Quote:
Originally Posted by Cinisajoy
Now if Amazon is so against 99 cents why do they allow it? Better yet, please explain how amazon is so against 99 cent books? They make 65 cents on almost every 99 cent book. Why do they allow countdown deals at 99 cents? They only get 30 cents on those.
Please show me in writing where Amazon is against 99 cent books. Or is this the royalty thing?
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The royalty thing, of course.
Amazon doesn't forbid 99 cent *regular price* titles because some are PD or shorts.
But they do discourage it.
They allow 99 cent sales but that isn't the everyday pricing; just, as I said, temporary promos.
The same with free books. They allow it but they put limits on it.
If they didn't care they wouldn't limit.
The Other thing is Amazon has a pricing recommendation tool for indie authors based on genre also-boughts. In most cases it recommends higher prices than prevailing rates.
There is this general perception out there that Amazon wants to drive ebook prices to rock bottom; they don't. They tolerate freebies and 99 centers but their own policies are for regular prices closer to $5 than zero. (Author Earnings has documented this repeatedly.)
After all, there has to be room for promotional discounts.
There is a sweet spot for ebook pricing that maximizes profits and all evidence from Kindle and Smashwords is that it lies in the $4-8 range, depending on genre and author fanbase.
Pricing normal books lower is about buying visibility, not generating revenue.
That is how price jogging works: you price the book a bit higher than the average price you want to maintain and then drop it dramatically for a day or two once in a while. Regular price sales go up after the sale ends, making up for the losses from the promo.
Modern Retail pricing is a dynamic thing, not a matter of setting a fixed price and praying.