# Some thoughts on audiobooks and ACX (stipends!)



## ElHawk (Aug 13, 2012)

Hey, guys. I just finished listening to the "draft" version of The Sekhmet Bed in audiobook format. It turned out amazingly well, because my narrator, Amanda C. Miller, is spectacular and smart and hard-working and I really can't say enough good things about her. Now that the production is pretty much done (for the most part), I though I'd share a few things I learned in the process in case anybody else finds it useful.

It's a long post, so here's the Cliff's notes version:

There are some pros and cons to working with ACX...consider carefully before you jump in!
ACX's stipend-plus-royalty share program is a real draw for experienced, professional narrators and can hook you up with a very good actor to produce your book.
You can qualify your book for the stipend via a well-timed free run.
Even if you don't qualify right off the bat, you may be able to convince ACX to offer the stipend anyway, if your sales are good enough or if you have other things going for you (name recognition, etc.)
Visibility for an audiobook is a serious challenge and may require some very creative thinking when it comes to promo.

First of all, although there are some drawbacks to working with ACX, it has a lot of benefits, too. I thought long and hard before I tried ACX. The biggest drawback is that if you choose to split royalties with your narrator, your audiobook is tied to ACX's distribution for seven years. Right now their distribution looks really good: Audible.com and iTunes, which are the biggest sources of audiobook purchases anyhow. But in seven years I have no doubt that the way listeners buy (and listen to) audiobooks will change, and there's certainly no guarantee that ACX will keep pace with changes. So it represents some risk to tie yourself to them for seven years, but with a book that sells fairly well, splitting royalties can also be a big draw to voice actors, who would then enjoy a little extra income for that duration.

You don't have to tie your book to their distribution, but then you must offer a payment up front to your narrator, and I didn't feel I had the budget to make an attractive enough offer compared to how much work it takes to produce a good audiobook. And I wanted to attract the best narrator I could get. I'm a huge consumer of audiobooks -- I probably listen to more books than I read -- and I know the importance of having an excellent narrator.

What I _didn't _ know -- what I never found in all my research when I was beginning this process -- is that ACX will put *an additional stipend * on certain books as a way to tempt narrators to audition for projects which are likely to sell well, _and _ which are using the royalty share/seven years of distribution option. I found this out purely by chance, when I got a crazy flood of auditions for The Sekhmet Bed, and had to close the book to auditions sooner than I'd planned to just so I had the chance to give each audition a fair listen.

Apparently ACX uses a Super Secret Amazon Algorithm to determine which books qualify for the stipend. And I happened to sign The Sekhmet Bed up for ACX a couple of days before I did a free run on BookBub which resulted in 25,000 downloads in 48 hours. This obviously triggered the algorithm and flagged my book for the stipend, and the auditions went bonkers. I was able to choose Amanda as my narrator (a difficult choice...there were so many excellent auditions!) and she earned almost $1000 for doing the production, and she'll split royalties with me. It was a win-win situation, we had a great rapport as we worked together, and she's agreed to do the narration for the next two books in the series, provided I can get ACX to offer a stipend for those, too.

She checked into how this is done, and apparently the algorithm isn't the only way to make it happen! Authors can contact ACX directly and ask for the stipend to be applied. ACX said that since the algorithm highlighted one of my books as qualified, it's likely they'll put the stipend on the rest in the series, too. I'll find out for sure on Monday, when I contact them about it.

Why is the stipend so important to narrators? Well, in addition to the fact that it's MONEY and we all like money, it gives them some security against the time they put into producing your audiobook. It's a LOT of work. Amanda was getting up in the middle of the night to record The Sekhmet Bed between 1:30 a.m. and 4:30 a.m., when her neighbors were asleep and therefore not yelling and creating distracting background noise! She definitely deserves all the compensation she can get for that kind of commitment, and there's no guarantee this audiobook will sell well even though the ebook has been a really steady earner for me (more on problems of audiobook sales later).

In addition, though, *ACX's stipend counts as qualified income for the members of certain actors' unions, and helps those actors keep their health insurance. * This was a big deal to Amanda -- I imagine it's a big deal to many other professional actors, too!

