# Kris Rusch says we're doing free (and POD pricing) wrong



## Guest (Jan 23, 2014)

Kris Rusch's latest discoverability post is up, and it's sure to spark a heated discussion because she disagrees with almost all of the accepted wisdom on these boards about free promotions, bookbub, Select, and perma-free. Still, she makes some good points, especially about getting crap reviews when you give your books away all the time. What do you guys think?


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## JRTomlin (Jan 18, 2011)

Joe Vasicek said:


> Kris Rusch's latest discoverability post is up, and it's sure to spark a heated discussion because she disagrees with almost all of the accepted wisdom on these boards about free promotions, bookbub, Select, and perma-free. Still, she makes some good points, especially about getting crap reviews when you give your books away all the time. What do you guys think?


Her comments agree with my own experience that what works best as a promotion is a highly discounted product. I don't see that she says not to use Bookbub. Lots of us use it for loss leader promotions, which is exactly what she advocates as far as I have read. (But I haven't finished reading the post)



> The best use of the "free" strategy, however, is to give away the first book in a series for a limited time only. Make sure you have at least two more books in that series, or the math will not work. - See more at: http://kriswrites.com/2014/01/22/the-business-rusch-pricing-part-2-or-discoverability-part-7-continued/#sthash.R7mlE4uv.dpuf


This is exactly what people do on Bookbub every day of the week although I use 99 Cents because 'free' is difficult to time unless you're in Select. Even that goes along with her thinking though, because it is "discounted to an obscenely low price" to use her phrase.

I am sure there will be people here who will rant about disagreeing with her. I don't. I find the concept of loss leaders in a series to make perfect sense.


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## Guest (Jan 23, 2014)

For discounts, yes. For free promotions, no.


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## JRTomlin (Jan 18, 2011)

Joe Vasicek said:


> For discounts, yes. For free promotions, no.


I know dozens of people at least who do that with free promotions on Bookbub for the first in a series and say that it works. My only objection is the difficulty of timing 'free' if you're not in Select.

ETA: If you don't believe me, read that 70+ page Bookbub thread.

Ah. I just came to her comments about not 'paying' to give your books away. I know a lot of people it works for and most of us even in the heyday of Select paid for at least some ads.

She is right that if you advertise a free book on Bookbub, it has to generate a lot more sales to pay for itself. It still may be worth it if you have plenty of books out.


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## Usedtoposthere (Nov 19, 2013)

I think that her arguments are ones I've heard again and again, here and elsewhere, and that I won't change any minds with the evidence of my experience (on her ideas of a Free-promo'd book having no hope of becoming a bestseller, paying to promote your promotion being a waste of money, poor reviews BECAUSE the book was free (as opposed to "because the book reached a large, diverse audience"), etc.  

Bella Andre had a book free yesterday. Nora Roberts had one a while back too, I believe. Kris better hustle on over and tell Bella and Nora how they're doing it wrong.

She has some points in there--like timing a promo around the release of the latest book in series--that are obvious common sense. But, um, if you don't promote that promo, it's not going to do you much good, not these days. So I'd say her knowledge of the effective use of this strategy appears limited.


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## JRTomlin (Jan 18, 2011)

Rosalind James said:


> I think that her arguments are ones I've heard again and again, here and elsewhere, and that I won't change any minds with the evidence of my experience (on her ideas of a Free-promo'd book having no hope of becoming a bestseller, paying to promote your promotion being a waste of money, poor reviews BECAUSE the book was free (as opposed to "because the book reached a large, diverse audience"), etc.
> 
> Bella Andre had a book free yesterday. Nora Roberts had one a while back too, I believe. Kris better hustle on over and tell Bella and Nora how they're doing it wrong.
> 
> She has some points in there--like timing a promo around the release of the latest book in series--that are obvious common sense. But, um, if you don't promote that promo, it's not going to do you much good, not these days. So I'd say her knowledge of the effective use of this strategy appears limited.


You might want to re-read what she said and think about that rant. She said that free can often work. So your point is?


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## Usedtoposthere (Nov 19, 2013)

JRTomlin said:


> You might want to re-read what she said and think about that rant. She said that free can often work. So your point is?


I don't think I was ranting, was I? I try very hard not to rant. I think I was disagreeing, by saying that she makes arguments I've read a lot, about such things as
1) Setting a book free will get you slammed with one-star reviews
2) You shouldn't pay to promote a free book with sites like BookBub
3) You won't get good sales on the free book, let alone bestseller-type sales, once it comes off Free

There were a number of others, too, but I didn't read all of them carefully, because as I said, I didn't think anybody's mind would be changed on this topic. I guess that was my point: it's some of the same arguments I've heard a lot, and people don't seem to be swayed by evidence either way.

She does say free can work with "a strategy," which she defines. I guess I'd just say that it can and does also work with "other strategies."


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## Vaalingrade (Feb 19, 2013)

Temp-free for sounds like bad medicine all around.

First, in order to do that you either have to go permafree (a ~2 week process) and then drop out of it... somehow (a process that is pretty much random and uncontrollable), or use Select, which, frankly, I would rather gargle with battery acid than do.

Second, *none of your giveaways will count toward a list the second you stop being free* that means it does NOTHING for sales rank. So congratulations, you've paid a lot of money praying for the long tail... which is a lot shorter because you're not on the free lists.

The power of free is staying power. You get on the list, you hang out on the list, people find you thanks to the list. That creates a sustainable source of visibility for your series, easily maintained by well placed ads on less expensive and restrictive sites than Bookbub.

I get her logic, but it's based on _grocery store_ usage of loss-leaders and sort of forgets that grocery stores have loss-leaders ever week, it's just that they switch the product being used for it. Not something ebook authors can easily emulate unless you have 52 different series to put the first one free each week.

Edit: I also like how the takeaway from the Twelve Years a Slave thing is 'permafree totally doens't work gais' and not 'people are embarrassingly gullible'.


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## 90daysnovel (Apr 30, 2012)

Permafree doesn't have to be a loss leader at all, in that the 'per unit' cost is so minimal that it isn't really a loss. Once production costs (editing, art etc) have been amortized, the only loss by giving away free eBooks is an opportunity cost, which is why the 'Don't give away more than 100 televisions' logic is faulty. Permafree works in that it creates a greater opportunity (via word of mouth, visibility via algorithm benefits etc) than it costs. 

There are free books which don't do well. There are plenty of paid books doing badly too. But permafree is like turning the difficultly level down to 'Casual'. You'll get some eyeballs on your work without having to actively promote it with paid adverts. It's as close to a passive income generator you'll ever find in publishing, so long as you have something worth selling after the free taste.


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## AngryGames (Jul 28, 2013)

> I am sure there will be people here who will rant about disagreeing with her.


No rant necessary. I just disagree about the free thing being 'bad' or ruining my day because it will get bad reviews.

However, every author has a different experience and there is no one size fits all, which is the main reason I don't read 'advice' blogs for writers.

case in point:



> The other big risk of offering a book for free? The increase in negative reviews. Everyone who has ever offered a book for free has experienced this.


Everyone = hyperbole, which reinforces my opinion that advice blogs like this are worthless to everyone but the blogger.

I'm in no way saying she is an idiot (she isn't, she's quite successful), or doesn't know what she's talking about (she does, for herself based on her experiences). But whenever I read these blanket statements...



> When you offer a loss leader to everyone, then a good percentage of the recipients will not like the product.


Rubbish. Had to stop reading.


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## Carradee (Aug 21, 2010)

Vaalingrade said:


> Temp-free for sounds like bad medicine all around.


Russell Blake seems to be doing well with it. He used the freebie until the ROI made it worth switching to paid (if I recall correctly).

As for folks like Hugh Howey&#8230; The funny thing about his freebie? Everyone I've met in person who's heard of _Wool_ didn't even know the first novelette is a freebie. If they've read it, they've gone straight to the omnibus. It's completely different audiences. (My sample size was >100 people to get 10 who've even heard of him, by the way. I'm the type of introvert who's comfortable in a crowd, even one of strangers. I just find it draining and need solitude to recharge afterward.)



Vaalingrade said:


> I get her logic, but it's based on _grocery store_ usage of loss-leaders


Not really. It's based on how audiences in the marketplace diverge. You definitely pick up fans with freebies, but there are also would-be fans who ignore free titles. Stick to one price point-whatever it is-and you're promoting to one audience at the expense of others. A freebie, offered to an audience at large, is like bringing a sprinkler to a water gun fight. You'll hit your target (audience), but you'll hit a bunch of spots outside your target, too, which may or may not be to your ultimate benefit.

I know very few people with an e-reader. Most of them started off downloading a bunch of freebies, got startled by the erratic quality, and now stick to Project Gutenberg for freebies and buy whatever else they want to read. Unless I nag them about a freebie I recommend-and even then, I have to send them a link and nag them, for them to read it.



JRTomlin said:


> She is right that if you advertise a free book on Bookbub, it has to generate a lot more sales to pay for itself. It still may be worth it if you have plenty of books out.


Which she herself admits; she just doesn't recommend it, at least in part due to the delayed ROI.



AngryGames said:


> > When you offer a loss leader to everyone, then a good percentage of the recipients will not like the product.
> 
> 
> Rubbish. Had to stop reading.


So your personal experience runs counter to years (if not decades) of information on how business, marketing, and audiences function. Interesting. Makes me wonder what makes you such an outlier. Do you have any ideas? [my tone = intrigued, not snarky]



AngryGames said:


> Everyone = hyperbole, which reinforces my opinion that advice blogs like this are worthless to everyone but the blogger.


Hyperbole by definition is intentionally exaggerated generalization, not intended to be taken literally, so your reaction puzzles me, tbh.

She does say point-blank at the end of her post that she's speaking of the majority and not outliers; perhaps 1% of folks' experience will differ, confirming she was using that "everyone" as a generalization that's true of the vast majority in the situation she describes.


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## David &#039;Half-Orc&#039; Dalglish (Feb 1, 2010)

The post is full of either the blatantly obvious (perma-free works for series) or the blatantly wrong (never pay for a free book ad, because people might not like it, and you'll need to sell more books to make back the cost, which apparently would just be impossible). When she puts far more love for getting your books into libraries than any sort of price pulsing or sales or perma-freebies, it's clear delusion-land is where this advice is both coming from, and where it's going to get you.

*edited to add*

From near the bottom of her post:


> Those of you who don't agree, don't sully the comments section. Write your own blog post with numbers to back up your claim to prove it.


"Screw you people with like, math and sales numbers. Go write that on your own blogs. I, however, don't want to see them." This is verified that her *own post* has zero sales numbers to back up her advice. Instead, we get anecdotes about soap.


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## Pnjw (Apr 24, 2011)

The only thing I have to say about this is that I will use whatever strategy gives me the highest return. Am I missing out on some people who never pick up free books? Sure. Am I running the risk of a bookstore not stocking my paperback? Sure. But the question becomes do I move more books and make more money by offering a permafree and a lower price paper book? The answer for me is yes. So honestly if I lose a few potential readers who won't sample my permafree, so what?


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## Guest (Jan 23, 2014)

These series of posts are making less and less sense to me. The problem is she just doesn't have the numbers to back up her theories, whereas others do. I also have my own numbers, and I know that free works as one of many strategies. What all this boils down to is KKR has no more idea of what works than anyone else with their own method.


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## Courtney Milan (Feb 27, 2011)

My introductory novella to my series went free in March of 2013. The remainder of the books in that series stayed in the top 100 in historical romance for pretty much the entirety of 2013.

Not an accident.

The idea that you should be scared of greater exposure because of negative reviews is backwards. The inevitable consequence of greater exposure is that more people who are less likely to like your books will buy them, yes. But...the alternative, which is to NOT have people exposed to your books, is worse. And for every 1-star "Bleah, this book has sex!" review I get on my permafree, I get a 5-star review saying, "I didn't think I would like historical romance, but this was amazing." Every time I get a 1 star review, I nod approvingly because it means I'm expanding my reach and more people are taking a chance on me as an author.

I care about growing my audience. I'm not going to do that if I never take any chances.

I appreciate that she's debunking advice that's four years old, but since I haven't seen the words "post-free bump" anywhere recently, that's irrelevant.

The reason I think she thinks that permafree doesn't work is something I've said consistently about Kris and her husband--there is no evidence, anywhere, that either of them have ever had a book sell extraordinarily well on Amazon. They are not writers that get amazing traction. They're making a decent living because they have so many damned books out there--not because they actually know how to sell well. There is no word-of-mouth buzz from readers about her books or her husband's books.

Permafree works for me--and continues to work for me--because readers tell their friends to read my books. This month on Amazon US, 9,367 people have downloaded the first book in my series. I have 4,172 sales of the full-length book that follows, and 4,070 sales of the book after that. These numbers are a little high--I'm getting more people buying the first book because I just released a new one, and that's catalyzing sales of #1, too. More typically, in October of 2013, on Amazon US, I gave away 9,867 copies of my permafree, and sold 1,631 copies of book one and 1,712 copies of book #2. So I'm getting about a 16% follow on. There is no other way I'd be selling that many copies of book #1 and #2 three months after the release of Book #2.

When a reader says "I loved this book by Courtney Milan" to a friend, they can follow it with "The first one is free, try it!" My permafree book turns buzz into readers.

There's no evidence they've even tried permafree, so I really don't understand what she's basing all this on.

Editing to add: since the numbering scheme above could be confusing, the book that is free is an introductory novella that I think of as Book #0. Book #1 is a full-length book at $3.99. Book #2 is a full-length book at $3.99. There is also a book 1.5 in there that I haven't mentioned, and I recently released Book #3.


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## Guest (Jan 23, 2014)

Courtney Milan said:


> My introductory novella to my series went free in March of 2013. The remainder of the books in that series stayed in the top 100 in historical romance for pretty much the entirety of 2013.
> 
> Not an accident.
> 
> ...


It's like you're in my head! 

I like both KKR and DWS. They say a lot of good things, but yes, I see no evidence of any of their books doing well. DWS' stuff languishes way way down in the rankings. Without their huge catalogue and their workshops, where's the evidence that their ideas are viable to those without a huge catalogue trickling in pennies here and there?


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## PhoenixS (Apr 5, 2011)

With all due respect to Kris, while I believe she understands the economics of print (though I can't speak to that as most of the authors I work with don't have their print rights so I freely admit no first-hand knowledge there), I don't believe she quite understands the economics of ebooks and the way the *recommendation* algos at Amazon, BN, iTunes and, god-love-em, even Kobo bolster discoverability when it comes to free and low pricing. Her assertions about free books being in the Top 100 after Select began is simply not true. And it doesn't seem she understands how their algos for ranking work at all either. She's making guesses about how well free might or might not work rather than citing qualified sources. She's using fuzzy math because I don't believe she's actually studied the economics of the *digital* market closely, or her conclusions would be different.

I've built a business using free and low prices. Note I use the term *business* and not religion. I've managed the giveaways of 1.3 million books over the last 2 years and earned our hybrid authors (Jennifer Blake, Christina Skye, Lynette Vinet and others) more selling low-priced ebooks than they're making from their trade print side. I fully agree you need to have a strategy using free. And I agree you need to be selling books in the right genres for it to work most successfully. And, like most successful business tactics, it will work best for those who study the market and who best understand the drivers and trends around those tactics.

I'm not clear at this point -- and yes, I've read each of her posts -- whether she's now addressing the newbie author or the hybrid with backlist, but I work with both. I can say free and low-price tactics can work for both so long as the author has a clear idea how to go about it. Today's post doesn't really do anything to help an author figure out *how* to use free both strategically and successfully. And it seems from her comments she doesn't intend to delve further. Since she mentions turning these posts into a resource book for writers, I think she's doing a disservice not to give them the tools to help them strategize and be successful if they do use the free/low-price model as part of their marketing plan. And perma-free is a very, very valid option. Check right here on KBoards for validation of its viability. There are plenty of stats here to back up that position. What I'm seeing in Kris' posts is a lot of hypothetical and theory and few, if any, numbers to validate it.

To clarify, I don't sell short stories, so I can't comment on the tactics needed to move them in any substantial quantities. Selling shorts requires a vastly different marketing plan than selling long novellas and novels. As Kris says, there is no one-size-fits-all. But if she and Dean are mainly pushing shorts, they're seeing a very different market than the novelists among us.

What I have done is work with others to demonstrate the power of the algorithms used as tools in marketing strategies. Tactics that are no more "cheats" in digital marketing than co-oping front table visibility or drugstore dumps. It's just jockeying for position the way any marketing department works. If (generic) you don't understand the algos when you build a marketing plan, it's like not knowing how much traffic different venues get before deciding where to do your book drops. Understanding the algorithms and working *with * them is not the same as *gaming* them. It's business intel that can be acted upon. And every online store relies on them.

Selling digital is different than selling print, and a lot of us have been in that selling game as long as Kris has, so there's no experience benefit there. Until I see something in the way of proof that her ebook marketing advice is better than that offered in, say, Let's Get Visible, then it means less than most people's advice here on KB. At least the folk here are providing hard data and results. We've anted up. Do you think Kris will call?


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## Donna White Glaser (Jan 12, 2011)

We're doing free wrong? But I'm making money doing that. Guess that'll have to stop RIGHT NOW. Thanks, Kris.


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## WDR (Jan 8, 2014)

Reading her article, it struck me that her comments about putting an ebook up for free were within the context of trying to "game" Amazon's ranking algorithms, not in the context of giving readers the first book free and getting them hooked so they'll buy the second book free.

I think Rusch was commenting only from that angle, that of trying to fool Amazon's system to get your book up into the top 100. She did mention at the start of that section that "When used properly, 'free' is a strategy that works."

