August Sales Numbers

Wow, so they weren't kidding about a summer slump. My sales definitely slowed down in the month of August, and it was scary! Overall, I had a good monthly total simply because I now have four books out instead of 3. On the other hand, each book's individual sales were the lowest they've been since February, which is disappointing. That's one of the hardest parts about self-publishing. It's a lot of ups and downs and you never truly know what to expect from month to month. The only true way to guarantee growth is to keep writing books.

August Sales Numbers:


BEAUTIFUL DEMONS (Book 1 of the PHD series. 10/31/10)Amazon Kindle Store: 855 US + 234 UK + 2 DE = 1091Barnes & Noble: 296Smashwords: 2Total: 1389INNER DEMONS (Book 2 of the PHD series. 12/22/10)Amazon Kindle Store: 702 US + 157 UK + 1 DE = 860Barnes & Noble: 244Smashwords: 2Total: 1106BITTER DEMONS (Book 3 of the PHD series. 2/24/11)Amazon Kindle Store: 671 US + 118 UK + 1 DE = 790Barnes & Noble: 219Smashwords: 1Total: 1010SHADOW DEMONS (Book 4 of the PHD series. 7/3/11)Amazon Kindle Store: 1146 US + 111 UK + 1 DE = 1258Barnes & Noble: 284Smashwords: 3Total: 1545Total August Sales: 5050
Overall Sales To Date: 40698


There are two very exciting things about my August sales, despite the slowing numbers. 1. My UK sales got a huge boost this month. It's the first time I've sold over 600 books in the UK, so that was super exciting. 2. I passed the 40,000 books sold mark! I never dreamed I would be able to sell that many books in less than a year! And I still have until the last day of October to try my best to hit 50K in a year. Of course, with the huge slow down, that's definitely not a guarantee. Already in September, the numbers have continued to seriously drop. For example, Beautiful Demons hovered between 1000 and 1500 sales rank for months, but lately has been seen closer to 4000 and 5000 in the kindle store. I ended last month with an average of 162 books sold per day. Yesterday, I only sold 84 books. To be honest, it's scaring me. And since I started this sales number report in order to be honest and give a true picture of what an Indie author's sales look like, I have to tell you how I feel.

I have thoughts that go through my head about what if I've reached the maximum numbers for this series? What if it's all downhill from here? There are a million scary thoughts in my head. Still, I do understand logically that if I continue to put out new books, there will be spikes and then things will begin to drop again. It's a pattern. It's natural. It happens to everyone. I think it's scary because it makes me feel a little bit out of control. I'm not sure what to do to boost my sales back up - other than writing more books. I plan to release the 5th book in my series, RIVAL DEMONS, in October. Then, if all goes well, the 6th book, DEMONS FOREVER, will come out just before Christmas. Perfect timing to end the series just before the biggest boost of ebook sales, right? I hope so. For me, that's the only marketing strategy I can come up with, and I think it's a good one. I'm a writer. So I'll write. As for sales, we'll just have to wait and see what happens.

Have you seen a lag in your summer sales? What have you done to boost them? How do you get over the fear of seeing sales drop? If you're an Indie author, please let me know how you handle these lags if you've seen them.