Pricing Limbo - How low can you go

[Brian]

I'm an author who has recently begun self publishing eBooks on Amazon, Smashwords, and Barnes & Noble. The question I always grapple with is: "What is a good price for an ebook?"

I've read of people balking at going E due to the price of eBooks (yes, and due to the love of paper books). The minimum price on Amazon to receive 70% royalties is $2.99 (seems low). I've priced my own books at #3.99 with mixed success.

So I ask you, what is a good eBook price for someone who is not a bestseller?

What is the maximum you're willing to pay for that book you want (e.g. $9.99)?

Does it irk you that eBook prices are so high in general?

Thanks ahead of time for the input.

[Rachelle]

I think for new authors $3.99 is a good price until you get a following.

[Danielle]

I agree, $3.99 seems reasonable. I don't like paying over $9.99 for an ebook of a bestselling author but I will for the ones I love. So start low until you get a fan base then increase you price. I understand were some people are coming from when they say ebooks are priced to high. Because you aren't paying for having the book printed, shipped etc. Also, when you buy a ebook its not something your going to collect or have on your shelf to look at. With that said, I personally feel that the authors have put in a lot of time and hard work to give us a great story to escape into and they should be rewarded for their hard work so I rarely complain about the prices of books with one exception. When a book comes out in hardback for $25. I won't pay that much ever. I hope this helps. I know I'm just blabbering away. :)

[☺~Tina~☺]

I won't pay over 9.99 for an ebook. I don't care how much I love the author. I will either wait for the price to come down, download it from the library or go buy the hard cover with a Border's coupon!

Also it depend on the length of the book too. I won't pay $7.99 for an ebook that is like 120 pages.

It hard to say. If the book is good, people will buy it. I've bought A LOT of ebooks (like over 250 since 8/09, I own 3 paper books!

3.99 sounds good but you want to be fair to yourself as much as the reader.

[Mhollie]

IMHO...Brian, don't sell yourself or your work short. What do you think your time is really worth? How many hours did it take you to complete the manuscript & get it to pre-press, etc? Take that all into account when you set your price. Then look at it from a publisher's perspective and meet somewhere in between.

I think a reasonable price for any full length novel in e-format would be around $5.99 as there is a much lower overhead than a manuscript that actually has to be put to press.

[Tania]

I'll pay under $5 (australian) for an author unknown to me with good reviews on good reads. However I do admit to a free ebook addiction and love trolling through amazon for free ebooks. It's a good way to discover new authors.

For my favourite authors and for books I can't wait to get my hands on I'll pay under $12. That's mainly because I've got space issues and going to ebook format wasn't so much about the prices but about being able to have more books :). But I will shop around online and get the cheapest price.

The thing with ebook pricing is that you can't sell your books on like you can with an physical book. You also can't pick up a second hand book if you want to try out a new author or pick them up cheaply at a charity book sale. Which I think will a) make people less like to take a risk on a new author and b) make the number of authors people are able to buy restricted in comparison.

My main problem is that being in Australia many ebooks I can't buy due to some weird international publishing rules. I could walk down the street and buy it in paper back at my local bookstore but can't buy it in ebook format. GRRRRRRRRRRR.

[Brian]

Wow, this discussion has provided some interesting insights. Thank you everyone for participating.

[Irene]

It doesn't help the author any but when it comes to e-books. I'm cheap. If it's a new release and IF I really, REALLY want it. I'll go as high as ten bucks. That's it... I absolutely refuse to pay the same price for ebooks that I would for a hardback. I'm pretty cheap when it comes to hardbacks too. I VERY seldom buy first run books. But if I do, I can be convinced to go all the way to twenty-five dollars- but that's only if it's really nice and so new the ink isn't dry yet.
I never pay that much for authors I don't know. If I'm following an author, sometimes I open my wallet.
I haunt the bargain bin at used bookstores- no money for the author in that...
I do book swaps- still no money for the author in that...
and I also... HUSH... download- no money for the author in that - oh and it's technically illegal but that little detail doesn't bother me much.
If these avenues of cheap books weren't open to me, I still wouldn't be buying a lot of books. What I would do is use my public library more often. That's what we did when I was a kid we were poor. We went to the library. I'm a taxpayer. If I couldn't download it. I'd get it from the library. If I couldn't download it, swap it, buy it used or get it from the library, I wouldn't read it.

Very, very seldom would a new author ever get any money from me.

That said. I started to wonder how I do find new authors. These days this site turns me on to a lot of different authors. I see what other people are reading and try them out.
The other big way is short stories in anthologies. I do buy anthologies and sometimes nice, pretty new ones in big bookstores.
Product placement works. If another book is in the same pile as a book I already know I like.
Endorsements work. If one of my favorite authors has a blurb that says this book is great, I'll take a look at it. But it has to be an endorsement from some author I know. An endorsement from Joe Smith Magazine weekly doesn't work for me.
When I used to shop Amazon a lot, they had a cool sales pitch. They'd say "customers who bought this product also bought THIS product..." Sometimes that would get me to take a look.

I ALMOST bought several books recently. Ah but I didn't... I was able to get all of them from other people.
I ordered another ereader instead.

[Brian]

I'm a used bookstore junky, so paying more than $3.99 for a book irks me. Since eBooks don't include anywhere near the overhead of paper books, it seems they ought to be cheeper. I have a hard time paying $5.99 or $6.99 for an eBook. I only payed $12.99 once (Lonesome Dove, what a great book).

I'd love to be charging $5.99 for my eBooks some day, but this seems like the scary stratosphere of pricing. I'll probably stick to $3.99 for my better selling books and $2.99 for the poorer sellers. That just seems like the right price for me now.

Someday, E will be the way and paper books will go the way of the Dodo and vinyl records. I'll probably shed a tear on that day but I also hope to be a well established player in the eBook world (charging no more than $5.99 for my books ;-).

Thanks for all the useful input.