It certainly shows that most of the people commenting here understand the concept of the _loss leader_, giving the first book away free to entice people into buying the rest of the series. We all understand the value of the free sample, but I don't think that was her focus. I also think that was her mistake, because she should have broadened the view to consider those scenarios and make clearer what she was focusing on.


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## Jim Johnson (Jan 4, 2011)

I think this is the best piece of advice in the post:



> But&#8230;think twice before you use a strategy that has become really common among indie booksellers.


I love kboards but there are times it sounds like lemmings chasing lemmings. "Everyone's doing perma-free! Gotta do permafree!"

Reminds me of when I was just getting started in tradpub submissions and everyone was convinced the one true way was to do a proper cover letter, get the proper manuscript format, submit to agents, run on the rejection treadmill until you got a sale. It was just How It Was Done.

Gradually, writers found another way to publish, and the One True Way wasn't the only option any more. I'm feeling like perma-free is like that; it's an option, but not the Only Way. If everyone is doing option A, maybe option B fits your goals better. Or maybe there's an option C no one has though of yet. Maybe the difference between blazing your own trail vs following someone else's.


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## Courtney Milan (Feb 27, 2011)

JimJohnson said:


> I think this is the best piece of advice in the post:
> 
> I love kboards but there are times it sounds like lemmings chasing lemmings. "Everyone's doing perma-free! Gotta do permafree!"
> 
> ...


The thing is, nobody is saying that you have to do permafree. People have just said, "This works for me." Some people have tried it and felt it didn't work. Some people have tried it and felt it did work. Do whatever you want. Nobody's stopping you. And hey, free is a decision, not a death sentence. You make a book free, it's not that hard to take it off free. Try things. Learn a little.

Kris is the one who said it didn't work and you shouldn't do it without providing numbers or examples. Despite the "no one way" disclaimer at the front, she's the one who said "This doesn't work."

I have no problem with people doing their own thing, but it's really annoying to see someone who has NEVER TRIED A STRATEGY and who isn't operating a business in a way that would benefit from a strategy say it doesn't work in general. How would she know?

And that's my biggest problem with them both. There is NO EVIDENCE that she and her husband are doing anything other than selling a very small handful of copies on a very large number of books. Why would you listen to a word they have to say about discoverability when for the most part, they aren't getting discovered?


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## Quiss (Aug 21, 2012)

Averaged 20-30 sales per month for Book Two over the last six months.
Made Book One permafree end of Dec.
Have sold 200 copies of Book Two so far this month. The other are also way up. No deluge of drive by one-stars.

It's working for me. Maybe not in the millions but better than anything else I've tried so far. I'm at the top of the free list for my sub-genre, exactly where I need to be with Book One. I'm not shooting for the overall Top 100 list.


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## ElHawk (Aug 13, 2012)

JRTomlin said:


> I know dozens of people at least who do that with free promotions on Bookbub for the first in a series and say that it works. My only objection is the difficulty of timing 'free' if you're not in Select.


That's been my experience. The free promo I did on Bookbub was awesome, but I had that book in Select at the time so I had precise control over when the book went free. It would be difficult to work free + Bookbub unless it was on a permafree title, and then Bookbub probably wouldn't take it. Deep discounts for loss leaders make much more sense to me at this point. I'm still very interested in experimenting with permafreeing the first in a series to see what it does to the rest of the books, but rolling discounts of first books in series looks much smarter at this point in time.


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## beccaprice (Oct 1, 2011)

> I recently released Book #3.


Does this mean that the Mistress Rebellion is out? (I want that book!)

in other news, I've had a perma-free book since I started publishing (June 2013, so not all that long). It gets downloaded by the hundreds. I haven't seen any carry-over to my other books, though.

I'm going to publish two more short stories (illustrated, but not ILLUSTRATED - just spot pictures) over the next few months, and I may very well put one of them up as perma-free, to see whether the lack of carry-over was due to the specific perma-free book, or that perma-free just doesn't work for my writing, which is non-series fairy tales.


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## ElHawk (Aug 13, 2012)

Courtney Milan said:


> The idea that you should be scared of greater exposure because of negative reviews is backwards. The inevitable consequence of greater exposure is that more people who are less likely to like your books will buy them, yes.


Exactly. If you only ever had good reviews before, and now suddenly you're getting a few bad ones, that only indicates that you're finally starting to reach a wider audience. Rejoice. And a few bad reviews are nothing to trip out about. They won't ruin your sales, and they'll only ruin your day if you allow them to.


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## jcalloway (Jan 10, 2014)

WDR said:


> Reading her article, it struck me that her comments about putting an ebook up for free were within the context of trying to "game" Amazon's ranking algorithms, not in the context of giving readers the first book free and getting them hooked so they'll buy the second book free.
> 
> I think Rusch was commenting only from that angle, that of trying to fool Amazon's system to get your book up into the top 100. She did mention at the start of that section that "When used properly, 'free' is a strategy that works."
> 
> It certainly shows that most of the people commenting here understand the concept of the _loss leader_, giving the first book away free to entice people into buying the rest of the series. We all understand the value of the free sample, but I don't think that was her focus. I also think that was her mistake, because she should have broadened the view to consider those scenarios and make clearer what she was focusing on.


This.

Rusch posts free short stories on her blog every Monday, then replaces them with a new story the following Monday. She constantly offers her writing for free with the option to either buy the stories from distributors or to make a donation directly to her if you read and enjoyed her offerings. WMG Publishing also posts free audiobooks on a regular basis as well.

She is obviously not opposed to free as long as _she_ has control over the distribution of her samples.

I think the point she is trying to make about permafree on Amazon has to do with gaming the algorithm, which Amazon inevitably cracks down on, so it should not be relied on as the be-all end-all of your marketing plan. She _seems_ to be proposing a more lasting solution for using free samples, one that the author can control and that cannot be yanked away when the distributor catches wind of the practice. But her points are getting hazier each week as she continues to spend chunks of her discoverability posts snarking at "carpetbombers."


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## Edward W. Robertson (May 18, 2010)

There are some individual points within this post I agree with. For instance, making the first book in a series free to promote a new release in the series-yes, great tactic. It works well, and is even more effective if that first book is rarely if ever discounted, because the big sites are more likely to say, "Ooh, that's unusual," and throw the offer before their readers.

Of course, if that book is always free, then your stream of downloads month by month and year by year is probably going to outpace the effects of a brief sale.. but at least both tactics are effective.

Also, it is a well-reasoned piece-_if_ you agree with her basic assumptions:

"All business books recommend that a limited number of loss leaders. In other words, if you're giving away television sets to get people into your Best Buy, you better have no more than 100 television sets in stock, so that deal vanishes fairly quickly. ... Loss leaders should be scarce, to prevent stockpiling. This is where 'free' has lost its power. With so many writers offering so many books for free, readers have stockpiled books. If I read every free book on my e-reader, I wouldn't have to buy books for a year. (Don't tell Dean that.) Fortunately for you all, I do buy books anyway."

As for the first part, I don't care what all business books recommend. That's an appeal to authority. Toss that out the window. The crux of the argument, then, is that when too many people offer permanent loss leaders, readers wind up with so much material that they never need to pay for an author's regularly priced books.

False. That's based on the idea that books are fungible. Well, if you're browsing a category without looking for any specific book, then yes, they are going to be pretty fungible. In that context, a buying decision is going to come down to what's visible, price, reviews, blurb, cover, personal preference, etc. Those things all guide a reader toward a decision, but since they're no guarantee that the reader will like the book they select, they're all imperfect. In that context, one book is pretty replaceable with another. Price may be a strong factor in the final decision.

But if you've read the first book in a series, and you really liked it, that information is an extremely powerful predictor that you're likely to enjoy the _next_ book in that series. So it is better to pay $3.99 for Book #2, which you know you'll probably like, than it is to pay $0.99 for Random Book X, which you have no good idea whether you'll enjoy. Unless you're on a very tight budget, at this point, price is far less important to your purchasing decision than knowledge.

You only have that knowledge because you read Book #1. Why did you choose Book #1 over Random Books A - ZZZ? Well, obviously that's mega complex. But if you narrowed your decision to Book #1 and Random Book A, and Book #1 was $0.99 while Random Book A is $5.99, I think, generally speaking, we can agree that Book #1 is going to win that battle most of the time.

And then all those readers will be much more likely to go on to read Books #2-Infinity.

That's why a permanent loss leader makes a lot of sense. Even in a sea of permanent loss leaders. Books are only fungible until they aren't.


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## David &#039;Half-Orc&#039; Dalglish (Feb 1, 2010)

Courtney Milan said:


> And that's my biggest problem with them both. There is NO EVIDENCE that she and her husband are doing anything other than selling a very small handful of copies on a very large number of books. Why would you listen to a word they have to say about discoverability when for the most part, they aren't getting discovered?


Well then, clearly her advice isn't for *you*. Didn't you read the five pages of caveats at the beginnings and ends of her post? Her advice is only for starting out authors who have written ten novels, all fiction, yet only begun self-publishing, are willing to pay money and have good covers, editing, and blurbs, and who have a solid internet presence, their books available on all markets, have read all of her discoverability posts, eat with their left hand, write while facing east, and are currently seeking out path K for discoverability options. Sheesh. So rude of you, Courtney.


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## Courtney Milan (Feb 27, 2011)

David 'Half-Orc' Dalglish said:


> Well then, clearly her advice isn't for *you*. Didn't you read the five pages of caveats at the beginnings and ends of her post? Her advice is only for starting out authors who have written ten novels, all fiction, yet only begun self-publishing, are willing to pay money and have good covers, editing, and blurbs, and who have a solid internet presence, their books available on all markets, have read all of her discoverability posts, eat with their left hand, write while facing east, and are currently seeking out path K for discoverability options. Sheesh. So rude of you, Courtney.


You're so right.

*sobs*

I eat with my right hand.


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## zoe tate (Dec 18, 2013)

> When you offer a loss leader to everyone, then a good percentage of the recipients will not like the product.


"Good percentage" is subjective.

But a higher percentage than if you *don't* offer a loss leader to everyone, obviously - that's Marketing 101.

In my opinion, people who disagree with that are simply uneducated regarding marketing. But there's the thing: writers generally _are_ comparatively uneducated in marketing matters, and that's nothing to be ashamed of.



Joe Vasicek said:


> Kris Rusch's latest discoverability post is up, and it's sure to spark a heated discussion because she disagrees with almost all of the accepted wisdom on these boards about free promotions, bookbub, Select, and perma-free. Still, she makes some good points, especially about getting crap reviews when you give your books away all the time. What do you guys think?


I think she's very successful at what she does, argues her case very convincingly with logic and evidence behind most of her assertions, has one or two undisclosed biases and prejudices (as we all do), and that authors, collectively, can learn quite a bit from her, overall. I've always thought this. I acknowledge, as well, that the way she writes on her blog can irritate some people, some of the time (and given the subject-matter, I don't think that's astonishing, either). I thnk that people who dismiss her observations and reasoning out-of-hand, because of _their own_ prejudices, are typically the losers for it.


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## zandermarks (May 20, 2013)

I think some of this depends on what choices you are facing, and this will vary based on where you are in your audience building, numbers of books written, and numbers of books sold.

If the choice is between (a) readers reading for free versus (b) readers paying for your books, then one set of rules applies.

But if your choice is between (a) readers reading for free versus (b) readers not reading your books at all, then I think another set of rules applies.

At this point, I'm in the latter group. I've got one book out, and it's one of those strange birds that people don't expect to like but then fall in love with. It fits into the broad genre category of "Urban Fantasy," but it also feels a little like Urban Fiction, although it's really not. One reviewer (Kirkus) even suggested that I have created a new sub-genre of Urban Fantasy with this book.

So unless people start talking about it, it's not going anywhere. And to get people talking about it, I have to get people reading it. (Interestingly, when I did a free giveaway last summer, my review averages went up, not down, and some of the review statements blew me away--saying they liked my protagonist better than Odd Thomas, for example, and other statements I found equally mind-blowing.)

So at this point I'm taking a bit of a tie-dyed/Grateful Dead attitude to the question of giving it away, because I don't think my little oddball book wants to play nice with readers' existing expectations, and I need to find my initial base of readers.


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## philstern (Mar 14, 2011)

I agree with her points about perma-free. I know it's worked very well for some people, but I've always thought that it dilutes things in the long run.


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## Mark E. Cooper (May 29, 2011)

JimJohnson said:


> I think this is the best piece of advice in the post:
> 
> I love kboards but there are times it sounds like lemmings chasing lemmings. "Everyone's doing perma-free! Gotta do permafree!"


It's not just permafree though, its chasing what works surely?. You wouldn't say we're lemmings if it was profession editing or covers we were "chasing" would you? You would say of course you should do that! Doh, no brainer. We chase what works not because we are lemmings, but because it DOES work.


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## Jim Johnson (Jan 4, 2011)

philstern said:


> I agree with her points about perma-free. I know it's worked very well for some people, but I've always thought that it dilutes things in the long run.


That's something I've been trying to figure out how to articulate. Everyone offering perma-free stuff could result in a marketplace trained to expect every writer to provide something for freesies. Going into publishing with the expectation that you will HAVE to give something away IMO isn't a great idea. I'm all for price pulsing and making something free temporarily, like with a Select free day or a coupon giveaway or the like, but putting something up for free, forever, rankles my own personal sensibilities. Everyone's mileage varies, naturally.


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## Quiss (Aug 21, 2012)

JimJohnson said:


> but putting something up for free, forever, rankles my own personal sensibilities. Everyone's mileage varies, naturally.


Never say forever.
Would you be less rankled if someone ran a freebie for two months as opposed to Select-sanctioned five days? Permafree doesn't mean forever free. As soon as it quits working, I'd probably stop  Seems sensible.


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## Jim Johnson (Jan 4, 2011)

markecooper said:


> It's not just permafree though, its chasing what works surely?. You wouldn't say we're lemmings if it was profession editing or covers we were "chasing" would you? You would say of course you should do that! Doh, no brainer. We chase what works not because we are lemmings, but because it DOES work.


I agree that providing a good blurb, cover, editing, etc. and writing the best book you possibly can put together within your budget and means are all no-brainers. Do those to present the most professional and good quality book you can provide to readers.

I see pricing that product as a entirely separate element.


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## Jim Johnson (Jan 4, 2011)

Quiss said:


> Never say forever.
> Would you be less rankled if someone ran a freebie for two months as opposed to Select-sanctioned five days? Permafree doesn't mean forever free. As soon as it quits working, I'd probably stop  Seems sensible.


I was going with the assumption that perma-free meant permanently free, as in forever.  Limited time freebies, one time coupons, occasional sales, even permanently discounting (but charging something more than nothing) the first book in a series; I'm in love with all of those and will be using them to varying degrees. Kris's post touched on those.


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## minxmalone (Oct 28, 2012)

Edward W. Robertson said:


> The crux of the argument, then, is that when too many people offer permanent loss leaders, readers wind up with so much material that they never need to pay for an author's regularly priced books.
> 
> *False. That's based on the idea that books are fungible. *Well, if you're browsing a category without looking for any specific book, then yes, they are going to be pretty fungible. In that context, a buying decision is going to come down to what's visible, price, reviews, blurb, cover, personal preference, etc. Those things all guide a reader toward a decision, but since they're no guarantee that the reader will like the book they select, they're all imperfect. In that context, one book is pretty replaceable with another. Price may be a strong factor in the final decision.
> 
> But if you've read the first book in a series, and you really liked it, that information is an extremely powerful predictor that you're likely to enjoy the _next_ book in that series.


This has been my experience with offering free titles. The buying decision is driven by so much more than price. There are many free books available that I haven't downloaded. Why? Because I won't download a book that I'm not interested in just because it's free.

The book still has to be something I want for me to even care. Making it free is just removing the last obstacle that might stop a potential reader from trying me out. Books are not replaceable. People are downloading the book that Bella Andre just made free not just because of the price but because it's a BELLA ANDRE book and they wanted it even when it cost $4.99. The price drop just took away their last obstacle to getting it.


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## Justawriter (Jul 24, 2012)

Courtney Milan said:


> My introductory novella to my series went free in March of 2013. The remainder of the books in that series stayed in the top 100 in historical romance for pretty much the entirety of 2013.
> 
> When a reader says "I loved this book by Courtney Milan" to a friend, they can follow it with "The first one is free, try it!" My permafree book turns buzz into readers.


This exact conversation happened about your books. I don't read a ton of regencies and a friend was raving about your books and said, "her first one is free, you have to try it." So, I did. I wouldn't have otherwise because it's not what I normally read or look for, but someone told me about it and the fact that it was free made it a no-brainer. I think you might pick up a lot of new readers this way, people who step out of their normal reading range and take a chance because there's no risk.


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## Rykymus (Dec 3, 2011)

Free is like surgery. It can work, but there are risks, and it should only be used when necessary, and not on a regular basis.


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## MonkeyScribe (Jan 27, 2011)

JimJohnson said:


> Reminds me of when I was just getting started in tradpub submissions and everyone was convinced the one true way was to do a proper cover letter, get the proper manuscript format, submit to agents, run on the rejection treadmill until you got a sale. It was just How It Was Done.


But it _was _how it was done. It was pretty much the only way. So if you didn't follow that, you didn't stand a chance.



> Gradually, writers found another way to publish, and the One True Way wasn't the only option any more. I'm feeling like perma-free is like that; it's an option, but not the Only Way. If everyone is doing option A, maybe option B fits your goals better. Or maybe there's an option C no one has though of yet. Maybe the difference between blazing your own trail vs following someone else's.


We didn't "find" another way, one was offered to us and we took it. Plenty of people tried self-publishing before the advent of Amazon and the digital readers, but almost all of them failed. But I do agree that we're very fortunate that there are many different options now, more paths to success than have ever existed before.