So by choosing to do the royalty-share/seven years of bondage option, you may actually be increasing your odds of getting an excellent actor to produce your book...maybe even an actor with some name recognition or a local following, which could really help your visibility.

Now, I had no clue about the stipend thing when I started. It was purely happy coincidence that auditions for The Sekhmet Bed lined up with by BookBub free run. But it shows that even free downloads count toward qualification for the stipend. So it might be a good idea to time a book's audition period with a free run, especially in conjunction with a high-power promo site like BookBub. (At least, free downloads counted as of June 2013...I don't know whether they still do.)

So about the problem of visibility.

Amanda has been very proactive in figuring out how we'll promote this series of audiobooks (which I appreciate greatly!) She learned that Audible's recommendation algorithms leave much to be desired, categories are kind of limited, and the way Audible currently transports key info from the book's corresponding Amazon page (such as rating, ranking, reviews, etc.) leaves MUCH to be desired. So you are really very much on your own when it comes to promoting an audiobook...you don't even have handy-dandy algorithms to help you out a little.

We've been brainstorming some creative ways we can promote the book to try to maximize our royalties as quickly as possible, and as we begin actually implementing some of our ideas, I'll start a thread about that. Because right now, we really have no idea what will be effective, and it's all groping in the dark.

However, it leaves a lot of room to try some creative tactics neither of us has ever tried before, and that's kind of exciting!

Okay, I'll leave it there for now. I'm happy to answer any questions people may have about the process from the author's end.


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## jimkukral (Oct 31, 2011)

Thanks for the insights. I believe audio books "can" explode for self-published authors, but only if more affordable options exist for getting them read. That's a huge barrier. Most authors don't have the sales to get a good actor, so they have to pay for it up front, which of course, they can't do because they don't have the money.


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## Christa Wick (Nov 1, 2012)

It's very generous of you, El, to take the time and detail your experience and the insight you gained. I hit approve on my first audiobook last week and am waiting for ACX to do their review. It's the collected version of a serial, so I'm also finishing up on approving the three separate cuts.

I've had a really hard time finding voices I like, so I opened it to both flat fee and royalty share auditions. I received about 23 auditions in short order, I don't know if that means ACX flag it as eligible for a stipend. I also thought the stipends program ended sometime early October (i.e. no new enrollments). Do you know if they restarted the stipend program?

My narrator will be very familiar to most WC visitors -- it's Mike Dennis (http://mikedennisnoir.com).


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## ElHawk (Aug 13, 2012)

Christa Wick said:


> Do you know if they restarted the stipend program?


I don't know for sure. I'm going to find out when I talk to them tomorrow!


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## polecat (Oct 18, 2013)

Probably off topic but is the audiobook for The Sehhmet bed available yet? I am thinking of buying it and if the audiobook is available you can get it at a deep discount.


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## Christa Wick (Nov 1, 2012)

polecat said:


> Probably off topic but is the audiobook for The Sehhmet bed available yet? I am thinking of buying it and if the audiobook is available you can get it at a deep discount.


If El just finished listening to it before she's approved it (i.e. as she notes, "draft" version), it could be up to a month before it's live as I understand it.


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## Gertie Kindle (Nov 6, 2008)

Christa Wick said:


> If El just finished listening to it before she's approved it (i.e. as she notes, "draft" version), it could be up to a month before it's live as I understand it.


And then another few weeks before it becomes whispersync available. My audiobook went live on 10/22 and just got into whispersync yesterday. I'm hoping that will make a difference.

I chose to do a novella so I could pay my narrator up front. The drawback to that is that shorter works don't sell as well.


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## ElHawk (Aug 13, 2012)

Gertie Kindle 'a/k/a Margaret Lake' said:


> And then another few weeks before it becomes whispersync available. My audiobook went live on 10/22 and just got into whispersync yesterday. I'm hoping that will make a difference.
> 
> I chose to do a novella so I could pay my narrator up front. The drawback to that is that shorter works don't sell as well.


Yep, I guess it will be a couple of weeks. ACX has to approve the file and I hear it's taking about 14 days of late for them to get through all the various files to approve.

It sounds great, though! I'm really happy with how it turned out.


