Wednesday, April 11, 2012

Kindle Sales

 Virtual Strategy Magazine had a recent article about Best-Selling Paid Kindle Books in March. I'm going to highlight some of the article highpoints. In talking about these 16 books, they included "only paid units and do not take into consideration borrowed or free units."

More than 100,000 books are now available in the Kindle Owners’ Lending Library, including over 100 current and former New York Times Best Sellers. 

 In March, each time Kindle owners borrowed a KDP Select book from the lending library, the author received $2.18, leading to significant increases in income for independently-published authors. 

Debora Geary was one of the top 10 KDP Select authors in February, and 51% of customers who borrowed one of her books from the Kindle Owners’ Lending Library went on to buy one of her titles. 

L.J. Sellers, author of the Detective Jackson Mystery/Thriller series, saw that 25% of customers who borrowed one of her books also bought one of her books, all of which are also available in the lending library. 

 T.R. Ragan is the best-selling thriller author of the Lizzy Gardner Series and was the number one KDP Select author in February. She earned over $11,000 from the KDP Select fund, and her royalties from paid sales of her books increased by more than four times from January to February.
Clearly, the article was an endorsement of the KDP Select program. But it also shows that the program has been beneficial for a lot of writers. [Shout out to L.J. --Yay!] If any of you have your books currently available through the Kindle lending library or would like to provide your own stats or just want to leave a comment, please join us in the Comments section.

12 comments:

  1. Thanks for the info. Encouraging stats for sure!

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  2. This is very encouraging, Helen. Thanks for sharing.
    Karen

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  3. There's a huge ugly underbelly to this that the article doesn't mention. Indie authors have to give KDP exclusive rights, unlike big publishers, meaning they can't sell through Barnes and Noble or anywhere else. Many indie authors are flocking to this program because of the five free days they are allowed to use, again something that the big publishers can do at anytime on Amazon.

    For the few authors who are "discovered" on the lending program it can be a huge boost. Most indie authors, though, have done little more than narrow their readership down to Kindle owners only. For the authors who haven't joined, they've seen their sales drop because of the glut of free books advertised.

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  4. Once my third book is out and if the program is still available, I'll try it with my first book. Hopefully this will lead to sales of the others.

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  5. Good for LJ!
    Neither of my books are in the program.

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  6. I'm not part of the program, but I believe you can have your book on Kindle and not be part of the KDP program.

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  7. Yes. The Kindle part isn't exclusive. If you want to be part of the "Select" lending program and you're indie, you have to be exclusively on Kindle and nowhere else. If you're with a main publisher, you can be in the lending program...and everywhere else too.

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  8. I've done the Kindle Select. When I've chosen to let my book be FREE, I've had quite a few downloads. A few sales have followed, but not many. I've not had much lending, but then again I've not advertised much and my book is very quirky niche. It's all a bit of a science project. I personally am fine with where I'm at based on the effort I've put forth. That's the key.

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  9. I am just trying to get my detective series on KDP (waiting for my cover artists- for ever!!) and had sort of decided not to be part of the lending programme, but may reconsider it now. I think it could be a good idea to allow one book in the lending library and leave the rest for sale as someone has mentioned. I think that's what I'll do.

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  10. I've had my books in the lending program and the first month did pretty well, but last month and this not so hot. I'm thinking this works best with authors who have numerous books in one genre, where the stimulus in sales can be seen. I have a lot of books and stories up on Amazon, but they are not all in one genre.

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  11. You may be right Maryann. One free book seems to mostly help the other books of that author if the books are in a series.

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