However, saying there are many paths is not the same as claiming that you can stroll in any random direction and not still run the risk of stumbling over the cliff.


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## ElHawk (Aug 13, 2012)

zoe tate said:


> I think she's very successful at what she does, argues her case very convincingly with logic and evidence behind most of her assertions, has one or two undisclosed biases and prejudices (as we all do), and that authors, collectively, can learn quite a bit from her, overall. I've always thought this. I acknowledge, as well, that the way she writes on her blog can irritate some people, some of the time (and given the subject-matter, I don't think that's astonishing, either). I thnk that people who dismiss her observations and reasoning out-of-hand, because of _their own_ prejudices, are typically the losers for it.


Word up to all of this.


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## Monique (Jul 31, 2010)

Pretty much everything Phoenix and Courtney (and others ) said. Especially this:



Courtney Milan said:


> And that's my biggest problem with them both. There is NO EVIDENCE that she and her husband are doing anything other than selling a very small handful of copies on a very large number of books. Why would you listen to a word they have to say about discoverability when for the most part, they aren't getting discovered?


And ignore people who are (Phoenix and Courtney and others) who know what they're talking and walk the walk?


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## Vaalingrade (Feb 19, 2013)

Carradee said:


> Russell Blake seems to be doing well with it. He used the freebie until the ROI made it worth switching to paid (if I recall correctly).


That's not what's being discussed. Russell was permafree with a long, long time, then stopped. He didn't try and do stunt pricing like going free just for new releases.


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## blakebooks (Mar 10, 2012)

Hmmm.

For two years, I offered perma-free the first books in my JET and Assassin series.

During that time I went from 450 sales a month, in Dec, 2011, to over 450,000 units sold as of Dec, 2013. 

I am experimenting with having the first books now as paid. For one month, it's worked well, but the moment I think my sales are slowing, I wouldn't hesitate to run one or both free again for the duration - with a BB ad to kick them off.

True, you will get more one star reviews. You will also get more five star. At last count, JET had 863 reviews. 9 of those are one stars. I can live with that. 

If you simply ignore real world results, her dogma sounds convincing. Because I value results, not dogma or theory, I can disregard her counsel with a clear conscience. It reminds me of the advice I followed that said Select was a bad deal due to exclusivity (back in Dec, 2011). Made perfect sense, and was completely wrong.

It's a shame that some authors don't have the experience to understand why some things are just bad counsel. They're the ones who will suffer following it.


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## Cherise (May 13, 2012)

zandermarks said:


> I think some of this depends on what choices you are facing, and this will vary based on where you are in your audience building, numbers of books written, and numbers of books sold.
> 
> If the choice is between (a) readers reading for free versus (b) readers paying for your books, then one set of rules applies.
> 
> ...


I'm no one to talk, but I think you need to put out a sequel. I'm surprised you haven't by now!


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## Vaalingrade (Feb 19, 2013)

JimJohnson said:


> I love kboards but there are times it sounds like lemmings chasing lemmings.


Fun Fact: Lemmings do not actually leap to their deaths. What actually happens is they climb carefully down the cliff face to the beach below and then mate. So your analogy is correct, but not for the reason you intended.



David 'Half-Orc' Dalglish said:


> Well then, clearly her advice isn't for *you*. Didn't you read the five pages of caveats at the beginnings and ends of her post? Her advice is only for starting out authors who have written ten novels, all fiction, yet only begun self-publishing, are willing to pay money and have good covers, editing, and blurbs, and who have a solid internet presence, their books available on all markets, have read all of her discoverability posts, eat with their left hand, write while facing east, and are currently seeking out path K for discoverability options. Sheesh. So rude of you, Courtney.


Ironically, if your book is available in all markets the pricing stunts she's advocating are almost impossible to coordinate.


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## Gennita Low (Dec 13, 2012)

70 plus pages on Bookbub numbers and permafree showing mostly VERY positive results vs one blog post telling everyone they are wrong, with no numbers to back them up. Hmm. All rightee, then.


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## Usedtoposthere (Nov 19, 2013)

Something I've always wanted to say, and this seems like the right post to say it:
My experience with free & reviews is that "it varies." I have seen that some readers devalue it because it's free, or they pick it up because it's free when a more careful examination would have told them it wasn't for them (because it has sex in it, or whatever). 

BUT: I've also seen that some people will give it a more lenient grade because it's free, with an attitude of delighted astonishment, as in, "Hey! This was free! And yet it was a good book! Five stars!" LOL. When if they'd paid for it, maybe they would have given it four. And they'll talk it up more, too. "Good book! And FREE!" as Courtney says. More than they would with a paid book.

My sense is that the review average comes out in the wash.

FWIW, YMMV, and all that.


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## Sarah Woodbury (Jan 30, 2011)

Permafree works for me to the point that I made the first novel in both of my longer series permafree. YMMV.

I can't count the number of people who have said, "I saw the book was free, took a chance, loved it, and bought all the rest". The fact that readers can try one (or two) of my books for free makes them happy because if they don't like it, no harm, no foul.

That survey that Kendall posted the other day ... didn't it say that well over 50% of authors making over 250K had said that permafree was helpful in their success? http://theseasonforromance.com/wordpress/2014/01/the-self-publishing-survey-results-its-a-brave-new-world/

I like data


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## Adam Poe (Apr 2, 2012)

I will continue to use what is working for ME.

Since going perma-free, the following books in the series went from selling 1-2 a day on Amazon, to 20-22 a day. The book has been perma-free a long while now, too. I tried a 'deep discount' first instead, but that did not work near as well.

And saying you will get more bad reviews is kind of bogus. The extra reviews you get are proportionate to the amount of copies you are moving, in my experience. Obviously if you go from selling 1-2 copies a day to giving away 200 a day (as we are), you are going to get more reviews. And, so far, there has not been a huge influx of low stars. In fact, until today, we haven't gotten a below-4 in a few months and are sitting at 93 on US and 21 on UK.

I think I am using free correctly, because it is working for me and my funnel strategy. More readers.


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## zoe tate (Dec 18, 2013)

blakebooks said:


> For two years, I offered perma-free the first books in my JET and Assassin series.
> 
> During that time I went from 450 sales a month, in Dec, 2011, to over 450,000 units sold as of Dec, 2013.


I'm sure you'd be the first to agree that many other things have changed for you, during that time, Russell, especially regarding the number of books you have on sale and the following you've so steadily and impressively been attracting?

And that it wouldn't be at all logical to attribute that just to having the first books in your JET and Assassin series free during that time?

And that it's not as if you've been able to "split-test" it?

And that you actually can't tell - any more or less than anyone else could, in your position - to what extent that was the reason for it, simply because you haven't done the same thing without making them free? 

You're describing a correlation here, not a causation, aren't you?

No criticism at all, of course - just an inescapable observation, there.



blakebooks said:


> If you simply ignore real world results, her dogma sounds convincing.


Hers is "dogma" and yours are just "results"?

Or might you be using just a tiny bit of emotive language there, to describe the difference?

I'm not for a moment suggesting that she's right and you're wrong, but she certainly discussed a lot of evidence for her beliefs, if you read her whole series of articles. I'm not suggesting that you *need* or *ought* to read her whole series of articles on the subject, obviously: simply that you may be being a little unkind to speak of her perspective as a "dogma", you know?

To be fair to her, she _does_ appear to be making a living from the pricing policies she uses.


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## Monique (Jul 31, 2010)

Perhaps someone can clarify this part of the post.



> First, bookstore questions. Every once in a while my 30-year history in this business bites me in the ass, particularly when it comes to clarity. When I tell you that you will get on bookstore shelves if you price your paper books correctly (which means at least $2 profit to you in extended distribution-not $1.50, not $1.68, but $2), I don't mean you'll get on all bookstore shelves. Nor do I mean actual shelves.
> 
> Here's the hard truth about bookstores-and yes, I need to write a long post on this-no bookstore carries every book published that week, let alone that month or that year. When I was travelling last week, I stopped in bookstore after bookstore, from Hudson News to Powell's to some other indies whose names my tired brain can't remember, and none of them had one of my favorite mystery author's latest book. He's a New York Times bestseller and his book came out the day I left. I had special-ordered a copy, and figured I would regret it, because I'd see it everywhere. Instead, I saw it nowhere.
> 
> ...


She's saying if I want my paperback books to appear on the virtual shelves of stores like Mysterious Galaxy that I MUST price my books so that I have a $2 profit via expanded distro. Less than that and the books will not appear. Am I understanding that correctly?


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## Lloyd MacRae (Nov 18, 2012)

Vaalingrade said:


> What actually happens is they climb carefully down the cliff face to the beach below and then mate.


This self publishing stuff has perks I never expected.


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## Jim Johnson (Jan 4, 2011)

Monique said:


> Perhaps someone can clarify this part of the post.
> She's saying if I want my paperback books to appear on the virtual shelves of stores like Mysterious Galaxy that I MUST price my books so that I have a $2 profit via expanded distro. Less than that and the books will not appear. Am I understanding that correctly?


Based on reading her and Dean's blog posts in the past, I think what she means is that if you price your book in expanded distro and aren't making at least $2 profit off each copy sold, it's probably not worth the effort to do expanded distro. I don't think the bookstores give a crap about what the writer's profit is--they want to know how much they can discount the book and still make a profit for themselves.

I'm pretty sure you could set up your price through expanded distro so that you actually make no profit at all. But why would you?

Definitely one part of her blog post that could have been clearer.


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## Monique (Jul 31, 2010)

JimJohnson said:


> Based on reading her and Dean's blog posts in the past, I think what she means is that if you price your book in expanded distro and aren't making at least $2 profit off each copy sold, it's probably not worth the effort to do expanded distro. I don't think the bookstores give a crap about what the writer's profit is--they want to know how much they can discount the book and still make a profit for themselves.
> 
> I'm pretty sure you could set up your price through expanded distro so that you actually make no profit at all. But why would you?
> 
> Definitely one part of her blog post that could have been clearer.


That could be what she meant, but why not just say that? Why is $1.68 not good enough, but 32c more is? I mean, the point of that section is to tell you how to price to get onto virtual shelves, isn't it? Isn't the implication that if you don't price that way, you won't?


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## Mark E. Cooper (May 29, 2011)

JimJohnson said:


> Based on reading her and Dean's blog posts in the past, I think what she means is that if you price your book in expanded distro and aren't making at least $2 profit off each copy sold, it's probably not worth the effort to do expanded distro. I don't think the bookstores give a crap about what the writer's profit is--they want to know how much they can discount the book and still make a profit for themselves.
> 
> I'm pretty sure you could set up your price through expanded distro so that you actually make no profit at all. But why would you?
> 
> Definitely one part of her blog post that could have been clearer.


Actually, I read that part a little different. Let's say I charge $15.99 and make only $0.10 a book in extended. That means the book shop can't put it on its shelf with a decently deep discount to attract eyes to its shelves, because the discount is sort of already built in. But if I price at $18.99 (which doesn't matter a crap to any author because Amazon automatically discount to whatever they want and NEVER sell it at the prices we set anyway) the book shop can do a nice sign for its display saying $3 off while stocks last! And gain attention. They still only get the same money, we only get the same, but it attracts readers.

I read it like that. Could be BS for all I know, but the "min $2" thing is her way of telling us how to figure out a price, not how to make the $2 I think.


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## blakebooks (Mar 10, 2012)

Zoe: I can tell, because at one point I took the Assassin book off free, and sales on that series tanked. So I took it back perma-free, and they rebounded. That was over a year ago.

One can always claim that any results "aren't in a vacuum" and thus might not be causal. Anything could account for my sales (80% of which are for the two series that had a perma-free first book, BTW) including positive thinking, the market deciding I was just swell, good luck, my covers, etc. etc.

I read that one. That was enough. She cited a whole slew of data, none of which was ebook-related. Why, I have no idea, given that there is so much data from those who have run their first titles perma-free and watched their sales rocket. Perhaps because the data didn't support her position?

Sorry. It smacked of dogma to me. My experience is detailed as results. I did X, sales increased by Y amount. Now, again, we could certainly argue that's correlation, but when I see correlation with 70 pages of results articulated here on KB, specifically addressing that question, I have to ask myself how anyone spending even cursory time researching the effectiveness of perma-free could miss the #1 thread on the #1 board frequented by indie authors, outlining the hard numbers, for page after page.

Obviously I disagree with her position. That doesn't mean she's wrong. I could be. I'll just continue to muddle along doing what I'm doing, and leave the series of blog posts on how to excel as a self-pubbed author to those with the time to write them. I'm afraid I'm simply not a consumer of those, as my experience differs with much of the stuff bandied about as wisdom in some circles, i.e. not rewriting, not running perma-free, etc. To my admittedly biased ear, there are too many sour notes to make a tune, much less a symphony, in that wisdom. 

If she can post some hard numbers outlining how an author might be hurt by running perma-free, I'd be all ears. But anecdotes from unrelated industries dealing with hard goods vs. e-goods have no bearing on my ebook retail business.


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## Courtney Milan (Feb 27, 2011)

zoe tate said:


> Hers is "dogma" and yours are just "results"?
> 
> Or might you be using just a tiny bit of emotive language there, to describe the difference?
> 
> ...


Can you point me to the post where she discusses the permafree release that she made, and the effect that had on sales?

Because until then--yes, the dozens of people who say that permafree really can work are describing evidence, and she is describing an opinion not based in evidence. We can call it "dogma" or "poorly informed" or "not grounded in reality." I'm not sure what you would prefer, but generally, when someone makes a false statement of fact without examining the relevant evidence, I don't feel like anyone needs to call it anything other than that.

Permafree doesn't work for everyone, and not everyone wants to do it. I'm the last person to say everyone has to do the same thing. Nobody posting in this thread has said that permafree is the solution to everyone's problems.

But if you're going to claim that permafree doesn't work when there are surveys showing that basically every author that has made over six figures has done permafree... Well, you'd better have evidence. And Kris doesn't cite one dad-blamed anecdote about a permafree book for her assertion that permafree isn't a good strategy.

So yes, we're going to use different words to describe the side that has an 800+ author survey and numerous successful authors saying a particular strategy works under some circumstances, as compared to the person who wrote something decrying permafree without ever going permafree herself, citing no evidence of book sales at all.

That's not a double standard. That's called logic.

EDIT: Finally, on them making a living: Yeah, I believe they're making a living. With several hundred books between them. It's not hard to make a living with several hundred books.

But you know what? You can ALSO tell that they're not making a ton of money on their writing. How? Because they're still running workshop after workshop after workshop. Add the hours they're spending on workshops and the money they make from that. If they were making loads per book, it would not be profitable for them to run those workshops. It just wouldn't.


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## Donna White Glaser (Jan 12, 2011)

Vaalingrade said:


> Fun Fact: Lemmings do not actually leap to their deaths. What actually happens is they climb carefully down the cliff face to the beach below and then mate.


No wonder they're in such a hurry.


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## Monique (Jul 31, 2010)

I take this to mean, what she actually says:

_"When I tell you that you will get on bookstore shelves if you price your paper books correctly (which means at least $2 profit to you in extended distribution-not $1.50, not $1.68, but $2), I don't mean you'll get on all bookstore shelves. Nor do I mean actual shelves."_

You will get onto virtual shelves if you price your with at least $2 for ED. Less than that and they won't list you. Pricing "correctly" means $2+.

That's simply not the case, at least for the store she uses as an example - Mysterious Galaxy.

Either she's wrong, or she's saying something else none of us can understand.


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## JRTomlin (Jan 18, 2011)

I can tell you that *I* put the first book in my trilogy 'perma-free' and lost money on it. The increase in sales on the other two novels didn't even come _close_ to making up the lost income on the first book. I considered that sales 'tanking'. It was an utter failure.

If it works for you, that's great. What her caveats are intended to convey, although everyone prefer's David's humour, is that the same strategy doesn't work for everyone in the world in every genre or series in the world. For example, if that first book had been in a 10 novel romance series, it might very well have worked. (*hint* I don't write those. )

ETA: On the expanded distribution pricing, I have no clue what she meant.

I get just a little tired of the 'do what I or someone else does and it has to work' mantra that has developed on this forum, and the way people who post other experiences are denigrated. What works for you, or Hugh, or Russell or anyone else may or may not work for other authors.


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## Pnjw (Apr 24, 2011)

No one ever said permafree works for everyone. But KKR is saying permafree (forever) is never right and to never buy ads for permafree. My results both times I have purchased an ad for my permafree (it's been free for a over 18 months) say otherwise.

And yes, I did take it off free once. Overall sales were less without the permafree than they are with it.


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## Jim Johnson (Jan 4, 2011)

Courtney Milan said:


> But you know what? You can ALSO tell that they're not making a ton of money on their writing. How? Because they're still running workshop after workshop after workshop. Add the hours they're spending on workshops and the money they make from that. If they were making loads per book, it would not be profitable for them to run those workshops. It just wouldn't.


At the risk of sounding like a Dean and Kris fanboy, I think you're making a massive assumption here that they're offering their workshops and lectures primarily to make money because their book sales aren't making them a ton of money. Dean and Kris have been running workshops for well over 10 years, originally on location in Oregon and only more recently online as they figure out how to translate their in-person workshops into either 6-week online courses or short lecture series.

They have their own opinions on how things should be in publishing, but they have both been consistent for as long as I've followed them in the message that successful writers should continually learn about all the various parts of being a writer and a publisher and running things as a business. I've taken a handful of their workshops and I felt like I was getting a steal by paying so little for the knowledge they were imparting. I could have spent twice as much and felt like I got my money's worth.