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## minxmalone (Oct 28, 2012)

There's a big backlog right now. I had an audiobook go live last week and it took 40 days for them to approve it. I actually thought there's been some kind of glitch because it's never taken that long before.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

Thanks for your post, ElHawk. Very helpful!


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## pauldude000 (May 22, 2013)

minxmalone said:


> There's a big backlog right now. I had an audiobook go live last week and it took 40 days for them to approve it. I actually thought there's been some kind of glitch because it's never taken that long before.


When the production for my first novel was complete, it required 30 days to approve. It even shocked my narrator, Kevin Pierce.

My new novel is in production, so I will get to see what the average is. It should be out of production by the 18th of Dec.


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## Christa Wick (Nov 1, 2012)

I submitted the collected version around November 3 and the 3 installment versions yesterday. Probably a race to get them all up (without whispersync) before mid December, but I started very late! There's too much negative noise (a lot for good reason, I think) to make the decision to jump in an easy one. It also doesn't seem to be a topic covered at the romance writers conferences (aside from some throwaway remarks by presenters, usually those have a good experience), so no easing the pain there. 

Do any of the other genre conferences or overall industry conferences cover the topic of getting your audiobooks produced (or self-producing) and MARKETING them? I'm really surprised RWA doesn't, but they are still trad pub focused for the most part. I would think BEA or DBW conferences would, although they would be heavy on totally letting someone else take care of it for a fee at least 3x what I paid my excellent narrator to voice & produce it for me. In February, there was a DIY (mostly) conference online only that was pretty helpful. I hope they do it again for 2014 and add more meat about audiobooks.


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## Gertie Kindle (Nov 6, 2008)

ACX does touch on marketing but I didn't see any new advice.


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## Christa Wick (Nov 1, 2012)

Gertie Kindle 'a/k/a Margaret Lake' said:


> ACX does touch on marketing but I didn't see any new advice.


Yeah, I read that page the other day and it was a bullet point of "Get on FB, Twitter, etc." and "Done that already? Start a blog"

herp derp ACX herp derp


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## Jean E (Aug 29, 2011)

Thank you ElHawk.  This is a very informative post.  I am no where near getting an audiobook recorded, but I have made some notes in my How To Self Publish and Become a Famous Author notebook.  Best of luck with it.


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## JumpingShip (Jun 3, 2010)

The stipend thing is a real mystery. It's not always tied to sales. At least, it didn't seem that way for my books. I put all four of my books up on ACX in January. Like the OP, I was suddenly flooded with auditions. I went to look, and two of my four books had stipends attached. I was thrilled, but the strange thing was, my bestseller, which had a good free run just prior, and had even reached the top 20 on Kindle previously, was not given a stipend.   Instead, my third and fourth book in the series were. Not that they are poor sellers--both have sold well and have good reviews, but it puzzled me that they received stipends and my 'flagship' book hadn't. 

I ran into some problems with my first narrator. Nice guy and all, but he just couldn't get the job done. In over two months, he had only finished two chapters. The stipend has a 60 day deadline for completing the book, and he exceeded it. I had to 'fire' him. I got another guy in June (it took almost 8 weeks to get the other narrator off the contract--through no fault of his--he was extremely cooperative and I felt so bad.   ) 

By this time, my stipend was nearing expiration and I had to find a narrator quickly. I found one that had a good resume, sounded good, etc and signed him for the two books with stipends. He did the work in the required time--but he was not nearly as pleasant to work with as the first guy. We had some creative differences and he was quite arrogant. 

I then went to bat for my book, No Good Deed, to get a stipend on that one as I really needed a new narrator. I had asked back in May and also in Feb, but never had answers. This time, I called and wrote again, had an ACX person give me her word she'd see it went up the chain to those who decided, and she did!   NGD received a stipend and I got an awesome narrator (Daniel Penz) who has been wonderful to work with.


