Adventures in Epublishing: Step 2

By September 9, 2010

If you’ve been following me here on Flyover Geeks, you may have seen the initial Adventures in ePublishing article. I’ve been following epublishing genius J.A. Konrath as I’ve traveled down the path of epublishing my YA novel, Into the Shadows, which will be available on Amazon and Smashwords later this fall.

Today we’ll take a look at Konrath’s second suggestion in How to Make Money on eBooks, which discusses how to price your ebook.

2. Price it right

Konrath suggests a price of $2.99 because Kindle pays a 70 percent royalty on ebooks priced between $2.99 and $9.99. If you decide to price it more or less than those base prices, you’ll still get 35 percent.I’ve read a variety of articles and people are all over the board on this. Some feel that you should price below $2.99 because you’ll get more readers, if that’s what you’re after. Some have delusions of grandeur and feel that their masterpiece should be priced at $7.99 or more, which then pits them against traditionally published works.

As for me, I’m sticking to the Konrath method. I feel that $2.99 is a fair price to sell a novel from an unproven author. But I also don’t feel that I should give it away for free. I did a lot of work to produce this writing, and I’m happy to sell it to you for a fair price. Konrath states that he sells way more books at that price point and doesn’t see the point in pricing it higher. And he has the numbers to back it up.

In addition to that, I’m not going into this venture thinking that I’m going to sell a million copies and make, well, two million dollars, although that would be nice. My goal is to gain readers for the day I do have a published book hit the shelves. They may be more willing to slap 15 bucks on the counter and their local Barnes and Noble if they already know they’ll like the writing I produce.

I’d love to hear your comments on this. Do you purchase ebooks? What are your thoughts on buying a book from a new or unproven author? Does $2.99 sound like a good price to you?

Karly Kirkpatrick is a YA writer, avid reader, high school German teacher, and mother of a toddler. She is currently pursuing an MA in Writing and Publishing at DePaul University in Chicago. Read INTO THE SHADOWS, the free online YA novel before it hits the ebook stores this November at http://karlykirkpatrick.blogspot.com!
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