdown plans.

We recommend joining Facebook groups of books & authors abroad. But it’s important to obey the group’s rules, some groups allow you to promote your book for sale, some groups offer to exchange views & consultations, others are for free days etc. good useful information can be found on good groups.

Offer your readers a truly valued gift and use it as a way to collect your clients mailing info to create a mailing list, it can be of a great importance during the book promotion process. For your next published book, you will have guaranteed first readers who know & love your writing style and you will offer your book to them first, it works!

 You should create a short minute long promotional video for your book, and promote it on your YouTube channel, the more visibility & exposure for your book the more chance for it to sell well.

When preparing the book description, forget for a minute that you are your book’s sales person with the aim to promote it, just describe the book in a marketing dialect & emphasize the book’s unique trades for the readers.

The post Authors Secrets appeared first on Simple Story.

Following your publishing, especially if it’s an eBook on Amazon, some people will tell you that it is time to improve it, change pricing and promote it more. I want to share with you from my own & many independent writers’ experiences: you have written a book, you are happy with it then start with your next one.

There are many reasons to continue with writing & publishing a number of books & I want to share them with you:

Creating Additional Asset

You have to look at any additional book and an asset that will bring more income. We usually think of real estate as assets, a book is a passive income platform and the more books we have the more we would profit & from all of them.

Convincing a Reader to Read Our Books

In the world of printed books as well as eBooks, readers have countless opportunities. We need to convince book lovers to purchase our books, for we have a special something to tell them. Many check to see who the writer behind those words is, and as soon as they see a series of books they realize it’s not just a one book independent writer, but an author who has a great value to offer. For a reader, it will be easier to buy a book from us when he sees our series of books.

Changing Prices

When we have just one book and it’s the source of our income, then we will not change its price. We would even rarely use Amazon’s free days module. When we have a series of books we can ‘play’ a bit with the pricing, some will be free, some we will raise their price and change it every few weeks, this way the reader will see our series of books in a range of prices and would be able to choose according to his budget. This way we create great visibility and make our readers read our books and acknowledge the value.
Of course, this is relevant for eBooks only, with printed books prices are harder to play with.

What is interesting to our Readers?

Sadly we can never know in advance which book will be successful and which will not. The more books we publish the more we will increase our chances to create a bestseller. New books create curiosity & interest, but even if we follow the same actions, there will always be more successful books. Why? We don’t know. Perhaps it’s the book title; perhaps it’s the book cover and perhaps its luck that is involved. The more books we write will help our luck to work for us.

‘Simple Story’ publishing had followed many book series, including our own, and there were always different levels of success between different books in diverse niches.

Amazon Likes a Series

There are many promotional services of books & authors on Amazon. The more they feel a writer has more selling books the more they help him succeed. Why? Because they profit from sales commissions just like we enjoy the royalties. They promote successful writers with more emails to their subscribers, they grant successful books more category options and in general, would help you to sell more.

There is a lot to tell your mailing list

Your previous book subscribers are on your mailing list, they have read and were captivated by your book and now they are waiting for your next one. Don’t disappoint them, write your next book and send it to them. Your sales & publicity would rise and the additional asset you have created for yourself will grant you more financial options.

An example to a successful mosaic book series by Sigalit Eshet, co-founder of ‘Simple Story’ can be found on this link.

Any published book has increased the sales of all previous books in the series. The first and meaningful purchases always came through the mailing list.

Another example of children’s books series is by a ‘Simple Story’ client, Sigal Magen.

In conclusion to the subject of books series, I can only say that publishing your first book is difficult and a very challenging but fun experience. From your second book, it’s becoming a whole different kind of experience, your readers would love to get from you another story or more professional knowledge. Each book is an asset that helps create your passive income and deifying your professional name.

‘Simple Story’ would love to help you continue to grow your readers’ audience.

The post The Power of a Series appeared first on Simple Story.