[frahse]

Originally Posted by Justin Nemo

Hi Steve

Thanks for your input.

I'm not suggesting for a moment that unpublished authors should be over charging for their work, they need to be affordable. Although I have seen some charging $20 plus. I also realise that publishers have overheads which inflate book prices.

My point is that 99 cents is a ridiculous amount of money to charge for something that has taken days to produce, or at least should have. Now I don't know if that book is crap or the best literature since Charles Dickens (Yes I know that's another debate!), but as a reader and buyer of books, I wouldn't touch it.

I think we as authors need to find a level of pricing which is fair to everyone. Fair to us for our work and fair to the reader who doesn't probably know us from a whole in the head. If you buy a Wilbur Smith or Lee Childs you know in advance what you can expect.

I have always pitched my books less than £3.00 which is around $4.50. Do I sell many? Compared to who? Probably not enough for the guys that want to charge less than a buck, but when I do sell a book I don't feel cheated and I don't think the buyer does either, well at least they've never told me so.

Justin, you have taken many of the commenters here to task. They are (as far as I know) being quite forthright and honest with you, and you are essentially calling some of them ridiculous.

In fact, I think besides being rude, you are being ridiculous as well. You think 99 cents is ridiculous as a cost for your book and further you say right above that this book might have taken "days" to produce.

Let us assume it took you a year to produce this book which you sell for 99 cents. You make a pitch that this wonderful book for 99 cents is your way to introduce yourself to readers. You let anyone that wants, browse extensively in your book. You offer critiques and interesting lead ins into the story, the characters, the relationships that are discussed in the book in as many places as you can find.

Readers see all this, browse the book, buy it, or borrow it, and like it.
You sell a 100,000 of them. Not a great number on the high end, but a very good number. Book sales total = (.99)x(100,000) 99 thousand dollars. Let us say your cut is 70%= 69,300 dollars.

Now Justin I don't expect you to tell us here, but think about how much money you made last year. During the whole year. Was it above $69,300 dollars?

But wait, that book might have only taken "days to produce" according to what you said above. We will be generous and consider that you worked hard during those "days" and really need a whole month to produce a book.
Let's give you a month off during the cold season so you can enjoy the warm waters somewhere. That is 11 months of productive time for 11 books.

Let me see. (11)x(69,300)= $762,300 dollars. Most the people here would be happy with that model, or even something considerably less.

Now you want to charge $25.00 for each book because you think it is worth it. O.K., no one is going to stop you. Let us hear how that works out.