Sales so far this month...

My sales have sucked on Amazon, but they're up on B&N. Go figure.

My amazon sales are decent (or normal).  I'm averaging almost 60 sales a day across the board.  Today has been bad, but I think it's because those December reports are finally getting ready to be released (can't wait to see what the borrow rate was).

By BN sales have tanked.  Had a great November, and then not much of anything for December or January. 

My sales volume has been okay, but they are mostly the 99 cent titles. I usually average about 90 cent per sale over a month, but thus far am averaging about 60 cents

On the positive side, I think most of the new sales are being driven by a project wonderful ad I have running on a minecraft blog.

Sales have been slow for me too. I was really hoping they'd be boosted since I released 3 episodes in a new episodic series. Gonna try and do some marketing.

We're seeing lower spending in our associates account, too. Retail is typically down two weeks after Christmas, BUT, what makes this even worse this year is most Americans lost $100 or more in their paycheck thanks to the loss of the Social Security tax break. I know for us, we lost $300 each month because we've had two raises since the tax break took effect (my husband moved up two ranks).

:/ It will get better in February.

Sucky.
Had a decent two-day promo which now totally fell off the cliff.
I went from selling about 25 per day between the two sci-fi titles just last week to 3-4 each over the last few days. WTH? Ranks utterly annihilated.
Not a happy camper

I don't see how Amazon's sales reports would impact sales reporting. That would mean all of us will suddenly see a clump of sales when they're done crunching numbers? Didn't happen last month. Won't happen this month.

We're such an optimistic bunch, though. Since I started this late summer, every month there is a thread such as this, and every time there is some reason for low sales and an assurance that next month will be better. What have we got, if not hope

Good. Very good. My rankings haven't improved on at least a number of my novels, in fact those have slipped slightly so I assume a lot of other authors are seeing the same. As good as last year? I don't think so but that's my fault for not getting Not for Glory out in December. But then again, I also have more books out to bring home the money for me.

My Atlantis series (three books) is rocking... up like 800 percent. My best seller (Tear in Time) is DOWN by nearly 75 percent (after Amazon played games with the "also boughts"). All in all though, across all seven titles, I'm actually running well ahead of last years numbers, by nearly 2X. Unfortunately, I know the party will end very soon. Last year, the sales boom ended sometime in February, so I'm sure it'll be the same this year too.

As for sales across the other channels, B&N, SW, Sony, etc., they're all up slightly, but nothing to write about...  but wait, I'm writing about it (ok, that was an exceedingly bad joke - lol). Anyway, it looks like they're up about 50 percent or so. But that's not really saying much because typically I only sell a handful a month there.

If anyone has any suggestions on how to improve sales at Smashwords (and the others), I'm all ears

What sales? 

Skate said:

What sales?

Click to expand...

I'm right there with you.

What JR said.

Hm...dare I use that cocky-looking sunglasses emoticon? Nah. Too arrogant. Instead I will express my empathy for the rest of you who are suffering. 

Wait, I think that was worse. Sh*t. Sorry. I'm SORRY!

ChristopherDavidPetersen said:

As for sales across the other channels, B&N, SW, Sony, etc., they're all up slightly, but nothing to write about... but wait, I'm writing about it (ok, that was an exceedingly bad joke - lol). Anyway, it looks like they're up about 50 percent or so. But that's not really saying much because typically I only sell a handful a month there.

If anyone has any suggestions on how to improve sales at Smashwords (and the others), I'm all ears

Click to expand...

I actually sold a copy of my novel at SW before selling any at Amazon. However then the rules of the universe reasserted themselves and now I have 4 times as many sales at Amazon than at SW.

I assume anyone who succeeds more at SW relatively speaking than at Amazon probably got the luck of the draw, as there isn't really a way to promote stuff at SW.

I have some sales, and I'm grateful for those. I feel bad for the people who were expecting a big post-Christmas bonanza. I was pessimistic and not expecting one, but I'd say sales are down even from my low expectations.

One of my new short stories is doing well. Total fluke, but it's only 99cents, so ... yeah ... higher tax bracket here I come.

Holy shit, Robert, those 2013 sales are awesome.

I can't complain about mine. B&N finally came in with about 85 sales, and I have about 90 on Kobo for January. Amazon sales I have no idea (see the other thread, since I'm locked out of my account). I think no more than a handful. My Amazon sales have been truly pathetic lately.

Sales are good...not sure if I'd be saying that if I hadn't gotten part 2 of my trilogy out in time for Christmas. Part 3 out Feb. 1, so hopefully that will keep momentum rolling a bit.

Dalya said:

I feel bad for the people who were expecting a big post-Christmas bonanza.

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Yeah, a lot of people only got through The Autumn That Must Never Be Mentioned Again by convincing themselves that Black Friday, then mid-December, then post-Christmas, then early January, sales would be made of rainbows and glitter and win, despite any real evidence. But that's okay, prawns. There's always Valentine's!

More or less half of my fifteen titles haven't sold since October. I think most of my books have the approximate visibility of a neutrino hidden by a cloaking device sitting in the blind spot of a man with no eyes, in the dark, at this point.

Quiss said:

Sucky.
Had a decent two-day promo which now totally fell off the cliff.
I went from selling about 25 per day between the two sci-fi titles just last week to 3-4 each over the last few days. WTH? Ranks utterly annihilated.
Not a happy camper

I don't see how Amazon's sales reports would impact sales reporting. That would mean all of us will suddenly see a clump of sales when they're done crunching numbers? Didn't happen last month. Won't happen this month.

We're such an optimistic bunch, though. Since I started this late summer, every month there is a thread such as this, and every time there is some reason for low sales and an assurance that next month will be better. What have we got, if not hope

Click to expand...

I don't see why it affects Amazon's reporting either, but most of us know the system isn't reporting in real-time like Amazon claims.

Plus, many, many authors experience days of barely any sales and they are always the week before sales reports come out, and the week before we are paid. You don't really get a huge amount of sales showing all at once as soon as the reports are out, but you will see a slight rise in sales over a few days sometime during the month if you had sales on those really slow days. It's only my opinion, but those better days are not really days your book is selling more, but just some of the sales you previously had but never were showing on your reports.

Kobo still continues to climb for me - but Kindle is stuck in a rut.

The cliff came for me in August with a slight boost in October. I shouldn't complain (ah, why not?) but with 25 books published, I should be doing better in total than I am.

I've got a new release next week (second in a series), a free run of the first book a few days later, and a lot of promos purchased for both. I'll be blogging, fb'ing and tweeting as well as having a sacrificial chicken for dinner both nights (there seems to be a shortage of goats lately).