Taleist Self-Publishing Survey

[kennyc]

Some info here: http://blog.taleist.com/2012/05/24/r...ishing-survey/

but unfortunately they are Selling the results as an ebook at Amazon (clever huh?):

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00...SIN=B0085M7KIU

some highlights:

- 10% of self-publishing authors earn 75% of royalties--a statistic that's eerily similar to the income breakout in traditional publishing. (Only about 60% of the more than 1,000 respondents were willing to answer questions about their earnings.)

- Half the authors earned less than $500 in 2011.

- A quarter of books probably won't make back the authors' production expenses.

- Earnings were sharply defined by genre. Romance writers earned 170% more than others, with literary fiction authors earning the least.

- Authors who sought outside help (editing, copy editing, proofreading, cover design) earned more than those who didn't.

- The 29% of respondents who went from a traditional publisher to self-publishing earned twice as much on their own as they did from their publishers.

- The most financially successful self-publishers write more than their peers, and spend less time marketing. In fact, those self-publishers who marketed the most earned the least.

More at a couple of blogs:

http://catherineryanhoward.com/2012/...ishing-survey/

http://www.thebookdesigner.com/2012/...ishing-survey/

(I hope this is not all old news, I learned of it from the SFWA website this morning: http://www.sfwa.org/2012/05/two-surv...ef=as_li_ss_tl )

[mr ploppy]

Originally Posted by kennyc

Romance writers earned 170% more than others,

Yay, my next one should do really well then

[gmw]

I see Mr Ploppy has cherry-picked the highlight that he liked. Well, I like this one:

Originally Posted by kennyc

[...]The most financially successful self-publishers write more than their peers, and spend less time marketing. In fact, those self-publishers who marketed the most earned the least.[...]

So if I do no marketing at all I should earn lots and lots. Suits me!

Thanks for the post Kenny.

[VydorScope]

I'm with GMW on this one!

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by gmw

I see Mr Ploppy has cherry-picked the highlight that he liked. Well, I like this one:


So if I do no marketing at all I should earn lots and lots. Suits me!

Thanks for the post Kenny.

Hey! I hadn't quite thought of it like that, divide by zero and zoom-zoom infinite velocity!