I'm sure it would be disingenuous to say they're offering the workshops and lectures as a service to writers, because of course they're making something out of the effort, but I firmly believe that they want to give back as much as they can to writers, especially newer writers, and are intentionally underpricing their workshops to make them as accessible as possible.


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## Usedtoposthere (Nov 19, 2013)

I don't do permafree, and haven't. I do occasionally-free, and yeah, I was in that top category on the recent survey. But I don't disbelieve that permafree works for others. Why would I? Nor do I believe that anyone "has" to do "free" of any kind to succeed. 

I really don't like, though, people saying that something "doesn't work" that patently DOES, at least for many people. Why say it at all? That's what I don't get. 

I don't think anyone on here is saying, "You must go permafree"! Why would they? What do I care what you do? I think most people here are just offering their own experience, as in "This worked for me." And props to them for being willing to share that.


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## melissafmiller (Feb 17, 2011)

Deanna Chase said:


> My results both times I have purchased an ad for my permafree (it's been free for a over 18 months) say otherwise.
> 
> And yes, I did take it off free once. Overall sales were less without the permafree than they are with it.


Me, too. (Although mine has not been permafree as long.

And me, too.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

I think what Ed said about fungibility really pinpoints the problem with the wisdom Rusch is trying to draw from the general retail model.

Here's another way to think of it. Let's say one of my local supermarkets wants to get me in the doors, so they put Diet Coke 12-packs on sale, 5/$10. It's usually $5.69-$6.49 per pack, so this is a big discount. So I go to that particular store to do my shopping, and while I'm there, I buy $200 worth of other food, a lot of it at full price.

What I *don't* do is buy a bunch of other Coke products, even though they might be discounted along with Diet Coke. 'Cause I only like Diet Coke. That's it. But that's fine with the supermarket. The loss leader wasn't intended to help out Coca-Cola Company, Inc.

But if you take "Coke" out and put in "Jim Butcher," well, I'm going to buy every single thing he writes. Period. So the store that first tempted me into picking up a Butcher book hooked me for, what? ... 27 other purchases, or something. Except I haven't made any of those purchases in the place where I bought that first book. The beneficiaries of the loss-leader are Butcher and his publisher, not that little used book store.

So, loss-leaders in a general retail environment work really differently: they get you into the sales environment where you will purchase other unrelated things. This is may be part of Amazon's thinking about free books: they get you onto Amazon.com where you might buy something else. But from the author's perspective, free books are a way to start an addiction. If you hook a reader, they're coming back just for you for a very long time.

That's not the case with many other products. To take Rusch's example, just because I get a Samsung TV for free from Best Buy and like it doesn't mean I'm going to rush out to buy a Samsung dishwasher, fridge, VCR, DVR, MP3 player, laptop, cell phone, and so forth. Rusch's post assumes authors are in the position of Best Buy. We're not. We're in the position of Samsung, but it's different because buyers may well rush out and buy our whole line of products after getting one freebie.

This is my general reaction to anything that tries to apply a very broad marketing principle without being adjusted for differences of particular sales situations. I'm frankly not even sure the term "loss-leader" is the best one for free books because loss-leaders are used so differently in other retail environments. "Free sample" might be more appropriate.


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## Kay Bratt (Dec 28, 2011)

Can someone explain *how to* put a book on perma-free?


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## Usedtoposthere (Nov 19, 2013)

KayBratt said:


> Can someone explain *how to* put a book on perma-free?


You're with an Amazon imprint, aren't you? You can only do permafree if you're not exclusive to Amazon.
(It involves making the title free on other platforms, then enough people notifying Amazon so Amazon price-matches to $0.00.)


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## Zelah Meyer (Jun 15, 2011)

JimJohnson said:


> I'm sure it would be disingenuous to say they're offering the workshops and lectures as a service to writers, because of course they're making something out of the effort, but I firmly believe that they want to give back as much as they can to writers, especially newer writers, and are intentionally underpricing their workshops to make them as accessible as possible.


Yep. I've done several of their courses now, and through some of the anecdotes that Dean shares in the videos, it's clear that workshops played a big part both their careers when they were starting out. They learnt a lot from other writers when they were just getting into this business and I think they want to help newer writers in turn (and yes, we pay, just as they paid, for the time & knowledge involved.)


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## zandermarks (May 20, 2013)

Cherise Kelley said:


> I'm no one to talk, but I think you need to put out a sequel. I'm surprised you haven't by now!


Thanks!  I will, but I'm a sl-o-o-o-ow writer. I've figured out some of the key points for Wilkin's next character growth arc, but he's still got some more rounding out to do before I jump in.


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## 60911 (Jun 13, 2012)

I like Kris and Dean, I've taken lots of workshops from him, but if I hadn't done permafree, I wouldn't have been making a living as a full-time writer for the last couple years. Different paths for different people and all that, but there are an awful lot of full-time, high-grossing indie authors that tell basically the same story - permafree worked to get them the exposure they needed to sell more books. YMMV.


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## Edward W. Robertson (May 18, 2010)

JimJohnson said:


> They have their own opinions on how things should be in publishing, but they have both been consistent for as long as I've followed them in the message that successful writers should continually learn about all the various parts of being a writer and a publisher and running things as a business.


I will say I've been very inspired over the years by their posts about taking charge of your career as a writer. Ironically, what I've learned in pursuit of that inspiration has led me to disagree with them on just about everything that has to do with ebook marketing.


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## anniejocoby (Aug 11, 2013)

I read the article, and she says not to pay for a BookBub ad. WORST advice ever!!!! I paid for a BookBub ad on my Freebie in November, and went on to sell over 2500 copies combined of books 2 and 3 on Amazon alone that month, and sold another 1200 or so in December. Sold a buttload in Barnes and Noble and ITunes too. Before the BookBub ad, I sold like 300 total. Sales have settled down now, but they are still higher than they were prior to the BookBub ad. I credit that one ad with giving me a halfway decent career and providing me the money to reinvest in further promotions and new covers. 

So, anybody who says not to pay for a BookBub ad on a freebie does not know what she is talking about.


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## Kay Bratt (Dec 28, 2011)

Rosalind James said:


> You're with an Amazon imprint, aren't you? You can only do permafree if you're not exclusive to Amazon.
> (It involves making the title free on other platforms, then enough people notifying Amazon so Amazon price-matches to $0.00.)


Hi Rosalind,

I was talking about a book that is not Amazon-exclusive. So you'd upload the book to other platforms, and there is a way to set the price to free? Which platforms allow that? (thanks)


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## Pnjw (Apr 24, 2011)

KayBratt said:


> Hi Rosalind,
> 
> I was talking about a book that is not Amazon-exclusive. So you'd upload the book to other platforms, and there is a way to set the price to free? Which platforms allow that? (thanks)


Kay, you can set your book free on Kobo and Apple if you go direct. That should eventually get you price-matched to free on Amz. If you want it free on BN, you have to upload to Smashwords and set it free and have it distributed to BN.


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## Jana DeLeon (Jan 20, 2011)

KayBratt said:


> Hi Rosalind,
> 
> I was talking about a book that is not Amazon-exclusive. So you'd upload the book to other platforms, and there is a way to set the price to free? Which platforms allow that? (thanks)


itunes and Kobo. And you can at BN through D2D (is my understanding) But they will match itunes sooner than most.


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## Monique (Jul 31, 2010)

I asked for clarification on the paperback pricing issue. Comment is awaiting moderation. Will report back if/when I get a response.

eta: She replied very quickly.

I asked: Can you clarify the bookstore section? Are you saying that you must price your books with at least a $2 royalty in expanded distribution in order to make it onto the virtual shelves of stores like Mysterious Galaxy?

She replied: Yep. The price has to be high enough that your POD service, the distributor (Ingrams/Baker & Taylor), and the bookstore can make a profit when they list the book. If you short discount your book (underprice), you're preventing that. So your book has to make money for all involved. The easiest way to do that is set your personal profit at $2. (There are more complex ways to do that, but stick with the easy method.)

My follow-up: Thanks for the reply Kris. At least in the case of Mysterious Galaxy, they list my books even though my profit for expanded distro is mere pennies. They seem to have simply marked them up.


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## Carradee (Aug 21, 2010)

Jana DeLeon said:


> itunes and Kobo. And you can at BN through D2D (is my understanding) But they will match itunes sooner than most.


No, Barnes and Noble requires Smashwords. Last I looked into it, it's an exclusive agreement there.


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## cinisajoy (Mar 10, 2013)

Joe Vasicek said:


> Kris Rusch's latest discoverability post is up, and it's sure to spark a heated discussion because she disagrees with almost all of the accepted wisdom on these boards about free promotions, bookbub, Select, and perma-free. Still, she makes some good points, especially about getting crap reviews when you give your books away all the time. What do you guys think?


I guess I should go change this review


> A very nice short and sweet story. It is a great summer read. I would recommend this book to anyone and everyone who likes reading.


 and drop it down a couple of stars since my account says I got the book free. If you want I can gladly do that for you since you seem to think you get crap reviews for free.

Oh and other question: Has Miss Kris actually tried everything she talks about? That is also something to think about.


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## Quiss (Aug 21, 2012)

cinisajoy said:


> Oh and other question: Has Miss Kris actually tried everything she talks about? That is also something to think about.


HEY! That's _my_ nickname!


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## cinisajoy (Mar 10, 2013)

Quiss said:


> HEY! That's _my_ nickname!


My sincerest apologies Miss Quiss.


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## Guest (Jan 23, 2014)

cinisajoy said:


> I guess I should go change this review and drop it down a couple of stars since my account says I got the book free. If you want I can gladly do that for you since you seem to think you get crap reviews for free.


NOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!1!!! DON'T DO THAT!!!!!!! ANYTHING BUT THAT!!!!!!111!1!!!!!!










In all seriousness, a lot of great responses on this thread. I've read KKR's Thursday business posts religiously ever since I started self-publishing, but there's a lot in this week's post that doesn't jive with my own experience, and apparently many of yours as well. Specifically, I think that there's a lot more to the perma-free strategy than she allows for. Chalk me up with the others for whom perma-free was the catalyst that made their careers take off.


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## cinisajoy (Mar 10, 2013)

Right now I am gonna use Russell Blake and Gennita Low as I spend money on their books.
Please note I picked up the freebies before I knew them.
Russell had Jet free so I picked it up.   I liked his style though debatable on Jet because I haven't finished it.   Anyway he put Black on sale for 99 cents.    I picked it up and liked it.   It led me to buy books 2 & 3.

Gennita had Protector on a freebie special so I picked it up.   I loved it and have bought the rest of her books in that series, (hey if you want some more money you need to finish Warrior), plus her squirrel book for kids.

Now I noticed that another poster said that if he just read all the free books he had he would not need to buy books for a year.   I am the same way except I think it is 5 years.   So will someone please tell me why I spent over $50 just since Christmas on books?

So yes I would say free works to a point.   
Now I would also say if you put all your books free at the same time, you are not gonna make much.


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## Patty Jansen (Apr 5, 2011)

As she asked, I wrote a blog post in reply. I did my first-ever Bookbub ad for a freebie, and I'll be doing more of it in the future.

I don't get why she gets her knickers in a knot about Amazon changing algorithms and free not working anymore. If it stops working? Then I'll slap the price back on. Just exactly what have I lost by giving my book to over 25,000 readers on Amazon and probably over 30,000 on all stores (not sure until Smashwords reports numbers)?

I think the idea that it dilutes your market is a tradepub mentality based on the fact that if you publish, an X percentage of bookstores will carry your book, and an X percentage of people will buy it, and then only in the countries where you've sold the rights. The online market for English books is so vast that 30K of freely given books is not going to make a dent in it. The collective memory of the internet is 24 hours. New people join and become interested in reading all the time. The market is this big, flowing, morphing thing that moves into places that we could never reach before.


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## ChrisWard (Mar 10, 2012)

I was on Smashwords yesterday and the second new book down was from KKR. It was a 10k short priced at $3.99. I was thinking how I wished I was popular enough to sell something so short at that price.


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## Mark E. Cooper (May 29, 2011)

ChrisWard said:


> I was on Smashwords yesterday and the second new book down was from KKR. It was a 10k short priced at $3.99. I was thinking how I wished I was popular enough to sell something so short at that price.


Was it though? Selling I mean.


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## Kay Bratt (Dec 28, 2011)

[[Thanks for the responses to my questions, ladies!]]


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## zoe tate (Dec 18, 2013)

Courtney Milan said:


> You can ALSO tell that they're not making a ton of money on their writing. How? Because they're still running workshop after workshop after workshop. Add the hours they're spending on workshops and the money they make from that. If they were making loads per book, it would not be profitable for them to run those workshops. It just wouldn't.


So, not only are you assuming that they're doing those primarily to make money (which I believe is an entirely mistaken premise, myself), but also, by your logic, anyone who runs workshops advising people "how to make income from doing anything" can't, by definition, be very successful at it?

And then, having said all that, you're also criticizing others over their logic?


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## kurzon (Feb 26, 2011)

Tremendously hostile tone in this thread.

I find free and (semi-)perma-free very useful, but then, it's not as if Rusch says "never go free".  She just points out various risks about going free, along with benefits, and says to pick the best approach for individual books.  I don't 100% agree about never paying to advertise a free book, but I would definitely only do that very judiciously.

The short version of that post is "no magic formulas, use free judiciously, or consider just briefly low-pricing first books in a series and see if that works".  I really don't understand why this is such an awful thing to say.


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## Patty Jansen (Apr 5, 2011)

kurzon said:


> Tremendously hostile tone in this thread.
> 
> I find free and (semi-)perma-free very useful, but then, it's not as if Rusch says "never go free". She just points out various risks about going free, along with benefits, and says to pick the best approach for individual books. I don't 100% agree about never paying to advertise a free book, but I would definitely only do that very judiciously.
> 
> The short version of that post is "no magic formulas, use free judiciously, or consider just low-pricing first books in a series and see if that works". I really don't understand why this is such an awful thing to say.


I think this is in response to the rather defensive, passive-aggressive and overbearing tone in the article. I've read a lot of Kris' posts, but I've been finding them getting more passive-aggressive lately. The "you're silly if you do this" tone in this latest series negates a lot of the good advice she gives. Especially her caveats at the bottom are VERY passive-aggressive.


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## antonnaseton (Dec 10, 2013)

I distinctly remember Kkr and DWS being on the self publishing podcast and being asked about permafree. The hosts write serialized fiction and they set the first story free of their series. Both DWS and Kkr agreed with their strategy because they said its part of a series and you are offering readers a taste. They object to permafree if you have limited books or if it's not part of a series. That is what I have always understood about their stance on permafree - I think the blog post didn't convey that well enough.

Their philosophy has always been "more products on the shelve" gets you a LONG TERM career. I don't see the problem with that.

I would say if you have a shop full of things to sell then it is a great idea to start promoting. My strategy for 2014 is to write my tush off and then do promotion in 2015. And I will use permafree then because I would have the correct funnel in place.


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## kurzon (Feb 26, 2011)

Patty Jansen said:


> I think this is in response to the rather defensive, passive-aggressive and overbearing tone in the article. I've read a lot of Kris' posts, but I've been finding them getting more passive-aggressive lately. The "you're silly if you do this" tone in this latest series negates a lot of the good advice the gives. Especially her caveats at the bottom are VERY passive-aggressive.


The tone has been shifting recently, but then it sounds like she receives a massive amount of hate mail each time she posts. I'd qualify my posts up the wazoo as well, if I were dealing with that.

Tone or not, the post still is just basically what she's said all along: "No magic formula, keep an eye on the benefit of your approach, no need to under-price yourself".


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## Patty Jansen (Apr 5, 2011)

kurzon said:


> The tone has been shifting recently, but then it sounds like she receives a massive amount of hate mail each time she posts. I'd qualify my posts up the wazoo as well, if I were dealing with that.
> 
> Tone or not, the post still is just basically what she's said all along: "No magic formula, keep an eye on the benefit of your approach, no need to under-price yourself".


Well, if she can't hack that, either disable commenting or ignore it. She knows that the moment she makes a strong statement there will be strong statements in return. Kris' posts hang together with strong statements. "PLease don't hijack this post if you have other experiences" --with BB and permafree--FFS, what does she expect other than hostility after that statement?

I think what many people here take issue with is the "never advertise for a free book" advice. Giving the book for free to a loyal mailing list sounds like an excellent idea, and I will implement it, but does she even realise how hard it is to get TEN people to sign up to your mailing list who are not friends, let alone the thousands this approach would require?

Also, she seems to assume that people have a lot more control over their permafrees than they really have, which makes me question how much experience she has with this.

What she also assumes is that if you make your book free, it's somehow going damage you. The nature of digital bookselling is such that a change takes hours. Permafree not or no longer working? Put the price back on. Just exactly what damage have you done by trying?


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## Vera Nazarian (Jul 1, 2011)

Monique said:


> Perhaps someone can clarify this part of the post.
> 
> She's saying if I want my paperback books to appear on the virtual shelves of stores like Mysterious Galaxy that I MUST price my books so that I have a $2 profit via expanded distro. Less than that and the books will not appear. Am I understanding that correctly?


Yes, I believe she is indeed saying we literally need to set the price so that our per-unit profit (retail price minus print cost, minus wholesale discount which is close to 40%-50%) comes out to be exactly (or at least?) $2.00.

And this is what bothers me most about this latest blog entry of hers.

I admit, in general I really like Kris, her astute business advice and her series of posts. However, this time I think she has gone off into unfounded speculation land.

Fact of the matter is, the *wholesale discount* is what matters most, not your profit -- most bookstores want at least 50% wholesale discounts in order to make it profitable for them to carry the book. I have never heard of bookstores refusing to carry cheap low-priced narrow margin titles, as long as they get their wholesale percentage upon which they base their own pricing structure. If there is a hard-set *minimum per/unit profit* that *they* (as opposed to you the author/publisher) require in order to accept a book I would certainly like to hear it.