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## Anne Frasier (Oct 22, 2009)

oh, very informative!

i've wondered how people get stipends. I actually had my entire book paid for through ACX, which was of course wonderful, but it also had some drawbacks. You only have a certain amount of time to approve a narrator or you lose the funding, and you can only use ACX approved narrators. i actually got some much better auditions for non-approved narrators but i was unable to accept them. and because of the time element i had to make a choice even if i wasn't crazy about that choice. but i thought, well, i'm not paying for it... yes, and no. here's something i didn't think about-which was stupid of me. your book is rated by story and *narrator*. so... i have a book that used to get excellent ratings...now getting some not to great ratings and audio sales flatlined once the ratings started showing up. and with audio it's not like a cover. you can't pull it and replace it if it's doing poorly. i certainly don't regret going with ACX, but i wish i'd had more of a game plan going in. i'll certainly have a better idea of what to do next time if i decide to make another title available.


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## JeffreyKafer (May 22, 2011)

As for promotion, make sure you and the narrator are clear up front as to how involved the narrator will be. I encourage narrators NOT to spend much time promoting the audiobook because unless they are a superstar in the industry, no one is going to buy it because they narrated it. The narrator's time is much better spent narrating their next book, than spending time promoting a royalty-share.

Just something to discuss early on.


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## ElHawk (Aug 13, 2012)

Christa Wick said:


> Do any of the other genre conferences or overall industry conferences cover the topic of getting your audiobooks produced (or self-producing) and MARKETING them?


You know, I was wondering this, too. Primarily because Amanda and I have found little in the way of articles, advice, or shared experience online or in podcasts (though Joanna Penn's podcast has some useful info on the topic.) My assumption is that indie audiobooks are still a new enough thing that nobody has yet identified all the specific problems (i.e., how Audible's algorithms do and don't work) nor figured out fairly useful work-arounds or tactics.

If we're able to promote ours successfully, maybe I'll try pitching it as a topic at some conferences! I love public speaking. 



JeffreyKafer said:


> As for promotion, make sure you and the narrator are clear up front as to how involved the narrator will be. I encourage narrators NOT to spend much time promoting the audiobook because unless they are a superstar in the industry, no one is going to buy it because they narrated it. The narrator's time is much better spent narrating their next book, than spending time promoting a royalty-share.
> 
> Just something to discuss early on.


Yes -- I agree. That's a really great point.

In the case of my narrator, she does have a bit of name-recognition among anime fans and video gamers, so she could be useful in promoting it and helping the book reach some new audiences -- a lucky break for me. But for the most part, listeners are going to focus more on the author than the narrator (when it comes to making a purchase decision, anyway.) If you should end up with a mega-famous person in the audiobook world, like Davina Porter or Stefan Rudnicki, that changes, of course...but most of the folks on ACX are either new at this (though some are really excellent!) or are trying to expand their business from some other form of acting to audiobook narration.


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## Gertie Kindle (Nov 6, 2008)

JeffreyKafer said:


> As for promotion, make sure you and the narrator are clear up front as to how involved the narrator will be. I encourage narrators NOT to spend much time promoting the audiobook because unless they are a superstar in the industry, no one is going to buy it because they narrated it. The narrator's time is much better spent narrating their next book, than spending time promoting a royalty-share.
> 
> Just something to discuss early on.


My narrator has offered to help even though she's not on royalty share. We've done two books together and we're going to do three more if the first two sell well enough. I really prefer to pay up front if I can, but I might try going the stipend route if it's possible.

If the narrator gets a stipend and royalty share, does that royalty share still run for seven years?


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## JeffreyKafer (May 22, 2011)

Gertie Kindle 'a/k/a Margaret Lake' said:


> I really prefer to pay up front if I can, but I might try going the stipend route if it's possible.


The stipend is good, but keep in mind that a lot of us get very little of it. It's meant to cover expenses such as proofing and editing. We have out-of-pocket production costs that most authors are not aware of.



Gertie Kindle 'a/k/a Margaret Lake' said:


> If the narrator gets a stipend and royalty share, does that royalty share still run for seven years?


Yep, thank goodness.


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## ElHawk (Aug 13, 2012)

Okay -- I promised to update when I had news on whether I was able to convince ACX to put the stipend on another book.

I was able to do it, though it took a few weeks to get it all finalized.  I wrote to them asking about the possibility, and was then required to sell the idea to them by showing them sales stats and other data I've gathered about my book and other books in my genre, to compare how well The Crook and Flail can be projected to perform as an audiobook.  I also needed to present a promotional plan, and I think (but don't know for certain) that's what sold them on the idea more than anything, since promoting all my stuff, including audiobooks, in 2014 is going to be podcast-focused and is taking a tack that most other authors don't take (and should reach the desired audience efficiently and in a memorable way, if it works out as I'm thinking it will.  It's reasonable to assume that podcast listeners are likely to be audiobook listeners, too.)

