Self-Publishing Success: Pound of Flesh

 

It's weird. I always thought I'd have to get a book deal with one of the Big 6 publishers or write a breakout book for EC to make it onto the Erotica bestseller list at Amazon but that's not how it happened. It happened with an 11,000 word short story about a kinky couple's love of BDSM that I self-published myself in May.

 

 

For the month of November, that short story has been hopping on and off of the bestseller list. The sales are fan-fucking-tastic and I couldn't be happier. This was a book I'd typically send to EC but I decided to take a chance in May and do it myself. This is my career, and I decided it was time to take charge and stop being so damn wishy-washy about everything. I think it's probably the safest bet to try to reach as many readers as possible in as many formats as possible. I want readers to be able find me easily and quickly. I want to offer them lots of sexy, sinful and entertaining content at a great price.

 

Self-publishing was something of an experiment for me. Lots of author friends were taking the plunge. Some reported amazing numbers, some awful numbers and some were right in the middle. I tempered my expectations and decided to put the story up without any promo or any of the other usual business just to see what was possible.

 

At first, I made the huge-o mistake of pricing the book in no-man's land:  $1.99. Seriously, no, no, no. That price point seems to make books invisible. I sold, like, 11 copies that first month. LOL. What a joke, right?

 

So I changed the price to 99 cents, played around with the blurb and added a subtitle in parenthesis (An Erotic BDSM Short.) Slowly, the story picked up steam and around late June it settled into the 14-20K range on Amazon. I was cool with that. It was doing better than most of my EC, Samhain, Liquid Silver, etc backlist books. I saw a little bump in sales any time I had a new release with EC or Siren. That proved to me that new releases are very important for maintaining sales and finding new readers.

 

And, then, in October, a lovely, random reader gave it a 5 Star review. I was over the moon, of course. I love knowing my stories resonate with readers. I mean, I wouldn't write them if I didn't want to entertain, right?

 

So that review showed up and interesting things started to happen. Pound of Flesh started to race down the rankings to the high 2000′s and 3000′s. I hit the bestseller list at 99 and then 81 and then 76. I was stunned. Had one review made all the difference? Or was it that Siren menage book that introduced me to a new pool of readers who seemed to connect with my work? I really don't know. All I know is that something totally awesome happened.

 

Pound of Flesh will probably sell right around 600 copies for the month by the end of tonight. I'd been averaging 100-150 copies a month. That's a pretty big jump. Do I think it will last forever? Nah. But–huge but–now I know what's possible. After four years of writing for large epublishers, I finally hit the bestseller list–on my own. That was a huge moment of validation for me, especially coupled with the fact that I was recently offered a nifty new short story opportunity. (Hope to have more details on that one soon!)

 

Does this mean I'll only self-publish from now on? Um, no. LOL. It's a lot of work. You have to write, handle the editing, find a cover artist, do all the formatting, etc. I can't imagine doing that with every book. Also, I really enjoy working with my editor at EC and I'm falling in love with the reader community at Siren. I've never had such amazing emails and messages!

 

I do, however, think I'm going to streamline in 2012. I'm going to write for Siren, EC, that short story opportunity, and myself. I have some pretty filthy bits that are similar to Pound of Flesh but longer. Those will probably go up next because that's what readers seem to want (and what I enjoy writing, lol.)

 

So. Anywho. I guess the point of this post is to say that all kinds of totally cool shit is possible now. You don't have to just go with a Big 6 or a big epublisher or a small press. You can do strike out on your own and make things happen. Or, you can do like me, and do them all. Why not, right?