I set my LSI print titles to be 40%-50% wholesale discounted as a rule.

So I think what is going on here is simply the importance of wholesale discounting as opposed to your own profit margins. And based on her statement, I don't think Kris understands that -- though I could be wrong. And if I am wrong, I would like to have her explain how she has derived that $2 number, considering that print costs are based strictly on page length + cover type (HC trade cloth with jacket or trade paper or laminate, etc). So that shorter books will necessarily have lower print costs. And the final retail price -- that takes into account both your profit margins and the booksellers' profit margins with their discount -- is based on that.

The other thing that bothers me about this post is the sense that there is only a hazy understanding of the best practices utilization of perma-free -- which is that *perma-free* only works with:

a) series

b) compelling cliffhanger-type endings to hook the reader from one book to the next.

c) the first book of the series.


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## ChrisWard (Mar 10, 2012)

markecooper said:


> Was it though? Selling I mean.


I don't know. I didn't buy it, haha. She clearly thinks it will, though. Good luck to her!


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## beccaprice (Oct 1, 2011)

Is there a way to set your wholesale discount in CreateSpace? Because setting my extended distribution to $2 for an upcoming picture book makes the final price totally unrealistic.


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## Courtney Milan (Feb 27, 2011)

zoe tate said:


> So, not only are you assuming that they're doing those primarily to make money (which I believe is an entirely mistaken premise, myself), but also, by your logic, anyone who runs workshops advising people "how to make income from doing anything" can't, by definition, be very successful at it?
> 
> And then, having said all that, you're also criticizing others over their logic?


Well, no. That's not all I said. You're listing the conclusion, but you've left out the other evidence that I've mentioned. I don't think that DWS and KKR are making a lot of money on their book sales on a per-book basis, and I base that belief on the following evidence:

1. The sheer number of workshops--they're never NOT giving workshops of some kind or another.
2. The aggressive rattling of the tip jar with every post.
3. The fact that I have yet to see one person point to a single self-published book by either of them that has broken the top 1,000 on Amazon, ever, in the entirety of...how many years have they been claiming to do this? That's the big thing.
Like this book: http://www.amazon.com/Blowback-Retrieval-Kristine-Kathryn-Rusch-ebook/dp/B00AKIZY58/ at 226,118
Or this one: http://www.amazon.com/Skirmishes-Diving-Universe-Novel-ebook/dp/B00F3X4KC8/ at 90,615
Or this one: http://www.amazon.com/Anniversary-Day-Retrieval-Artist-Novel-ebook/dp/B006FCFJJY/ at 232,504
Or this one: http://www.amazon.com/Disappeared-Retrieval-Artist-Novel-ebook/dp/B004MME48G/ at 269,610
Or this one: http://www.amazon.com/Snipers-Kristine-Kathryn-Rusch-ebook/dp/B00DXBH7QI/ at 199,903

Those are the top 5 WMG-published KKR books listed when you search for her name on Amazon. We're not talking about breaking the top 1,000. We're talking one book that has even broken the top 100,000, and 2 that have broken the top 200,000.

Go ahead and look. See how many of Kris's WMG-published books you can find that have broken the top 100,000 and report back on their ranks.
4. The fact that when they do give examples the examples are always in 4 or 5 copies sold, not in 100s or 1000s. Compare that with the discussions in The Naked Truth by the Indie Voice members. People tend to gravitate to examples that fit their lifestyle, and I think it's very telling that this particular duo is really stuck on the 5 or 6 sales a month number. That is also consistent with the sales ranks on Amazon.
5. The fact that they never list numbers except in the most general sense, when almost everyone else in the community does, and it would only bolster their image if they could say what they were making. They talk of their income as "comfortable" and "above the median household income," but since they collectively have 300 or so books out, that could mean making $20 per book per month. And based on their Amazon rankings, that's about what I judge them to be making. Yes, that's a comfortable living, and no, I don't begrudge them that--but I don't think people who sell 5 or 6 copies of every book per month are qualified to write about discoverability. They're not writing books that are getting discovered in any fashion.

So yes, I think there is a lot of evidence that Kris is not qualified to write a blogpost, let alone a book, on discoverability, given that her books aren't being discovered. There's a lot of evidence that the only reason KKR/DWS make money on their self-published books is that they have SO MANY of them up.

But they're the ones setting themselves up as experts. Where is the proof that they have, in fact, made their books discoverable to readers?

Because that's what I want to know. How is someone whose books regularly hover at the 300,000 mark, qualified to tell people how to make their books discoverable?


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## cinisajoy (Mar 10, 2013)

Courtney Milan said:


> Well, no. That's not all I said. You're listing the conclusion, but you've left out the other evidence that I've mentioned. I don't think that DWS and KKR are making a lot of money on their book sales on a per-book basis, and I base that belief on the following evidence:
> 
> 1. The sheer number of workshops--they're never NOT giving workshops of some kind or another.
> *2. The aggressive rattling of the tip jar with every post.*3. The fact that I have yet to see one person point to a single self-published book by either of them that has broken the top 1,000 on Amazon, ever, in the entirety of...how many years have they been claiming to do this? That's the big thing.
> ...


If they are rattling the tip jar, it means they are not making good money on their books.


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## antonnaseton (Dec 10, 2013)

Courtney Milan said:


> Because that's what I want to know. How is someone whose books regularly hover at the 300,000 mark, qualified to tell people how to make their books discoverable?


I suppose you have a point there, though I think Kris has always emphasised on a long-term career rather than books in the top 100s etc. So I'm not surprised she's not fussed about her books being in the top 100.

But as I understand it, they have many income sources too, such as trad pub books, movie options, audio books, magazines and workshops. Their philosophy has always been diversification, and that's a strategy of its own.


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## antonnaseton (Dec 10, 2013)

cinisajoy said:


> If they are rattling the tip jar, it means they are not making good money on their books.


I think that's rather unfair to say that - it's just another profit channel as well. The tip jar is something lots of webserial authors use - even after they've succeeded in the web arena. Like I said before, their strategy has always been to diversify their income sources and this is just one. I don't think it's an indication of how well they're doing at all.


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## cinisajoy (Mar 10, 2013)

Another thought just occured to me.  She posts something she knows is either controversial/can't be proven/just plain wrong.   Ok Joe V tells Sheila E  that oh hey did you see what "so and so" said.   No I didn't but let me go look.
Sheila comes back and says OMG that is just plain wrong.  I can't believe it.   Sheila posts in a public place.   Well now, cin, CM, MQ and the rest of the gang go look and see what so and so says.   Big discussion ensues.    Meanwhile the lurkers just click on the link but don't say anything.

How much traffic did "so and so's" blog get because another group is talking about it?

I think this particular person knows exactly what she is doing.

Do bloggers get paid by number of clicks to their blog?


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## blakebooks (Mar 10, 2012)

Courtney: Well, yes, there is that, n'est pas?

There's an old saying, that may or may not be relevant. Those that can, do, those that can't...teach.

I'm not saying that's what's going on here. I'm saying that I don't find much of the counsel they offer to be useful for operating a book selling business that yields the sort of results I'm after. I have to make that call, nobody else. I am the steward of my little business, as are you, as are each of us.

I certainly don't think my approach is the only one. However, I've surfed the free wave about as well as anyone I know, so I feel somewhat qualified to discuss it, and I would have to attribute the lion's share of my sales to having been discovered via one of my free tomes. 

I bear Ms. Rusch no ill-will. Some people enjoy giving seminars. I'm not one of them. Nor have I ever found attending one to be particularly helpful, so I'm the wrong audience. But in my experience, the top athletes, CEOs, authors, actors, directors, dancers, musicians, singers...don't give seminars. It's generally those that aren't anywhere near the top, because the top ones are way too busy doing whatever it is they do to give seminars. Which is why I don't bother with them. If Warren Buffet's going to give a seminar on investing, I might be interested. If Jimmy Page is going to give on on being a rock guitarist, I might be in. If James Lee Burke offers a writing seminar, count me in. But generally speaking, if someone is going to ask me to pay them to tell me how to be a success selling books, I want to see hard proof that they are selling way more than I am - i.e., that their approach is yielding outsized results. I would sign up for that in a heartbeat. Unfortunately, nobody I know who is selling more than I am has the time to do a seminar - their time's way too valuable writing.

And so it goes.

Great rebuttal post. Remind me to never p#ss you off


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## Monique (Jul 31, 2010)

As to the paperback pricing and wholesale discounts, you have no control, as far as I know over discounts via CS.

The thing that struck me was the example she gave as evidence to support her theory that you must price high enough to have at least a $2 royalty (and I agree that in and of itself doesn't really make sense), also didn't make sense/hold water. My books are listed on Mysterious Galaxy. The shop simply marks them up a few books. I wouldn't be surprised if they're whatever aggregator they get the catalogue from does this and they are just populating their site with it. But I know not the details of such things. Kris replied further saying that not all bookstores will raise the price to build in a better cut for them, and that's true. But, so far, I've not seen evidence to support the "$2 rule".


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## phil1861 (Dec 22, 2011)

beccaprice said:


> Is there a way to set your wholesale discount in CreateSpace? Because setting my extended distribution to $2 for an upcoming picture book makes the final price totally unrealistic.


You can set a discount code in CS and use that with your eStore link to offer whatever discount you want. Trouble is with bookstores they want a return policy and CS doesn't do that. So, if you wanted to do your own order fulfillment and take books back, you could but at that point you're just buying and stocking your own books. Or, you agree to buy back any unsold from them and they use your discount code to do online ordering.


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## cinisajoy (Mar 10, 2013)

antonnaseton said:


> I think that's rather unfair to say that - it's just another profit channel as well. The tip jar is something lots of webserial authors use - even after they've succeeded in the web arena. Like I said before, their strategy has always been to diversify their income sources and this is just one. I don't think it's an indication of how well they're doing at all.


I wasn't trying to be unfair. Fact is if you are rattling a tip jar, it generally means that you are not making much from other venues.

Key point being see my jar..please give me money.


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## Guest (Jan 24, 2014)

cinisajoy said:


> Do bloggers get paid by number of clicks to their blog?


Nah, I do it for the love. But I don't have a tip jar either.

I was going to say I don't have ads, but that's not exactly true--I do have links to my books. But I only sell a handful of copies that way--it's not the focus, or the reason why I blog.


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## Guest (Jan 24, 2014)

phil1861 said:


> You can set a discount code in CS and use that with your eStore link to offer whatever discount you want. Trouble is with bookstores they want a return policy and CS doesn't do that. So, if you wanted to do your own order fulfillment and take books back, you could but at that point you're just buying and stocking your own books. Or, you agree to buy back any unsold from them and they use your discount code to do online ordering.


What is this discount code of which you speak? Please, oh wise one, enlighten this humble seeker of knowledge.


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## AngryGames (Jul 28, 2013)

Edward W. Robertson said:


> I will say I've been very inspired over the years by their posts about taking charge of your career as a writer. Ironically, what I've learned in pursuit of that inspiration has led me to disagree with them on just about everything that has to do with ebook marketing.


Thank you. I nearly quoted about 20 posts in this thread, but decided this is the best one.

Anyone who announces a 'truth' without anything to back it up is really only asking to get roasted over the coals, which is what has happened in this thread.

I'm much, much more inclined to listen to Blake, Robertson, anyone that has data to back up their claims (i.e. just look in the huge 70 page thread). When people like Blake, Howey, Konrath, etc. say things that have to do with ebook marketing, I listen (don't always follow since no advice is one-size-fits-all).

When people who have sales ranks in the realm of KKS and DWS, especially with the volume of titles between them, I tend to laugh to myself and go read a blog post by Blake or Konrath since they actually seem to be in touch with the present situation of ebook marketing.


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## Courtney Milan (Feb 27, 2011)

antonnaseton said:


> I think that's rather unfair to say that - it's just another profit channel as well. The tip jar is something lots of webserial authors use - even after they've succeeded in the web arena. Like I said before, their strategy has always been to diversify their income sources and this is just one. I don't think it's an indication of how well they're doing at all.


I don't think anyone is arguing that they don't have many profit channels. Yes, their strategy is to have lots of fingers in lots of pots. I'm not arguing with that--I'm making note of it, and I hope everyone else does to.

The DWS/KKR strategy at making an income is NOT to have highly discoverable books. It's to put out a lot of them and to make money on lots of different things--like workshops, and tip jars, and so forth. I'd listen to what they said about diversifying income, because that's where they have proven success. And I think KKR's Freelancer's Guide is a phenomenal resource.

But I think they've both been writing about stuff for so long that they've run out of things to say in regards to their core knowledge and experience base, and so they're branching out to things they're not good at.


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## Gone 9/21/18 (Dec 11, 2008)

Courtney Milan said:


> The fact that when they do give examples the examples are always in 4 or 5 copies sold, not in 100s or 1000s


I've been reading both Kris and Dean's blogs for several years now. His less lately since it's been very repetitive. The initial lure was watching them change from recommending everyone should try to go traditional first to recognizing what self-pub offered a lot of us.

If like me you've read Dean's blog for any length of time, you'd see that what Courtney is talking about is what he recommends for most indies. Not that being the breakout writer and selling oodles wouldn't be great, but [and I apologize in advance if I'm putting words in his mouth] that for most indie writers, the chances of being the mega-seller are small, but selling small quantities of many books can provide a living. He's offered math on that several times and his assumptions have always struck even my small-potato self as too modest.

In other words, the numerical assumptions he makes are so low I'd get so depressed I'd be off doing something else for needed income and never get the number of books you need for that to provide a viable living. (Admittedly I also started much later in life, and considering average lifespans, would probably never get to his number unless I wrote as fast as Elle, which I don't and wouldn't even try.) However, he also bases a lot of that on writing many shorts, not 90,000-word novels. And pricing those shorts so high they wouldn't sell more than 5 copies each a month. His pricing recommendations have always been where he loses me.

Still, this strikes me as a little like the outliner/pantser discussions. Why do we care so much what someone else does and finds success doing? Why do we care that these people recommend something other than what we're doing? She says in her post if you're doing something else and it works, good on you. Surely most newbies investigating the whole self-pub thing who find Kris and Dean will also find KBoards and other bloggers who have different recommendations.


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## Betsy the Quilter (Oct 27, 2008)

Folks, 

this thread has been reported.  Locking while I review--I've been out much of the day and haven't read any of today's posts to this thread. 

EDIT:  Reopened the thread...please remember to be civil both to your fellow members and in responding to Kriss Rusch's blog post.

Thanks,

Betsy
KB Mod


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## Monique (Jul 31, 2010)

Glad to see this unlocked.


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## phil1861 (Dec 22, 2011)

Joe Vasicek said:


> What is this discount code of which you speak? Please, oh wise one, enlighten this humble seeker of knowledge.


It has been awhile since I've been there, but I believe on the channels page you can go to or set up your eStore link and from there (I belive on the setup page for the eStore) generate and manage discount codes. These can either be by % or $ amount and are used when you direct people to the eStore for that book. There's a field for promotion discount code on the buy now page.

I advertise on my web page a 15% code for my paperback but I think i've only ever had one sale using the code. I think this is the only way with CS to offer any kind of wholesale pricing for your paperbacks.


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## Betsy the Quilter (Oct 27, 2008)

Monique said:


> Glad to see this unlocked.


Geeze louise, Monique, were you stalking the thread? 

I only locked it so I could have a finite amount to review.  Didn't expect I'd have to perma-lock it...

Betsy


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## Monique (Jul 31, 2010)

Betsy the Quilter said:


> Geeze louise, Monique, were you stalking the thread?
> 
> I only locked it so I could have a finite amount to review.  Didn't expect I'd have to perma-lock it...
> 
> Betsy


Maybe. 

I didn't expect it to be perma-locked, was a little surprised to see any lock frankly.


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## Betsy the Quilter (Oct 27, 2008)

Monique said:


> Maybe.
> 
> I didn't expect it to be perma-locked, was a little surprised to see any lock frankly.


I find on a long thread, it's better if I don't have to hit a moving target. 

Carry on...

Betsy


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

Betsy the Quilter said:


> I find on a long thread, it's better if I don't have to hit a moving target.


You are the stooping falcon, we the hapless voles? Or maybe you're the great big shoe and we're the wee scurrying ants? 

/fun with metaphors


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## Betsy the Quilter (Oct 27, 2008)

Or you're the lowing cattle, and I have the prod.


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## Maria Romana (Jun 7, 2010)

Sarah Woodbury said:


> That survey that Kendall posted the other day ... didn't it say that well over 50% of authors making over 250K had said that permafree was helpful in their success? http://theseasonforromance.com/wordpress/2014/01/the-self-publishing-survey-results-its-a-brave-new-world/


I had not seen this previously. Wow, what great numbers, and what helpful and inspirational information. I recommend everyone who hasn't, read the whole (very well-written) report.

Thanks for sharing the link!
--Maria


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## SBJones (Jun 13, 2011)

> In other words, whenever you're offering a loss leader, you're taking a _deliberate_ loss with the hope of later gain.


I don't agree with this. Once the upfront cost of writing the book has been recouped. There are no additional costs (except promotional or advertising dollars). Every sale is 100% profit. There is no loss, only trying to find the top of the bell curve of price vs volume. The worst that can happen is no profit (zero paid sales).

There is no cost per unit associated with an e-book, thus there is no deliberate loss. There is no difference between selling 0 books at $9.99 and giving away 25,000 for free. I know what she is trying to say that you have to have an increase in sales on other books to "make up" for lost sales, but that's the problem; there are no lost sales. E-books do not produce debt to be recouped unlike giving away a free paperback that has print and delivery costs regardless if it sells or not. That's why POD is so awesome. There is no production cost until the demand is requested. The demand is filled and paid upfront by the customer. Again no debt is ever produced.