So, after doing the most intimidating business presentation I've ever had to give, The Crook and Flail is going into production with the same awesome narrator who did The Sekhmet Bed.  And the stipend means that she still gets income that counts toward her Actor's Guild health insurance.  It's a Christmas miracle!

No idea whether I'll be able to get them to fund the next two books in the series, but I'm hoping to be able to pay for those out of pocket anyway, since I've got a few historical novels planned for the future that will sound best with multiple narrators, and it'll be easier to pay for their production myself than to convince ACX to back me.  

On the whole, I found ACX to be very welcoming, helpful, and friendly during the "presentation," though they were certainly very clear about their stance that I needed to give them some darn good reasons to put money into my project.  They weren't willing to just throw it at me because I held out my cup and begged.    Awesome people to work with, though...very professional.


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## Christa Wick (Nov 1, 2012)

Thanks for the update, El!


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## Gertie Kindle (Nov 6, 2008)

Congratulations. What you had to do to get the stipend makes a lot of sense. I can't see them giving it out to just anybody for any book unless it sells fairly well in ebook.

You definitely earned it.


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## ElHawk (Aug 13, 2012)

Right -- of course! Gotta prove I'm worth it. 

I'm very impressed with ACX, on the whole. I felt like they took my presentation as seriously as they would have taken any publisher's.

And I'm _suuuuuper _ excited to hear this audiobook! This is my favorite one out of all four volumes in the series.


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## Joseph Turkot (Nov 9, 2012)

I was able to get a stipend for my narrator John Badila. He's awesome. He was on the TV show "The Wire." His voice is gold. I am pretty happy with ACX. He is now working on the second book and receiving stipend and royalty share on that one too.


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## ElHawk (Aug 13, 2012)

Wow, that's fantastic!  I miss The Wire...


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## Jan Thompson (May 25, 2013)

Are there other alternatives to ACX? The "seven year bondage" is something I'll have to think about there. As you mentioned in your OP, the publishing world is changing rapidly. Seven years is eternity in the ebook world. I don't want to make commitments without knowing what's going to happen even next year, let alone 7 years from now.


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## ElHawk (Aug 13, 2012)

The seven-year thing is certainly a big sticking point, and I agree that it's worth being a little hesitant of it.

I believe you can distribute directly to iTunes without going through any intermediary...somebody please correct me if I'm wrong.  You can get an audiobook on Audible/Amazon without agreeing to seven years of exclusivity with ACX.  The present-day perks of the seven years deal probably won't continue to be perks for the entire seven years, so you have to decide whether you are comfortable with accepting some perks and committing some titles to ACX now, or opting for the less perky but more freedomy method that gives you greater control.

My plan, personally, is to do my Egyptian series with ACX and do the rest on my own.  That way I'm taking advantage of the short-term benefits via ACX but keeping the majority of my future catalog in my own hands.  When I know I'll be writing about 15 books per year once I'm writing full-time, it looks a lot less scary to commit four books to a seven-year contract.    But it is something to be considered carefully, because seven years is a LONG time in publishing.


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## Jan Thompson (May 25, 2013)

ElHawk said:


> My plan, personally, is to do my Egyptian series with ACX and do the rest on my own. That way I'm taking advantage of the short-term benefits via ACX but keeping the majority of my future catalog in my own hands. When I know I'll be writing about 15 books per year once I'm writing full-time, it looks a lot less scary to commit four books to a seven-year contract.  But it is something to be considered carefully, because seven years is a LONG time in publishing.


How are you doing this on your own?

I had thought I'd handle the audiobooks myself because I know actors and people in the industry who can record and produce my audiobooks for me. But when I read of ACX I decided to look into it to see whether it can do better distribution than I can but haven't had time to figure out if it works for me or not.

I don't know if I want someone to record my audiobooks in their homes unless they have a soundproof room.


