More Sales Numbers for the Curious

These sales numbers are from 5/1/11 thru 5/18/11. A total of 18 days.


A Knight in Central Park, time-travel romance (released on 3/18/11 and offered at $.99)

Amazon:    2,662
B&N:             187

Return of the Rose, time-travel romance (released on 3/2/11 and offered at $2.99)

Amazon:     854
B&N:             51

Taming Mad Max, romantic comedy (released on 4/25/11 and offered at $2.99)

Amazon:      93
B&N:              8

Finding Kate Huntley, romantic suspense (released on 5/6/11 and offered at $2.99) 12 days for FKH.

Amazon:     60
B&N:             2

The reason I think these numbers might be helpful to other writers is because we can all get a snapshot picture of what's happening in self-publishing as more people buy Ereaders. I have never changed the prices of my books because I want to see what happens with the $.99 vs. $2.99 pricing and because I feel that $2.99 is a fair price for all (I know I'm repeating myself.)

Will my newer books slowly rise or slowly drop? How about the time travels? Do time travel romances have a built-in fan base? Do people read more in May or more in October? So many questions. I could go on and on.

In April, 2011, I sold 5,431 of the $.99 book at Amazon. If I double the number above (2,662) by the end of May, I will be close to the 5,431 books I sold in April. If that number keeps up or even rises in the next few months, I am going to assume lots of people are buying kindles and they all like romantic time travels. :)

Truthfully, I have no idea what to do with all these numbers, other than share than with all of you. In a few months, after I release my other books, I might be able to do some concrete analyzing. Believe it or not I am writing and editing more than I am blogging or checking numbers.

I try to spend about 15 minutes a day looking at tweets, another 15 minutes looking over interesting sites or blogs. I probably spend an hour a day over here and I check my sales numbers a few times a day. I'm getting better about that. Checking numbers gets less addicting as time goes by because I'd rather write books than check #'s. I spend a minimum of five hours a day writing.

Disclaimer: I am not promoting self-publishing over any other kind of publishing. If you self-publish your book, I have no idea if you will sell 1 book or 20,000 books. Nobody knows. Self-publishing a book ten years ago or even one year ago is not the same as self-publishing a book today. Writers now have one more option to choose from when thinking about publishing their book(s).

Any questions?

Taming Mad Max on Sale Now!

Taming Mad Max is my first romantic comedy. Available at Amazon and B&N now! Taming Mad Max was a finalist in RWA's Golden Heart contest in 2008 under the title, Better Late Than Never.

Like me, Mad Max has four crazy sisters. Ever since his father passed away, Max has felt a tremendous responsibility, financially and emotionally, to take care of his mother and sisters.

When Kari Murphy is asked by her friend and mentor to help with a client, she's happy to help out...at least until she enters the exam room and sees Max Dutton, the same man who slept with her on the rebound and broke her heart into tiny little pieces. There is a little bit of everything in this book: NFL football, family drama, surprise pregnancies, sperm donors...you name it! I hope you'll give it a try.

More Number Crunching and Other Stuff

As of 4/25 at 8:30 PM A Knight in Central Park sold 5,299 copies from 3/18 to 4/25 and Return of the Rose sold 1,006, from 3/2 to 4/25 for a grand total of 6,305 books since March 2, 2011. That's crazy! I like to think maybe Medieval Time Travels are hot again!

This whole $.99 vs. $2.99 pricing is very interesting to me. I've made about the same with both books...and I like the idea of being able to give readers a MEGA deal with the book set at $.99. The rest of my books will be $2.99 only because I feel that's a fair price all around. A good deal for all.

I mentioned in one of my comments to a poster that besides sending out emails to friends and family, sending a few tweets, and putting messages about my books on Facebook, I didn't do much marketing. I have yet to blog besides here on my own website. BUT, I did have a wonderful reader mention my book on Pixel of Ink, and although I was up to 108 books a day, after the mention on 4/12, sales suddenly shot up to 580 in one day, before slowly coming back down to an average of 250 a day where I am still at as of today. Thank you Pixel of Ink!

Of course, I have no idea if sales will eventually drop to ten books a day. Who knows? I certainly don't. And I can't worry about it because I want to spend my time writing instead of worrying. I like to believe that my stories are fun reads for busy women everywhere and now I will be able to spend my time concentrating on writing romance novels! What a concept. In the end, that's all that matters to me. I want to write fun, romantic, fast-paced novels that leave readers wanting more. For 19 years that's what this has been all about. Some things never change.

Once again, let me know if you have a question.

Also, if you like reading contemporary romance with a bit of humor, my newest book, Taming Mad Max, a 2008 GH finalist, is available as of a few minutes ago!!! I sold a book! I haven't even told anyone and it wasn't me who bought it, so that's exciting! I want to know who bought my very first Romantic Comedy?! It's also available on B&N, and all three of my books will be available on Smashwords by the end of the week!

B&N Sales for a newly pubbed Indie Author

First off, I would like to say that I am sharing information about sales at Amazon and B&N because if you are like me, you are curious about this new self-publishing phenomenon. At least, new to me. I know some authors have been doing this for a while now. 

The first two weeks at B&N were slow and I was happy with 1 or 2 sales a day. After I released the second book (A Knight in Central Park $.99) on 3/18 sales slowly rose.

Here are my sales numbers starting in April, 2011 (#’s are combined for both books, but the majority of sales are for the book set at $.99):

4/1 = 15 books sold

4/2 = 12

4/3 = 21

4/4 = 16

4/5 = 12

4/6 = 24

4/7 = 28

4/8 = 31

4/9 = 35

4/10 = 49

4/11 = 22

4/12 = 25

4/13 = 24

4/14 = 22

4/15 = 35

4/16 = 41

4/17 = 50

4/18 = 41

4/19 = 35

4/20 = 24

4/21 = 25

With my first book, Return of the Rose, released on March 2, 2011, and my second book, A Knight in Central Park, released on March 18, 2011, I have, as of today, April 22, 2011, sold a TOTAL of 4,509 books at Amazon and 725 books at B&N.

If you have any questions, let me know!

Amazon Sales Ranking

I can only tell you what I know. I know that I was selling between 450 and 550 ebooks a day on Amazon when I got as low as #65 on the top 100 bestsellers on Amazon.com. I was hovering around #130 when selling 250 books a day.

A Knight in Central Park was released on Amazon on 3/18/11 and is ranked 172 as of today (4/21) and I sold 250 books yesterday (4/20).

Return of the Rose was released on 3/2/11 and is ranked at #1,667 as of today (4/21) and sold over 50 yesterday (4/20).

I tend to make the majority of my sales after 5 PM each day and on the weekends.

Let me know if you have any questions! I have to go get my hair cut, but later on today I plan to talk about how many books I've sold at B&N. :)

Theresa