I do agree with rewarding repeat customers. Offering them the discount upfront on new releases. I wonder how effective it would be if your loss leader was the last/newest book in your series?


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

Betsy the Quilter said:


> Or you're the lowing cattle, and I have the prod.


Hear me moo.


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## Betsy the Quilter (Oct 27, 2008)

Becca Mills said:


> Hear me moo.




/derail


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## Andrew Ashling (Nov 15, 2010)

Courtney Milan said:


> They talk of their income as "comfortable" and "above the median household income," but since they collectively have 300 or so books out, that could mean making $20 per book per month. And based on their Amazon rankings, that's about what I judge them to be making. Yes, that's a comfortable living, and no, I don't begrudge them that <snip>


I have no gripe with your argumentation, but isn't this exactly what they're always saying anyway: having a lot of different pies in the shop = making good money + long time career?



blakebooks said:


> I'm saying that I don't find much of the counsel they offer to be useful for operating a book selling business that yields the sort of results I'm after. I have to make that call, nobody else. I am the steward of my little business, as are you, as are each of us.


As the steward of my minuscule shop, I think I'd be more than happy to have a monthly income of $6k, if it allows me to write the things I like to write without giving in an inch to popular demand, and write at my own relaxed (lazy) rhythm. I have no extravagant demands, and it would still keep me in more tequila than my liver could stomach manage.
OTOH, one day I might wake up&#8230;



blakebooks said:


> Courtney: Great rebuttal post. Remind me to never p#ss you off


No. Don't.


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## Edward W. Robertson (May 18, 2010)

SBJones said:


> I don't agree with this. Once the upfront cost of writing the book has been recouped. There are no additional costs (except promotional or advertising dollars). Every sale is 100% profit. There is no loss, only trying to find the top of the bell curve of price vs volume. The worst that can happen is no profit (zero paid sales).
> 
> There is no cost per unit associated with an e-book, thus there is no deliberate loss. There is no difference between selling 0 books at $9.99 and giving away 25,000 for free. I know what she is trying to say that you have to have an increase in sales on other books to "make up" for lost sales, but that's the problem; there are no lost sales. E-books do not produce debt to be recouped unlike giving away a free paperback that has print and delivery costs regardless if it sells or not. That's why POD is so awesome. There is no production cost until the demand is requested. The demand is filled and paid upfront by the customer. Again no debt is ever produced.
> 
> I do agree with rewarding repeat customers. Offering them the discount upfront on new releases. I wonder how effective it would be if your loss leader was the last/newest book in your series?


I don't know the answer to this, but I agree with all of it, and have been releasing my new books at $1-2 less than I intend their long-term list price for this very reason. I have no idea whether it will wind up a net positive, but I like the idea. It could also work like gangbusters to price the first book and the new release at $0.99 to encourage the most buys out of your fans along with impulse purchases from new readers. Who knows.

There are a hundred different approaches to try, but all Kris wants to talk about is how grocery stores do it. I don't get it.


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## Guest (Jan 24, 2014)

Betsy the Quilter said:


> Or you're the lowing cattle, and I have the prod.


I'm pretty sure that cattle prods are fatal when used on lemmings.


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## Monique (Jul 31, 2010)

I don't think anyone is saying diviersification is a bad idea. Some people choose to fly solo with Amazon, but that doesn't mean they aren't looking into other avenues like audio, movie rights, etc. She makes a good living doing all of those things. That's awesome, but irrelevent here. This thread and its ensuing drama are based on the advice she's offering in this post about discoverability and pricing, not about diversification or other rights. The knock is that she hasn't shown great discoverability skills with her own books, nor does it appear she's tried some of the things she's dismissing, and is ignoring lots of evidence that defy her theories.


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## blakebooks (Mar 10, 2012)

Andrew: My problem with that assumption is that I don't know many, or in fact, any, authors, who have hundreds of books out and are making $6K or so a month.

I do know quite a few who earn big money, meaning at least that $6K, if not many multiples of it, using perma-free in conjunction with a series.

I draw no comfort from hypothetical folks writing a lifetime's worth of books to earn $6K a month, at best. Not to say it doesn't or can't happen, but it seems like an absolutely dismal ROI for what your time is worth, if you're going to spend any sort of serious time on novels. Let's just say that's not what I shoot for. Everyone's different. There is no right or wrong. I do think that if you're going to offer marketing and book selling advice, and in some cases, charge for it, that the burden of proof is on you to prove you are any good at what you claim. Just as if you are going to claim that diversification into audio, movie, etc. rights is a good use of your time, the burden of proof is upon you to demonstrate with hard numbers exactly how and why it's a better use than others. I mean, I can say in the abstract all of those things are good, but if I haven't made much, or anything, myself, I'm talking out my...well...you get the point.

I am usually in the minority in that regard.


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## L.T. Ryan (Aug 1, 2012)

SBJones said:


> I do agree with rewarding repeat customers. Offering them the discount upfront on new releases. I wonder how effective it would be if your loss leader was the last/newest book in your series?


I did this with the first book in a spin-off series that features a popular secondary character. I offered the book to my list for $0.99. It sold well and came close to breaking the top 100 on release. I decided to leave it at $0.99 for a few extra weeks. It continued to sell well. I've left it priced there, and since late November, this book has been ranking in the top 500 and continues to bring new readers into my main series.


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## Andrew Ashling (Nov 15, 2010)

blakebooks said:


> Andrew: My problem with that assumption is that I don't know many, or in fact, any, authors, who have hundreds of books out and are making $6K or so a month.


Of course. There had to be a snag. 



blakebooks said:


> I do know quite a few who earn big money, meaning at least that $6K, if not many multiples of it, using perma-free in conjunction with a series.


I have a series and a permafree. Well, sort of. My permafree for the series contains the first twelve chapters of Book I - 60k words. Maybe I should rethink that. While I'm making very gratifying pocket money and can actually pay most of my bills with what my books bring in, I'm not making anything near $6k a month.



blakebooks said:


> I draw no comfort from hypothetical folks writing a lifetime's worth of books to earn $6K a month, at best. Not to say it doesn't or can't happen, but it seems like an absolutely dismal ROI for what your time is worth, if you're going to spend any sort of serious time on novels. Let's just say that's not what I shoot for. Everyone's different. There is no right or wrong. I do think that if you're going to offer marketing and book selling advice, and in some cases, charge for it, that the burden of proof is on you to prove you are any good at what you claim. Just as if you are going to claim that diversification into audio, movie, etc. rights is a good use of your time, the burden of proof is upon you to demonstrate with hard numbers exactly how and why it's a better use than others. I mean, I can say in the abstract all of those things are good, but if I haven't made much, or anything, myself, I'm talking out my...well...you get the point.


You're absolutely right.


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## Adam Poe (Apr 2, 2012)

6k a month is definitely comfortable/respectable, but if it is true it is on over 300 titles, that is crazy. Our 4-part series with a perma-free lead in is making 1/5th that a month right now. That is with a 'catalog' of 6 novels and one short.


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## lynnfromthesouth (Jun 21, 2012)

I've been coming to the conclusion that I'm going to start not bothering with advice from other writers who haven't tried the solutions they recommend against, no matter if that's something like permafrees, or only going with one sales platform, or non-fiction writers who claim their AMAZING SYSTEM for marketing is perfect for fiction, or all the articles I've seen recently about outlining being necessary, to trade authors who rail against self published authors (well, maybe I didn't already listen to them). 

If you've tried both and one works better, I'd like to understand why and things like what genre, but if you haven't, then I fail to see what makes you an expert. Maybe some things are so comfortable that you see only the tunnel you are in, but that makes you an expert only in the features of your tunnel, not in why the other tunnels are bad. I feel like my time could be better spent writing or studying other things.


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## MonkeyScribe (Jan 27, 2011)

blakebooks said:


> Andrew: My problem with that assumption is that I don't know many, or in fact, any, authors, who have hundreds of books out and are making $6K or so a month.


I agree with pretty much everything you're saying, RB, but I do want to point out that KKR and DWS have already earned hundreds of thousands of dollars from the books in question, as these are largely books for which they were paid and where the rights have been reverted. I've read a few of KKR's books and she's certainly got enough talent to make more money from her backlist. It feels to me that she's coasting.


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## Jim Johnson (Jan 4, 2011)

SBJones said:


> I don't agree with this. Once the upfront cost of writing the book has been recouped. There are no additional costs (except promotional or advertising dollars). Every sale is 100% profit. There is no loss, only trying to find the top of the bell curve of price vs volume. The worst that can happen is no profit (zero paid sales).
> 
> There is no cost per unit associated with an e-book, thus there is no deliberate loss. There is no difference between selling 0 books at $9.99 and giving away 25,000 for free. I know what she is trying to say that you have to have an increase in sales on other books to "make up" for lost sales, but that's the problem; there are no lost sales. E-books do not produce debt to be recouped unlike giving away a free paperback that has print and delivery costs regardless if it sells or not. That's why POD is so awesome. There is no production cost until the demand is requested. The demand is filled and paid upfront by the customer. Again no debt is ever produced.


Knowing Kris (and Dean's) past comments, it's possible she's referring to deliberate loss here partly in relation to the time and effort it took you to write and publish the book. If you don't consider your labor costs as important, that's one thing, but if you've worked say 30 hours on a book and give yourself at least minimum wage, you're short $200 or thereabouts. Pricing your book at 0 will never enable you to recoup that time.

She didn't bring that out in this particular post, but I know from reading them both at length over the years that they do try hard to get writers to understand that their writing time has value and that value should be considered when writing and publishing. Otherwise think of yourself as working in your own virtual sweatshop.


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## cinisajoy (Mar 10, 2013)

JimJohnson said:


> Knowing Kris (and Dean's) past comments, it's possible she's referring to deliberate loss here partly in relation to the time and effort it took you to write and publish the book. If you don't consider your labor costs as important, that's one thing, but if you've worked say 30 hours on a book and give yourself at least minimum wage, you're short $200 or thereabouts. Pricing your book at 0 will never enable you to recoup that time.
> 
> She didn't bring that out in this particular post, but I know from reading them both at length over the years that they do try hard to get writers to understand that their writing time has value and that value should be considered when writing and publishing. Otherwise think of yourself as working in your own virtual sweatshop.


Your argument only works if you plan to take down your book as soon as you make that "minimum" wage.
Let's do your math. 30hours times 8 dollars = 240 dollars. If you charge 3 dollars a book, you get 2 dollars therefore you only need to sell 120 books. There you made your minimum on your book. Are you gonna take it down now? Or now you can give away all the copies you want because you said to make minimum.

You can never use the minimum wage argument in selling any of the crafts. You may make your money back or you may lose those precious 30 hours.
Here is the fact about books, some will make millions and others well the author is just out the time he took to write the book. Most people are somewhere in between.

I will say here is the thing about crafts of all types, be it books, needlearts, yarn arts or even painting. You are crafting something to sell, price it at what you think it is worth. I have heard arguments for x cents per stitch/word, 3 times the supplies, and other silly arguments. I have also heard X times hours +supplies. Now I think jewelry makers can make some good money because it takes longer to plan a necklace than to actually make it.

Now you put your stuff up for sale, you will either make some money or be out your time and supplies. There are no guarantees because you are at the customer's mercy.
Having said that I did make some good money stitching vases. The first vase I was making was a freebie. Everyone that saw it wanted one. Actually the first customer, just saw one side of the vase that was not even finished. But note those were all special orders. 
25 vases later I lost the pattern. I was tired of making the same thing over and over.


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## PhoenixS (Apr 5, 2011)

MichaelWallace said:


> I agree with pretty much everything you're saying, RB, but I do want to point out that KKR and DWS have already earned hundreds of thousands of dollars from the books in question, as these are largely books for which they were paid and where the rights have been reverted. I've read a few of KKR's books and she's certainly got enough talent to make more money from her backlist. It feels to me that she's coasting.


I can speak to this. One of our authors has a very large backlist of novels in our inventory (she's sold over 30 million in print, is a multi-NYT and international bestseller, yadda yadda). That backlist was with an agent/publisher who priced the books high, put fairly crappy covers on them, threw them out on all venues and sat back and let them be discovered on their own - absolutely no promo around them, so basically coasting. As of not 20 months ago when we got the rights to them, she was earning in the low 5 figures per year _before _ commission on these mainly forgotten works. She was still releasing new work through trade publishers, so was happy that she was making *any* additional money on the backlist. Found money!

That same inventory, spruced up and priced competitively (and using free and 99c liberally), earned her well over 6 figures this past year. *Over 10 times* what they were earning being available in all venues and priced at 5.99 or so. We had ALL the books in Select for the first year, and still have half her list to put up on BN. We anticipate increasing profit this year by getting the inventory on iTunes (we had none of her titles there last year) and by playing the permafree card.

This is for ebooks only. We basically traded ebook rights for print and audio rights on the inventory when half of it came up for contract renewal - we took all ebook, the agent/publisher took all print and audio. The audio rights were exploited about 14 months ago, just not by SMP (a deal was brokered with Audible and she got a nice advance on the audio side). So if you add the tiny print numbers and the audio revenue streams, these backlist books are doing even better than what I report on them, since I'm only reporting ebook revenue.


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## nobody_important (Jul 9, 2010)

SBJones said:


> There is no cost per unit associated with an e-book, thus there is no deliberate loss. There is no difference between selling 0 books at $9.99 and giving away 25,000 for free. I know what she is trying to say that you have to have an increase in sales on other books to "make up" for lost sales, but that's the problem; there are no lost sales. E-books do not produce debt to be recouped unlike giving away a free paperback that has print and delivery costs regardless if it sells or not. That's why POD is so awesome. There is no production cost until the demand is requested. The demand is filled and paid upfront by the customer. Again no debt is ever produced.
> 
> I do agree with rewarding repeat customers. Offering them the discount upfront on new releases. I wonder how effective it would be if your loss leader was the last/newest book in your series?


What people mean when they speak of "lost sales" or "deliberate loss" when they're talking about perma-free is the notion that you could have made $ by not making the book perma-free (or do any kind of free-run).

It's the same concept as opportunity cost, but applied to a freebie ebook sale/promo.


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## AngryGames (Jul 28, 2013)

I kind of dig being the evil boss of my own personal sweatshop of which I have one employee, me, and I torment the bastard as much as possible to get him to write more so I can take all of the glory for myself. 

I'd rather be the lowly employee in my own literary sweatshop than do anything else. I enjoy it. However, I'm not really in it for the money grab (grabbing cash is nice, but each of us has our own motivations). 

I don't subscribe to the 'time is money' thing when it comes to writing. In my tech career, you damn right time is money ($125+ per hour kind of money to fuel my cocaine and hooker habits). I can't really put a price on how much time I put into a crafted thing like paintings or writings. 

You might think my book or painting is worth $.99, or worse, nothing at all. 

Someone else might think my book is worth a publishing contract that has a nice big advance and my painting is worth $50k.


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## Betsy the Quilter (Oct 27, 2008)

/derail on

So, now that Russell (blakebooks) is a WSJ front page author, he had to "serious up" his avatar?  *sigh*  I miss the old one.

/derail off


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## Ty Johnston (Jun 19, 2009)

Meh.

Until about a year ago I found Kris and Dean's blogs posts helpful and interesting. Now? I just feel like they're trying to sell me on one of their workshops. Maybe it's me, maybe it's them, but I've lost interest for the most part.


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## Vaalingrade (Feb 19, 2013)

NadiaLee said:


> What people mean when they speak of "lost sales" or "deliberate loss" when they're talking about perma-free is the notion that you could have made $ by not making the book perma-free (or do any kind of free-run).
> 
> It's the same concept as opportunity cost, but applied to a freebie ebook sale/promo.


Of course, they never compare the theoretical sales the free book would have gotten to the sales the other books wouldn't have gotten if not for the permafree.


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## blakebooks (Mar 10, 2012)

The opportunity cost argument is fallacious. It assumes you would have sold any books. That assumption is not necessarily correct. Perhaps you would sell greater than zero, but how much greater is like the proverbial cat in the black box - until the wave form collapses, it's all uncertainty.

Anyone that thinks they "lost" 10,000 sales by giving away 10,000 books needs to recalibrate their assumptions.

I don't really care whether I give away 100,000 or 1,000,000 first books in a series. It's how well those free books translate into sales of the remainder of the series I care about. Then again, I think of my series as a unit, not as a collection of books. If my JET unit, at present earns, say, $20 net with the first book at $2.99, and I sell a total of 2,000 JET series units this month, I will make $40K net from that series. If I put the first book free, I lose the $2 net from that first book, so my net on the series unit drops to $18, but if I sell 2500 of those units, I'm in better shape.

That's the economics of it for me. On the more important side, I have to look at what will gain me the largest readership, not simply shift the most units. For a long time I felt that free units got me greater exposure, which was reflected in my conversion rate from the free first book to the rest. I decided to go paid on those first free books for a month, and my numbers are considerably higher than they were before, but I'm pretty sure the WSJ/Times/Huffington features might have had something to do with that, so January's an atypical month. I'll we watching the 30 day period from Jan 20-Feb 20 closely to see whether it makes sense to keep the first books paid, or make one free again. I do believe that folks who pay for a book are likely to read it sooner than those who get it free, hence my much higher conversion rate on paid sales of the first book, which are trending at around 70%, vs. 12% on free.