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## ElHawk (Aug 13, 2012)

I have a number of different options I can pursue.  The next three audiobooks that come from me are coming out via ACX and their stipend-share/seven-year-bondage thing, so precisely how I go about it is still to be decided, but there are a few options out there.

I have a friend with a fantastic sound studio.  He does a really popular podcast and has turned a little office space he rents into a recording studio.  I've been on his podcast and some others recorded in his studio a number of times, so I know first-hand that the sound quality is amazing.  I have discussed the possibility of renting his studio by the hour and also paying an actor by the hour to record in it.  So that's one possible route.

However, my narrator Amanda records right in her apartment (doing her recording during hours when her noisy neighbors aren't at home...or are sleeping!)  I assumed she had access to a super-fancy studio like my podcasting friend's, because the sound quality of her recordings is just as good as my friend's.  However, she just has her un-soundproofed apartment and a nice microphone that equalizes sound well.  So you can find quality recordings and professional production from people on ACX, even if they're recording in their apartments!  

You don't go into the narrator selection process blindly on ACX.  They do audition reels, reading parts of your story and sending you the clip.  You can assess their acting abilities, voices, and even the quality of their recording equipment before you agree to work with them.

Whether I'd work via ACX or totally on my own, I would never hire a narrator unless I could be certain of his or her ability to produce a file that sounds clear and pleasant to listen to.  I don't care whether it's recorded in a fancy sound studio or in an apartment, as long as I can't tell the difference!


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## Jan Thompson (May 25, 2013)

ElHawk said:


> Whether I'd work via ACX or totally on my own, I would never hire a narrator unless I could be certain of his or her ability to produce a file that sounds clear and pleasant to listen to. I don't care whether it's recorded in a fancy sound studio or in an apartment, as long as I can't tell the difference!


I agree! I need to look into ACX more e.g. whether their narrators can read my novels better than my stage actor friends. So it's nice to have options.

Another question... IIRC DWS has audiobooks for his short stories. I can't see myself doing that LOL but I do have blind friends who might benefit from audiobooks though they could easily have used Siri on their iPads to just read the ebook to them. So not much to fuss about there.

However, what about *novellas*? Do authors make audiobooks for novellas? I have a historical novellas coming soon and I'm wondering...

I really used to think only full length novels need audiobooks bc of long road trips LOL!


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## Usedtoposthere (Nov 19, 2013)

Chiming in to say, I got the deal someone else mentioned, where ACX pays for one book up front, and my experience so far has been wonderful. ACX themselves have been super helpful, I got some terrific narrators to choose from despite the "Audible-Approved" requirement, and I couldn't be happier about the narrator and producer I chose. (Not easy, because five of my books are set in New Zealand--not the world's most common accent, but very distinctive.) The really nice thing is that it's a company, and the producer is also the "director" of the narration, so my communication goes through him. He's a pro who knew what to ask me for, and it's clear he's project-managing the whole thing so I DON'T HAVE TO. Hooray. I strongly advise considering this when you're choosing a narrator--with all my marketing efforts, I think about, "how much time/effort/focus will this take?" The very best use of my time is writing books.

Re ACX: Because of the holidays, I asked for an extension of the 60-day maximum for production, and received it. Like I said, they've been super helpful, and there's a LOT of info on that page, too. Early days, but so far, so very good.

My plan for the others is to use the same narrator and pay for it up-front, because I don't see why I should do royalty share if I don't have to. It takes a good couple months per book, so there's time for (I hope) the previous books to at least help pay the way of the next book. 

You can go exclusive or non-exclusive with ACX, by the way (maybe somebody pointed this out above, but I didn't see it). However, you only get half the royalties with non-exclusive, but if you're very leery of the 7-year deal, perhaps that's worth it. With exclusive ACX (Audible and iTunes only), your royalties range from 50-90% depending on the copies sold--pretty good deal. The deal I got, where ACX pays, exclusivity is required, but I'd have done that anyway. Between Audible and iTunes, the audiobook bases are pretty well covered.


