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What 2 Years of Self-Publishing Gets You

5K views 80 replies 60 participants last post by  Chinese Writer 
#1 ·
2 whole years...
 
#6 ·
Happy anniversary! That is such an impressive progression -- I'll bet you're going to end up doubling, tripling, and more-ing your income as you release more books in this series!

I LOL'd at your first 3 months of 2015. :D You've mentioned stickiness a few times and you're so right. It takes more than a pretty cover and a cool blurb to maintain ranking (and income), and your experience shows you've got it! Of course, you also have pretty covers and cool blurbs. ;D

Congratulations, and here's to ever-increasing sales! :)
 
#11 ·
Congrats! This is a great story. Thanks for sharing it. We hear a lot about successes (which is awesome in its own way), but not nearly so much about the hard work and frustrations that go into them.

ETA a question: Are you seeing more backlist sales due to the success of BMO? Or are BMO readers pretty much sticking to that series?
 
#17 ·
It was interesting seeing your numbers. I've experienced something VERY similar. I don't think this is uncommon at all. I'm a few months ahead of you, it does keep climbing.

Also, just one piece of advice. Don't get discouraged when suddenly things plummet because they still do that once in a while. December and January were both 3-4k months for me, Feb was less than 2, March looks like I could have my first 10k month. But I'm not holding my breath :). Maybe. If I maintain my current numbers, it will be. But I don't have any scheduled promotions.

I've put in my notice, I'm quitting the day job in June (I'm a teacher.) But February was really scary because I thought, "Oh, crap, what have I done?"

Now, I'm glad I didn't go begging for my job back.

I hope you keep climbing!!!  Good luck!!!



 
#18 ·
Thanks for the support everybody! It is a little daunting posting my numbers like this, even to my usual steely self. I thought showing the month to month grind was important.

Sonya Bateman said:
Happy anniversary! That is such an impressive progression -- I'll bet you're going to end up doubling, tripling, and more-ing your income as you release more books in this series!
Thanks Sonya! Here's hoping we all have a great 2016.

GhostGirlWriter said:
Are you seeing more backlist sales due to the success of BMO? Or are BMO readers pretty much sticking to that series?
My stand-alone, Shade City has definitely had an uptick in sales, going from a perpetual 200-300k ranking to 20-30k. That book is closer to standard urban fantasy, although it deviates quite a bit. I hadn't ever even read the Dresden Files when I wrote it!

My Sycamore Moon series reads more like supernatural crime novels, so those haven't upticked as much.

Matt Ryan said:
Do you have a publishing schedule set out for this year?
Having a plan of future books is absolutely part of my business now, where it wasn't before. I only plan out about 6 months ahead right now, though. It's better to keep things simple while I'm launching this new series. 6 months from now my plans might fork in a couple directions.

kimberlyloth said:
It was interesting seeing your numbers. I've experienced something VERY similar. I don't think this is uncommon at all. I'm a few months ahead of you, it does keep climbing.

Also, just one piece of advice. Don't get discouraged when suddenly things plummet because they still do that once in a while. December and January were both 3-4k months for me, Feb was less than 2, March looks like I could have my first 10k month. But I'm not holding my breath :). Maybe. If I maintain my current numbers, it will be. But I don't have any scheduled promotions.

I've put in my notice, I'm quitting the day job in June (I'm a teacher.) But February was really scary because I thought, "Oh, crap, what have I done?"

Now, I'm glad I didn't go begging for my job back.

I hope you keep climbing!!! Good luck!!!
Thanks for sharing, Kimberly! I SO hope you're right! But it's true that we can't sit on our laurels and that income every month isn't automatic. It's the long-term picture we need to figure out. Congrats on figuring out yours and setting up your new day job!
 
#20 ·
Domino Finn said:
Thanks for sharing, Kimberly! I SO hope you're right! But it's true that we can't sit on our laurels and that income every month isn't automatic. It's the long-term picture we need to figure out. Congrats on figuring out yours and setting up your new day job!
Oh yeah, it wasn't until I sat down and outlined a plan to become successful, that I actually starting being successful. I don't have them all in my signature (because I can never remember how to update it) but I have seven books out with four more coming out in the next six months.

I'm working my rear off, but it is soooooo rewarding. I can't wait to be able to focus only on the books.
 
#22 ·
Wonderful. :)
 
#26 ·
Thanks for being so open with the numbers. Love that. This is remarkably similar to my own progression; I'll have to post them sometime when I cross a milestone (3 year mark has already come and gone, alas). Only difference is I haven't had a book earn around $2k in a month without the help of your friendly neighborhood BookBub.

Stating the obvious, I think you've found struck on something with BMOthat you can really build off of.

I also got a few terrible initial reviews. On, like, my first six or seven books. Those were pretty discouraging. Hooray perseverance (or masochism).

Nick
 
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