Regardless of Kris' sentiments on the value of free, we must all chart our own course. I don't have any philosophical opposition to free. In the end it's the numbers I'm concerned with as the steward of Russell, Inc. I will say that Russell, Inc. has no interest in penning hundreds of novels, only to see $6K a month for its efforts. There are far more lucrative ways to spend one's time and see better ROI, so Russell, Inc. will respectfully not follow counsel that yields that sort of result.

Betsy: I was told by my image consultant that cat ladies would respond better to a smooth skinned young fella with a pretty mouth, so there you have it. New avatar. Although I do miss the iconic one with the beard and bandanna. But the times they are a changin...


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## dalya (Jul 26, 2011)

NadiaLee said:


> What people mean when they speak of "lost sales" or "deliberate loss" when they're talking about perma-free is the notion that you could have made $ by not making the book perma-free (or do any kind of free-run).
> 
> It's the same concept as opportunity cost, but applied to a freebie ebook sale/promo.


Good point. I love the term "opportunity cost." Giving away something with no hard costs per unit isn't the same as Wal-Mart having a special on a hot kids' toy to draw people in.

General point about FREE:

Most people don't want free books. They want good books. Sometimes we have to give stuff away for free to get any visibility at all, but we should try to make our marketing about the entertainment value we offer, not just words per dollar.

Have a good look at other people's marketing and see if it gives you any feelings. For example, I'm on a mailing list for a clothing store. I get an email once a month telling me what % their stuff is on sale for. But I don't want clothes for 30% off. I want to know when they get a really flattering line of jeans that diminish the appearance of Author Pounds. I'll pay. I'll pay for good stuff.

I love the fact that I can offer some free reads for people who don't have the budget to buy books. I think it's awesome. I like people! I like to make them smile!

It's the people who buy books, though, (or blog about them or post reviews) who will support this career and keep me going. We have to remember that there's a huge market of folks who are happy to pay $3.99 for a book, or $9.99 for a book. I need to always think about how to TALK to them, and it's not by sending out newsletters about what % my books are discounted by today. (People who aren't "in the door" yet are different, of course.)


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## a_g (Aug 9, 2013)

This has been a wonderful discussion and I'm thankful, so thankful, for kboards for having such enlightened and passionate writers to chew on these things.

I read Kris' blog posts and I look at their model for success and it seems to be working for them. I then look to my plan, what I want to achieve and find the models that appeal to me are the Courtneys and the Russells and the Hughs.

Their experience tells a different story and it's one I wish to emulate. It follows to reason that I will take their advice under closer advisement than Kris'. She's talented, articulate and doing well _for what she's doing_.

My eyes for success fall on different models.

To round out my singing the praises of the kboards is that I'm most thankful for the exposure to discussions like this which show there are other ways to view something and how to apply it _to our own circumstances_.

*falls back to sing kumbaya now*


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## LilianaHart (Jun 20, 2011)

Wow, took me forever to read all the posts!

I've got numbers to prove that free works, and nothing any blogger or expert can say is going to change my mind, especially when they don't speak from experience. Free worked and continues to work for me. Every first book in every series I have is perma-free. Just got the last update for my numbers. More than two million books sold at an average price point of $4.99. More than 1.5 million books given away as freebies. So, yeah...


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## Usedtoposthere (Nov 19, 2013)

anderson_gray said:


> *falls back to sing kumbaya now*


LOL, I know. So good to know you can say what you think and not get flamed, and that you and others will get reined in if you cross the line. Some people like conflict, I know, but I sure don't. I like discussion!


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## blakebooks (Mar 10, 2012)

Oh, sure, Liliana, if you're going to confound everyone with all those numbers and facts and figures. Stop with all that mumbo jumbo and just say what you mean!


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## Athena Grayson (Apr 4, 2011)

I think you're going to get a wide range of opinions on Rusch's business advice, because you have a wide range of people running those little microbusinesses we call publishing.

Rusch's advice is not going to apply across the board, because we are not all playing the same ballgame, and we are not all playing in the same phase of the game. And, perhaps most importantly, we are not all playing towards the same criteria of victory (aka success).

When you are starting from Nobodysville, your success criteria is going to be visibility. When you are in the middle of the Plains of Modest Success, your success criteria is going to be an increase in velocity, with a handful of maintenance thrown in. When you have reached the High Plateau of Quit'cher Day Job, your success criteria is going to lean further into the maintenance and residual areas, with a steady trickle of new content and, probably most importantly, growth in your sales or income. In some of these games, FREE is going to be a game-changer for you. In others, it could set you back. I get what Rusch is trying to say here--underselling your product can "cheat" you out of income _and_ have the negative side-effect of de-valuing consumer perception of your brand over the longer term.

Right now, we don't have a whole heck of a lot of data on the longer-term, persistent success of self-pubbing in the digital market--there simply hasn't been enough time, and anyone who's been in this game for longer than twenty minutes can see how rapidly things change. That rapid change basically kneecaps any and all attempts to form an effective model for long-term *stability *(FREE doesn't do what it used to do, ranking algorithms change on a weekly basis, and whoops! Here comes a pants-on-fire purge of anything that might possibly tangentially refer to sex in it because of an epic pearl-clutching fit by a small, vocal minority). For me, what I'm taking from the series is that whatever you do, you do so _as part of a strategy_. Not just because of short-term boosts or because it works today. Which is sage career advice no matter what you're selling or where you're going.

Fortunately, it is a strange and wonderful time to be a writer, and we are free not only to take or disregard Rusch's advice, but also to _do so in varying degrees_, and _subject to change at any time_.


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## a_g (Aug 9, 2013)

Rosalind James said:


> LOL, I know. So good to know you can say what you think and not get flamed, and that you and others will get reined in if you cross the line. Some people like conflict, I know, but I sure don't. I like discussion!


I love how these boards work and that the mods are active in monitoring discussion should the flames get a bit too heated. Without these discussions, though, the information just swirls around and confuses things further.

I'm of the opinion that I really like to look at all sides, whether I agree or not, before I make decisions. Those kinds of decisions are informed and I like informed decisions. My informed decisions have a lessened chance of biting me in the butt. They may not work out but they don't hurt near as much.


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## Guest (Jan 24, 2014)

Regarding opportunity costs, though, I do think it's possible to get a rough estimate of what you would have sold if you divide your number of freebies by 100 x a multiplier for any advertising done on free ebook websites/newsletters.

This is based on the Smashwords data that says free increases sales by about 100 times, and my own experience. I have four perma-free titles now, three of which were paid for a short period. When they were paid, I would sell between 0-1 of them per month. Now, I get less than 100 downloads of them. For the fourth one--the one in my sig that actually gets a fair number of downloads--the sales that I was getting on it are about 100-150 times less than the downloads that I get now. Now, I've advertised that book a little (not a whole lot, but a little), so I think that explains for the discrepancy, since I didn't run any ads on it when it was paid and thus didn't drive as much attention to it.

Of course, breaking it down further, I can look at what percentage of people who download the free book buy the next book in the series, and what percentage of those people go on to buy every book. Based on that number, I can see that if the first book were paid, 100% of people who buy the paid book would have to buy every other book in the series to get the equivalent number of people reading through the whole series right now. When you take into account all the people who dropped out midway, I'm definitely selling more books overall by having the first book perma-free than I probably would have if the first book were paid.

So in terms of overall strategy, I can say that the opportunity cost for making the first book free simply doesn't exist. What few sales I would have reasonably gained by selling the first book at the same price as the others is more than made up for by sales through the rest of the series. Instead, the opportunity cost lies in _not_ making the first book perma-free, and that cost is fairly substantial.


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## Terrence OBrien (Oct 21, 2010)

> For me, what I'm taking from the series is that whatever you do, you do so as part of a strategy.


Agree. Much of the advice we see here and in various articles deals with tactics. People identify a tactic, say it worked for them, and then recommend everyone do what they did because they have sales.

We hear far less about strategy. Strategies are plans to achieve an objective. We have to know the objective to develop or evaluate the strategy. And we have to know the strategy to develop or evaluate the tactic.

A tactic that works very well for one person can be a disaster for another. Doesn't matter how many sales either has. It depends on the specific objectives and strategies.

As you noted, strategies will change as objectives change over time.


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## John Brown (Jan 3, 2014)

I believe the comments suggesting KKR and DWS are running workshops because they can't make it with their writing or can't write good product are inaccurate. 

Both of them consistently sold into the trade pub world before they went indie. DWS worked mostly as a ghost (for big name authors) and media tie-in writer from what I can tell. KKR was also the editor of the Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction for many years (her years as editor were the only time I really liked the magazine). KKR regularly sells short work to many of the biggest fiction magazine venues we have.

So I don't know that it's accurate to say they don't have writing chops and therefore teach.  

Furthermore, it's also not true that big sellers don't teach. Orson Scott Card teaches, by choice, at a university and an annual weeklong workshop. Brandon Sanderson teaches one course a year at a major university as well as attending lots of SFF cons and putting out his weekly Writing Excuses podcast. These writers are selling a lot of books and making a lot of money doing so. Lots of bestselling writers do not teach. But there are many who do, including in informal ways like sharing opinions and awesome data on KindleBoards and blogs. 

Furthermore, a lot of the KKR and DWS workshops are online with most of the workshop consists of watching recorded videos. The instructors probably spend an hour, maybe two, reviewing that week's assignment (they're capped at like 10 or 12 people). So it's not like they're spending many hours per day or week with them. 

They both write and publish a LOT. No, it doesn't seem that they have any breakout hits yet. So they can't talk from the experience others can about getting discovered in a big way in the the indie world. 

But the real issue with parts of KKR's latest two posts is what many here have been pointing out: she's strongly suggesting certain business tactics without providing pertinent data or addressing data that seems to run counter to her suggestions. 

It wouldn't matter if it was KKR or the bestselling lizard king of ebooks doing that. If she suggests something, we want to see test results. Because for a lot of indie writers, this is a business. And we'd like some evidence suggesting that a specific tactic works. 

And that's the one thing that I notice in indie world that's so different from the trade world. In trade world authors talked a lot about agents and editors and returns and contracts. I myself got a book deal with Tor Books and had the chance to hobnob with some of my favorite authors. Often the conversations I had with them tended to be more business oriented. But never did I see the level of discussion about business the I see in indie world. Granted I was (am) a new author and so might not have participated in a valid sample, but that's what I saw.    

So even if we might disagree or question some of KKR's positions, I do think her posts are great for bringing up business issues for discussion. I think she's helping many writers consider things we might not otherwise. Look at the discussion and counter data her post has spawned here. Some of the posts here have been very enlightening to me. And that's why I'm loving Kindle Boards and the counterpoints made here as well, especially from those who are doing well and have some data to share.


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## Michael Kingswood (Feb 18, 2011)

Courtney Milan said:


> But you know what? You can ALSO tell that they're not making a ton of money on their writing. How? Because they're still running workshop after workshop after workshop. Add the hours they're spending on workshops and the money they make from that. If they were making loads per book, it would not be profitable for them to run those workshops. It just wouldn't.


In fairness, Dean has on several occasions stated that they actually lose money on the workshops they do on the coast, and they do them to pay it forward just as had been done for them. Now, I haven't seen their records so I've no idea of the workshops' cash flow, but I'm willing to take him at his word on that. Now, their new online workshops? Those have got to be bringing in the dough, because the primary discussions in them are mostly pre-recorded.

Also in fairness, Amazon ranks alone don't tell the whole story for a person's sales, because there are other venues and ranks drop quickly. And these two both have multiple pen names, some of which they keep secret. So we're going off a very poor data source if the only thing we look at is the Kris Rusch name and her Amazon rank. *shrug*

Regardless, I'm inclined to agree with the naysayers on this thread. I think Kris mentioned how well free worked with one of her Sourcebooks novels a year or two ago, but aside from that I don't recall they've actually really tried it. So... Meh.

From my own experience, as a total nobody, until last summer my all time best selling title was Passing In The Night, a novelette that I wrote for the Writers of the Future contest back in 2011. After it got an Honorable Mention but failed to find a home among the various magazines and other publications, I pub'd it to a slow trickle of sales. But there was more to the story, so I wrote The Pericles Conspiracy to continue the tale. When I pub'd Pericles in late August, I set Passing In The Night to free. It went perma-free in early September. Since then close to 1,000 people downloaded it and Pericles has been selling as a steady trickle, making it my new best seller. I guarantee it would not be selling still if not for the free prequel.

Contrast that with my other novel, Glimmer Vale. Written in NaNoWriMo 2011 and pub'd in August 2012, it has sold...16 copies total. Now it could be the book sucks. Distinct possibility. But I've gotten good feedback from some honest people so I think it's at least decent. Well I finally published GV's sequel, Out-Dweller, and book 3 will be ready in late March. So far, naturally, no movement on Out-Dweller, because there's no movement on Glimmer Vale. I'm not sure I can expect book 3 to do much more at this point.

So I'm working on getting Glimmer Vale perma-free. Because if it's not selling worth a damn now, how can it possibly hurt? At this point there's only upside.

Different Topic

Re: the bookstore thing. It's already been discussed what Kris meant with the $2 thing. That came out of the Ella Distribution thing. On the email list for folks who have gone to Dean and Kris' workshops on the coast we talked about this a little more. Supposedly pricing that high will, as stated above, allow enough room for good discounting with an acceptable profit margin for everyone.

But...

Something I saw in December makes me wonder. I was getting ready for a local author event at...Mysterious Galaxy... (great place btw. If you guys are ever in San Diego, you really ought to come check it out). I saw that they had Pericles listed on their site for well above the cover price. Since I was presenting Pericles at the event, this concerned me. They told me the reason it was priced so high is that the distributor only offered a 25% discount for it, so they had to up the sales price to make a reasonable profit. This is spite of my pricing it at >$2 profit in expanded distribution. Now, once they got the physical copies of my book for the event, they adjusted their site to make it correct, but then that was them working with me directly and buying from me at a 40% discount. Not quite the same as ordering through the catalogue.

Through Kris' link, I noticed that they've jacked the price up on her books as well. So I suspect that while expanded distribution may not carry the "POD" tag any more, it still really doesn't offer the industry-standard discounts that bookstores need. Or maybe Mysterious Galaxy is getting the short stick for some reason (I doubt it; they're a quality bookstore who's been around for a while). Regardless, that has me re-evaluating whether to go to Lightning Source for my print versions. Problem is, that gets pricey quick, and right now I'm not earning enough to make the additional cash outlay worthwhile.

Something to think about for the future I guess.

Right. That's all I've got for this one.


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## blakebooks (Mar 10, 2012)

To clarify, I don't really care whether DWS and KKR earn huge money, almost no money, or none at all, from their seminars. I'm not a seminar-taker, so I'm not a customer.

I will say that I tend to model those who have the trajectory I want. I've said that I don't know how many times. I mean, I'd love to be Hugh, but I don't see a breakout hit in my future - or rather, I don't want to count on having one. So I've modeled the authors who are consistently seeing great earnings from their ebook business - and those are the romance authors, and sci-fi authors, primarily. They all tend to have some things in common, among which are a large backlist, good production speed, good but not outlandish pricing, and extreme pragmatism when it comes to the business. That resonates with me, and I want to be Bella or Colleen or Holly or Liliana or Courtney, not KKR. Call me crazy, but if you're going to shoot for something, go big or go home.

That's not to call into question how much KKR earns, because it has no effect on my life. Not one iota. 

I only care about what they have to say in the context of this board, because some of what they say I agree with, and think is good counsel, and some of it I disagree with (strongly), and think is ill-advised. So I make my position known.

Life is not zero sum. I won't make more because Grisham makes less. You won't make less because I make more, or less. In an inelastic market, sure, all books compete with all others, but in a market the size of which we're playing, that's abstract. The fact is that you can be a selfish A-hole and never share anything you learned, or go out of your way to do so, or spout anodyne bromides, or act as a cheerleader, or a naysayer...and none of it really will impact my sales.

I live by simple rules. Skepticism is one of them. Demand proof. Extraordinary claims demand extraordinary proofs. That's served me well, whether it's in evaluating agents, or business approaches, or retirement destinations, or financial planning. Any time anyone's asking you to pay for their expertise, demand that they show relevant results in the specific area you are being asked to pay for. Taking a course from a masterful short story seller is going to do little good if the result I'm looking for is in boosting my enovel discoverability. That seems obvious. To me, anyway. I might learn something, but it's more likely what I learn won't be relevant, equating to a waste of time and money. 

Again. Model success. Whatever success means to you. Model the results you want. Don't waste your time on modeling things that you don't want to be. Pick what you want, go after it with jets blazing, and model the leader in that field. You may fall short, but at least you picked a winner to model.

Ironically, my business model is somewhat like DWS' model - have income streams from a large backlist across multiple formats (paper, audio, ebook) via multiple vendors/channels. Diversification is good, in that I want meaningful income from my oeuvre. Where I break with their philosophy is on the scale. I want a bunch of books in the 10K and lower rankings, not a bunch in the 100K and up. So I write, price and promote to achieve that desire.

We'd all like to write Harry Potter or The Da Vinci Code or 50 Shades. 99.99999999999999% of us won't. So I want an approach that will yield solid results. Aside from genre, I have far more in common with the common-sense work-ethic of the more successful contemp romance authors than I do with most of the thriller authors I know (Michael Wallace being an exception). I look at the careers of the big earners in that genre and I see an income I'd be thrilled with and a sustainable workload to get it, doing something I love. I don't write romance, at least not until this summer, but I have modeled and learned from watching my colleagues in that genre. It's done well for me, too, albeit at a smaller scale than our romance stars.

All this is a long way of saying, I guess, that to answer the question of the correct way to use perma-free, I don't need to take a seminar or read a blog, I have but to look at what the top earners in romance are doing, and simply do that. 

There. My secrets are laid bare. 

Now go fish. 