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## Jan Thompson (May 25, 2013)

Rosalind James said:


> You can go exclusive or non-exclusive with ACX, by the way (maybe somebody pointed this out above, but I didn't see it). However, you only get half the royalties with non-exclusive, but if you're very leery of the 7-year deal, perhaps that's worth it. With exclusive ACX (Audible and iTunes only), your royalties range from 50-90% depending on the copies sold--pretty good deal. The deal I got, where ACX pays, exclusivity is required, but I'd have done that anyway. Between Audible and iTunes, the audiobook bases are pretty well covered.


Newbie question - Does ACX distribute to iTunes and BN?


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## ElHawk (Aug 13, 2012)

JanThompson said:


> However, what about *novellas*? Do authors make audiobooks for novellas? I have a historical novellas coming soon and I'm wondering...


I don't know! I'm sure some do, but whether they sell well, I can't say.

I have purchased an audiobook of a short story by one of my favorite authors, so there are some short audiobooks out there. How much they sell and whether they're worth the production cost is another question, and probably depends on whether you can get them produced well on the cheap.

In the grand scheme of things, I'm not sure that *right now* short stories in audiobook format are a wise investment of your budget, just because they _probably _ will sell poorly for you and will sell for less money than a longer audiobook. However, short fiction and novellas are catching on faster all the time in the ebook market (though not as fast as I think we'd all like to see...) so maybe there will be a big uptick of interest in shorter works among audiobook listeners. My gut tells me there won't be, because audiobooks are a bit of an investment for listeners, so they're likely to spend their entertainment budget on something that gives them more bang for their buck. Longer audiobooks are likelier, I think, to be better earners for you.

However, a platform that relies on shorter, serial content (Podiobooks.com, for example, which is free for listeners) could potentially be a great way to expose listeners to your work and could funnel people who are already big consumers of audio content toward your longer, paid audiobooks. Kind of like permafree for ebooks. I'm not sure this would work out -- I just have a hunch that it could be an efficient way to find the right audience and drive them toward longer, full-price audiobooks. If you can produce a quality audio file of shorter work with little financial investment, it could give you an excellent ROI on the paid-audiobooks portion of your publishing. It'd be interesting to experiment with.

My rule of thumb is to only spend a lot of time and money on something if I can see very clearly that it's _probably _ going to drive sales of my books. That includes things like getting all my work into every conceivable format. My time, and certainly my limited money, will _probably _ be better spent writing more books than producing short fiction as audiobooks. If things change drastically in the way listeners approach their audiobook consumption, and short work starts to take off, I'd reconsider that position. Until then, though, it's on to writing the next book!


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## ElHawk (Aug 13, 2012)

JanThompson said:


> Newbie question - Does ACX distribute to iTunes and BN?


I don't believe they distribute to B&N, but they do distribute to Apple and Amazon, as well as, obviously, Audible. Those are the three big places where the huge majority of listeners buy their audiobooks.



Rosalind James said:


> Between Audible and iTunes, the audiobook bases are pretty well covered.


And Amazon. Your audiobook version also shows up on Amazon as an available format, alongside ebook and paperback!

They definitely are well-covered bases right now, and I feel very confident that my books are well placed in the best sales channels for 2014 and maybe a few more years, too. However, people are hesitant over the seven-year exclusivity requirement because you just never know what new distribution channels will come along and become major players in the future. (Google Play will undoubtedly shape up to be a contender in audiobook sales!) Seven years is a loooooong time.

I'm more confident than some that ACX will remain a good company to partner with because it's owned by Audible, which is owned by Amazon now, and Amazon is usually pretty smart about keeping at the forefront of sales and audience-reaching. It'll be hard (but not impossible) for new companies to compete with that. However, I don't like to keep all my eggs in any one basket, so some future audiobooks will remain fully in my control just in case I see a need to establish an audiobook presence outside the ACX channels.


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## Usedtoposthere (Nov 19, 2013)

JanThompson said:


> Newbie question - Does ACX distribute to iTunes and BN?


iTunes, yes. And if you're non-exclusive, probably BN too? You might check it out on the ACX page.

Regarding your other question, about short fiction--most purchases of audiobooks are through the subscription service of Audible (per Audible). Subscribers listen to many more audiobooks than people who buy them one at a time. But the thing is, a short book, a novella or a story, is still a credit. It makes sense to me that people wouldn't want to spend their credit on a novella rather than a long book. I know that during the many years I had a big subscription package, I always looked at the number of hours, looking for books that were at least 8 hours long, and I'll bet lots of people are like that. So, yeah. I wouldn't bother for short fiction, not right at first.


