Adventures in Epublishing: February Sales Round-Up

I'm excited to report that so far, February has been Into the Shadows' best month ever since debuting in November 2010. While they aren't Hocking or Konrath numbers, I'm confident that in time with future books hitting the virtual shelves, as well as DarkSide Publishing flooding the shelves with books this spring, that by summer 2011, I'll be singing a different tune. And it's also promising because it's now showing growth each month.

Here's the breakdown for February:

Ebooks - 121
Amazon.com - 40
Amazon UK - 5
BarnesandNoble.com - 76
Smashwords.com - 0
Total: $172.15

Paperbacks Online - 6
Amazon.com - 5
CreateSpace.com - 1
Total: $16.72

Paperbacks (self) - 0
Total: $0

Total earned for the month of February: $188.87
Total copies sold February: 127

Overall Books Sold to date: 367
Overall Earned to date: $1,101.05

I am now only $58.90 short of breaking completely even on Into the Shadows, which I would expect to do halfway through March, if sales continued at the same pace. I was selling on average 3 copies a day for the month of February, although March has brought around a screeching halt. Maybe with the new iPad out in a week, we'll see a sales jump towards the end of March. The first week of February was still part of my 99 cent experiment, but only resulted in 39 sales. Which is nothing to sneeze at, but was a really crappy average. I was averaging 5.5 copies a day, which profit-wise was just covering my 1 copy a day. I would have expected to sell many more copies at that price. However, had I left the 99 cent price there longer, I may have seen different results. But ultimately I want to keep the books priced at $2.99 because in the long run I think I'll see better profits overall if I stay consistent.

Some great things about February:
I doubled my income from January ($93.53) by earning $188.87.
Ebook sales have risen for the second month in a row.
Got some great new reviews.
Was featured in two school (high school and college) newspapers.

Also, here is a list of my ebook sales so far:
November 2010: 38
December 2010: 34
January 2011:  80
February 2011:  121

Remember that November is kind of a fluke, I had 20 sales on one day for my release day contest, but only averaged 1 book every other day the rest of the month. December moved to a 1 book a day average, and then February we were up to 3 copies a day. Like I said, March has been slow so far, however, I do have 3 guest posts coming out this month and my new book will hopefully be out in another month or so. So we'll have lots more stats to look at then! 

Happy epubbing!

Comments

  1. Good job! I wish my numbers were like yours. Maybe when more reviews and listings of "Expert Assistance" get out over the next couple months. Also good to hear that DarkSide is making progress. Keep up the effort!

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  2. Those are inspiring numbers, Karly. Congratulations!
    One book a day averages look like they're moving to your 3 books a day for Feb. So your readers are spreading the word!

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  3. Congrats, Karly! I'm very jealous that your so close to breaking even! I'm still looking at a couple months before that happens.

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  4. Thanks guys!

    Yeah, Derek, the next book will be even more awesome because right now, my overhead cost will just be the ebook cover, $105. I'll work with my label to do the formatting myself for the first time. I'll probably add a full paperback cover to those costs, but I'm really focusing on the ebook first. So I should recoup those costs much faster even. I think my first book had costs of about $700.

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