No charge.


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## John Brown (Jan 3, 2014)

blakebooks said:


> I will say that I tend to model those who have the trajectory I want. . . All this is a long way of saying, I guess, that to answer the question of the correct way to use perma-free, I don't need to take a seminar or read a blog, I have but to look at what the top earners in romance are doing, and simply do that.


Unless, of course, you need to read their blog to find that out.

(grin)

Still, I think you probably just made the whole point of this thread.


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## zoe tate (Dec 18, 2013)

blakebooks said:


> To clarify, I don't really care whether DWS and KKR earn huge money, almost no money, or none at all, from their seminars.


Neither do I. And nobody's suggesting you should, Russell ... I think a few people (myself included, I admit) have chosen to make the point about that simply to demonstrate the obviously faulty logic above with which someone alleged "they can't be selling many books if they need to make money with seminars", that's all.



blakebooks said:


> Life is not zero sum. I won't make more because Grisham makes less. You won't make less because I make more, or less. In an inelastic market, sure, all books compete with all others, but in a market the size of which we're playing, that's abstract. The fact is that you can be a selfish A-hole and never share anything you learned, or go out of your way to do so, or spout anodyne bromides, or act as a cheerleader, or a naysayer...and none of it really will impact my sales.
> 
> I live by simple rules. Skepticism is one of them. Demand proof. Extraordinary claims demand extraordinary proofs. That's served me well, whether it's in evaluating agents, or business approaches, or retirement destinations, or financial planning.


As always, your posts make plenty of sense, and you make your many points in ways in which people on both "sides" of the "argument" can benefit from reading them. Thank you.


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## Terrence OBrien (Oct 21, 2010)

> Life is not zero sum. I won't make more because Grisham makes less. You won't make less because I make more, or less. In an inelastic market, sure, all books compete with all others, but in a market the size of which we're playing, that's abstract.


Agree life isn't a zero sum game. But in a competitive market one books increase in sales can easily come at the the cost of anther book. That is how competition works. It happens in a shrinking market, static market, zero sum market, and increasing market.

A new book can hit the market and have $100 million in sales. That doesn't mean the whole market expands by $100 million. It can contract, stay the same, or increase. Other books can easily lose sales to the new hit.

It is an abstract concept, but it has very real consequences.


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## Betsy the Quilter (Oct 27, 2008)

I'm not an economist, or knowledgable about game theory, or any of the other fascinating things that seem to be the basis for some of the posts here. 

All I do is buy books. 

And yes, I have a finite amount to spend on books.  So, if I head over to Amazon, and I'm trying to choose between the latest Michael Connolly or the latest Russell Blake, I have to pick one or the other.

But, guess what?  Next week, I'm going to buy another book.  And the one I didn't get last week will likely be the one I get this week.

Books are more like perishables to me--I need to keep replacing them.  I may only have a fixed budget for groceries, and may pick and choose what to spend that budget on, but next week, I'm going to buy more groceries.

Just something that struck me as I'm reading this...

Betsy


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## John Brown (Jan 3, 2014)

Besty, I love your title and avatar. It's got to be the most delightful bouncer persona I've ever seen.


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## Betsy the Quilter (Oct 27, 2008)

Thanks, John...

We say, "It takes a tough woman to make a quilt."


Betsy


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## WDR (Jan 8, 2014)

John Brown said:


> Besty, I love your title and avatar. It's got to be the most delightful bouncer persona I've ever seen.


But by the Grace of God, don't get her so angry that she sics the parrot on you&#8230; 

<_hides in the corner hugging his knees, rocking back and forth_>


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## Terrence OBrien (Oct 21, 2010)

Betsy the Quilter said:


> I'm not an economist, or knowledgable about game theory, or any of the other fascinating things that seem to be the basis for some of the posts here.
> 
> All I do is buy books.
> 
> ...


All you do is buy books? That is the basis of the market. Pretty important stuff. The economists start there.

What you described sounds like a reasonable consumer behavior. Other consumers might be deciding from a pool of five authors. But only one wins next week, and when they do come back, who knows what pool they might be considering. And some consumers might be looking for something to read on their lunch hour for the next week. They might not have any book in mind, and simply scan what is on the shelf.

And for any given consumer, the number of available books is far beyond what they can ever consume in their life. The consumer selects one set of books in her life, and rejects all the others.

So we have lots of reasonable and rational consumer behaviors.

In terms of preferences, we might ask producers if they prefer 1) a sale today or 2) a possible sale next week... or next month, or next year, or at some future possible date. That is what the competition is about.

Thought experiment: Consider all the books you have ever been tempted to buy in the bookstore. All the books you pulled off the shelf and looked at. Did you go back and eventually buy them all?


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## NoCat (Aug 5, 2010)

Terrence OBrien said:


> Thought experiment: Consider all the books you have ever been tempted to buy in the bookstore. All the books you pulled off the shelf and looked at. Did you go back and eventually buy them all?


*looks at three rooms of bookshelves and at the over 1500 books on her kindle*

Yes. Yes I did.


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## Betsy the Quilter (Oct 27, 2008)

Terrence OBrien said:


> Thought experiment: Consider all the books you have ever been tempted to buy in the bookstore. All the books you pulled off the shelf and looked at. Did you go back and eventually buy them all?


Well, when I was a well paid geek, I tended to buy them as I saw them. *also looks at bookshelves* And now, I put them on my Kindle wish list, and yes, I'm working through the list. *looks at 2000+ book Kindle library*

But I see your point. 

Betsy


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## Key (Jan 6, 2014)

Doomed Muse said:


> *looks at three rooms of bookshelves and at the over 1500 books on her kindle*
> 
> Yes. Yes I did.


 

Too many of them, for me. But no, not all.


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## WHDean (Nov 2, 2011)

You can look at this "perma-free or not perma-free" question from a scientific standpoint--as a thought experiment. Ask the following question: How could one demonstrate that perma-free works or doesn't work in selling series? The answer to this question gives you a better framework for evaluating the data that people present.

Now, there are two ways of assessing perma-free, the first an experiment and the second a survey. Doing both would be ideal, though the second is more realistic.

*The Experiment *

You'd need about 1,000 authors (500 experimental; 500 control), each with a series of books. The experimental and the control groups both put all their series up at the beginning of Year 1 for the same price, say $2.99/book. At the beginning of Year 2, the experimental group makes their first titles free. At the end of Year 2, we tally the results. If perma-free works, the experimental group should have had significantly more sales than the control group.

Observe the implication for the data floating around. We had to do this experiment in this way because you can tell the difference between sales resulting from perma-free and sales resulting from some other factor. Just because someone started selling after perma-free doesn't mean perma-free was the cause. That person could've been discovered for unrelated reasons.

Since the experiment is almost impossible to do, we might ask whether there's any analogous evidence--a proxy measure. Yes: A large number of sales rank data for perma-free and non-perma-free series. There'd be some problems with this, of course, but it would still be better than nothing and better than anecdotes.

*The Survey*

The survey design is simple enough. Ask several thousand Amazon customers (not readers of your blog, FB page, etc.) who read series whether they look for series by authors who offer the first book free. If a significant number have this buying habit, you can make a case for perma-free. (It also wouldn't hurt to ask whether people pick up and read free books-i.e., they browse the free shelves for books.)

Once again, observe the implication. We had to ask this question of consumers because it's basically the only possible causal factor that could show the value of perma-free. In other words, perma-free only works if it's actually an important variable in reader's buying habits.

I can't help note the obvious problem if this hypothesis is true. More people will adopt perma-free and the returns will diminish; once everyone does it, the playing field levels out.


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## Key (Jan 6, 2014)

WHDean said:


> *The Survey*
> 
> The survey design is simple enough. Ask several thousand Amazon customers (not readers of your blog, FB page, etc.) who read series whether they look for series by authors who offer the first book free. If a significant number have this buying habit, you can make a case for perma-free. (It also wouldn't hurt to ask whether people pick up and read free books-i.e., they browse the free shelves for books.)
> 
> ...


I think I follow what you're saying, but that last part doesn't make sense to me. The returns won't diminish, surely, if that's just a way that readers find new series they want to read. (Maybe I don't really understand what you're saying?)


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## WHDean (Nov 2, 2011)

Key said:


> I think I follow what you're saying, but that last part doesn't make sense to me. The returns won't diminish, surely, if that's just a way that readers find new series they want to read. (Maybe I don't really understand what you're saying?)


It could've been unclear. I meant that once every writer makes his first book free, there's no longer a comparative discoverability advantage in making your first book free--i.e., because everyone's first book is free.


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## RichardWolanski (Jan 20, 2014)

I'm currently doing a free promo with KDP select. It's gotten me more visibility in one day than the week I had my book on Amazon without understanding anything about successfully self-publishing. Now, It's gotten me on several lists and I'm hoping it will funnel people through the books in my series. I'm interested in seeing how this all fares when the promo week is over. I think free lets people take a chance on something they wouldn't have had if they had to pay for it, which is obvious I guess. I still think it's the best method to start with, and as you earn more then use a combination of free and advertising. What do I know? I'm really new to this whole thing...


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## Key (Jan 6, 2014)

WHDean said:


> It could've been unclear. I meant that once every writer makes his first book free, there's no longer a comparative discoverability advantage in making your first book free--i.e., because everyone's first book is free.


I see.  Thanks for explaining.

But it would still help readers find a series (if that proves correct), which is all that would matter to me--not whether I did better than someone else.

_(Unfortunately I've never written a real series in my life so far so it's all moot to me...)_


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## Andrew Ashling (Nov 15, 2010)

WHDean said:


> It could've been unclear. I meant that once every writer makes his first book free, there's no longer a comparative discoverability advantage in making your first book free--i.e., because everyone's first book is free.


But discoverability may not be the point. There are other techniques to bring your book to the attention of readers.
The point is to make it easy and risk-free to get a taste of your series. A permafree is ideal for that because it is an actual part of the series, and thus trumps blurbs, reviews and so on, which frankly only amount to hearsay.


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## Monique (Jul 31, 2010)

I have no way to compare my series with the first book as paid vs free. What I do know is that I have multiple reviews from people saying they tried me as a new (to them) author because the book was free, enjoyed it and bought the rest.


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## anniejocoby (Aug 11, 2013)

My big problem is that there are certainly impressionable young writers who will take her advice, and subsequently give up because her advice is just so...wrong. I mean, first she says not to promote until you have ten books out. Then she says don't do permafree, and if you do, don't buy ads for the freebie. That is a recipe for failure, especially for people like me. I don't have the patience to write book after book after book and have them all in the 600,000 rank or whatever. I would get so down and depressed and discouraged that I probably would have given up long before that magical 10th book was published. This isn't a knock against those with low ranks - I'm just saying that I don't have the patience to try to slowly build an audience that I hope somehow, someway finds me. 

So, I have taken steps to ensure that I am somewhat rolling. That includes permafree and BookBub on the permafree, and any other promotional opportunities I can afford. If I would have followed Kris' advice, though, I surely wouldn't be in this business long. I'm too much of an instant gratification person.


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## blakebooks (Mar 10, 2012)

WHDean: Or you can just stick with what just about every writer in the survey who makes over $500K a year does, which is first book in a series free.


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## Terrence OBrien (Oct 21, 2010)

Or we could merge it with the folks who make less than $500 per year. We can get lots of unreliable samples.


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## Guest (Jan 25, 2014)

WHDean said:


> It could've been unclear. I meant that once every writer makes his first book free, there's no longer a comparative discoverability advantage in making your first book free--i.e., because everyone's first book is free.


But you're assuming that discoverability is a zero-sum game--that if a reader discovers someone else's books, they won't discover my books. What if instead, the pie itself expands--that if everyone made their first books free, readers as a whole started reading more, and non-readers were converted into readers? If that's true, then "comparative discoverability" is meaningless, and the returns will not diminish but continue to grow.


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## Key (Jan 6, 2014)

Well, I read my first Jim Butcher book free from the library.  And the next ones I read, too.  But since then I've been buying them whenever I find them on sale.  And NOT reading them because I'm buying them out of order.  Oy.  But I am buying and will eventually probably have and read the whole series....


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## GearPress Steve (Feb 4, 2012)

Thanks, OP. I found a great deal of insight in Rusch's thoughts on pricing and I've modified the prices for my impending release based on that insight.


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## MonkeyScribe (Jan 27, 2011)

scslawin said:


> Thanks, OP. I found a great deal of insight in Rusch's thoughts on pricing and I've modified the prices for my impending release based on that insight.


I think she's wrong on price. I know she points to studies and books that support her $5.99 and up pricing scheme for a novel, who dismissing those who are making good money selling at lower price points, but the rebuttal is easy.

Who knows more about selling on Amazon than anyone else? Amazon does. Where do they set the price of their imprint books? $2.99 - $4.99.


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## David &#039;Half-Orc&#039; Dalglish (Feb 1, 2010)

Looks like we got called out on on her blog:



In short: people who make their living self-publishing on the vastly largest market don't like that she's not able to sell on the vastly largest market. Shocker. It's almost as if she's pretending all her advice had nothing to do with...selling your work on the vastly largest market.

Oh wait. Well. Maybe she'll add another caveat to the next post    Either that, or insist not putting books up for perma-free has something to do with comic books and Hollywood options. Because the people who desperately need to be discovered are rolling in those sorts of things, right?

Well, at least we know why we all have issues with her post. It was free! Maybe if we'd paid money for it, the sunk cost fallacy would have convinced us everything was brilliant...


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## Ann in Arlington (Oct 27, 2008)

Thread under discussion in Admin.  Locked for now. . . . .


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## KBoards Admin (Nov 27, 2007)

Caution: this discussion need not escalate into an us-versus-them battle. The discussion in this thread of the merits of a "free-book" strategy is a good one. And, while it's relevant to assess the credentials of the blogger offering opinions on the matter, let's avoid personal remarks here and focus our discussion on the merits (and potential pitfalls) of a 'free' strategy.


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## WHDean (Nov 2, 2011)

Monique said:


> I have no way to compare my series with the first book as paid vs free. What I do know is that I have multiple reviews from people saying they tried me as a new (to them) author because the book was free, enjoyed it and bought the rest.





blakebooks said:


> WHDean: Or you can just stick with what just about every writer in the survey who makes over $500K a year does, which is first book in a series free.


There are three separate issues here:

1. There's modeling good business practices. If I had a series of ten or more books, I'd do exactly what you're both doing: I'd offer the first free. But not just because you've done it. I'd do it because it's a tried and true business strategy. Even if no one had done it and the whole of the indie hive mind said it was dumb and useless, I'd still try it because it's a good strategy.

2. The controversy on this thread, however, surrounds evidence. My thought experiment was intended to illustrate what you'd need to show that this strategy actually works. And I think my experiment does show that no one can rule out the many, many confounding factors. For that reason, I don't think anyone can really claim to know that perma-free works. It might only be incidental to the success of some. Let's face it: lots of successful writers don't give away the first in their series.

3. All the same, I think the burden of proof lies with the perma-free doesn't help discoverability because it does everywhere else.


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## WHDean (Nov 2, 2011)

Joe Vasicek said:


> But you're assuming that discoverability is a zero-sum game--that if a reader discovers someone else's books, they won't discover my books. What if instead, the pie itself expands--that if everyone made their first books free, readers as a whole started reading more, and non-readers were converted into readers? If that's true, then "comparative discoverability" is meaningless, and the returns will not diminish but continue to grow.





Andrew Ashling said:


> But discoverability may not be the point. There are other techniques to bring your book to the attention of readers.
> The point is to make it easy and risk-free to get a taste of your series. A permafree is ideal for that because it is an actual part of the series, and thus trumps blurbs, reviews and so on, which frankly only amount to hearsay.


I don't assume books compete directly, but let's keep it simple and use one author. I'm saying that for perma-free to make a difference for the same series writer, a large number of series readers have to sample free books as part of their buying habits. That's all. This has to do with causes.


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## Marti talbott (Apr 19, 2011)

I am not so sure the permafree strategy works as well now as it did a year ago. It is like select -the more a multitude of authors use it, the less it becomes the solution for everyone. Last time I added it up, I had given away 140,000 free books in three years. Would I have sold that many if they were priced at $.99? I will never know. It's a toss up between promotion and money, it always has been, and it is an individual choice. Neither is right or wrong.

I pretty much ignore all the wisdom on the internet, even if written by successful authors. There are too many variables for anyone to make statements that apply to all books.


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## Guest (Jan 25, 2014)

WHDean said:


> I don't assume books compete directly, but let's keep it simple and use one author. I'm saying that for perma-free to make a difference for the same series writer, a large number of series readers have to sample free books as part of their buying habits. That's all. This has to do with causes.


It's called the library.


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## nobody_important (Jul 9, 2010)

Vaalingrade said:


> Of course, they never compare the theoretical sales the free book would have gotten to the sales the other books wouldn't have gotten if not for the permafree.


Of course not. Everything in that opportunity cost / lost sales argument is theoretical.

"I can theoretically give away X copies, which I could have theoretically sold for $Y, so I theoretically lost $z income."


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## GearPress Steve (Feb 4, 2012)

Well, I don't have a series (yet). But here's what I'm doing with my first title, which is within days of going live. I modified my pricing strategy after reading Kris Rusch's treatise on pricing.

Non-fic/136 pages/trade paperback/5.5 x 8.5 trim size

- Print version: $14.95 (£9.95 GBP UK and €11.95 Europe)
- Expanded distribution (of course)
- Kindle edition: $3.99
- Enrolled in Select
- Kindle Matchbook price: $1.99

I had originally priced the print edition at $9.97, but after reading what Rusch had to say, it made a lot more sense for me to raise the price. Now when my series is ready, then the pricing strategy will be completely different.


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