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## Jan Thompson (May 25, 2013)

Rosalind James said:


> iTunes, yes. And if you're non-exclusive, probably BN too? You might check it out on the ACX page.
> 
> Regarding your other question, about short fiction--most purchases of audiobooks are through the subscription service of Audible (per Audible). Subscribers listen to many more audiobooks. But the thing is, a short book, a novella or a story, is still a credit. It makes sense to me that people wouldn't want to spend their credit on a novella rather than a long book. I know that during the many years I had a big subscription package, I always looked at the number of hours, looking for books that were at least 8 hours long, and I'll bet lots of people are like that. So, yeah. I wouldn't bother for short fiction, not right at first.


Thanks! Me neither  When I get an audiobook from the library I expect to listen to them for long drives or road trips. Funny that I get a bit upset if the audiobook ends before I get to my driving destination LOL. So I try to have at least two audiobooks for road trips.

ACX seems to be promising after all, the 7-year-thingy notwithstanding. Thanks. I'll check it out...


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## JumpingShip (Jun 3, 2010)

Anne Frasier said:


> oh, very informative!
> 
> i've wondered how people get stipends. I actually had my entire book paid for through ACX, which was of course wonderful, but it also had some drawbacks. You only have a certain amount of time to approve a narrator or you lose the funding, and you can only use ACX approved narrators. i actually got some much better auditions for non-approved narrators but i was unable to accept them. and because of the time element i had to make a choice even if i wasn't crazy about that choice. but i thought, well, i'm not paying for it... yes, and no. here's something i didn't think about-which was stupid of me. your book is rated by story and *narrator*. so... i have a book that used to get excellent ratings...now getting some not to great ratings and audio sales flatlined once the ratings started showing up. and with audio it's not like a cover. you can't pull it and replace it if it's doing poorly. i certainly don't regret going with ACX, but i wish i'd had more of a game plan going in. i'll certainly have a better idea of what to do next time if i decide to make another title available.


I feel your pain. My only review on Deeds of Mercy as an audio book is one-star. The listener gave it 12 minutes, and couldn't get into it. I think they gave both the story and the performance one-star so I can't even blame the narrator. lol.

Maybe because it was the 4th book in the series? And the prequel and first book weren't out yet on Audible?  I know Audible refunds books, and I wish they would have just asked for a refund--and maybe they did and still reviewed it.


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## wildwitchof (Sep 2, 2010)

I've been following this thread as I go through my own first time *blush* with ACX, and this has been a shockingly good week, so I had to chime in.

I approved and paid for the final version around 11/29, and it went live on 12/12. I paid upfront, having chosen a narrator with a lot of bestselling romance credits (Tanya Eby - and I was so happy she was willing to work with me. She was a pro all around.) It cost me a small fortune (just under 3K) and I thought of it as a bit of a vanity project, honestly, with only long term potential. That is, I didn't expect to sell 50 the first day and almost a hundred more in the week following. I'm on the bestseller chart -- #10 in humor, #60ish in romance -- and today Amazon went live with the Whispersync and reduced it to $2.99 for ebook owners. Who knows what will happen now?

I still haven't earned back that 3K, but this strong start was a surprise. What kind of promo did I do? Just the FB page, the Tweet, the blog post. Not much else you can do--you can't even share from the listing page on Audible. I credit Tanya Eby's reputation for lifting me up at the start--she tweeted the book and has a big following. Perhaps that did it? Or the lack of competition in audio? (there are only 800 or so books in all of Fiction/Humor, for instance, and mine got put there as well as romance.)

I'm very curious to see if sales take off with the $2.99 bundle with ebook, or if it's a steady slide to obscurity. I dunno! Christmas is next week. I'm too busy to buy/read books for myself; right now I should be wrapping presents and making sugar cookies instead of posting. 

Anybody else have a steep discount on the audio? Did the volume make up for the hit in royalties?


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## Usedtoposthere (Nov 19, 2013)

Gretchen Galway said:


> I've been following this thread as I go through my own first time *blush* with ACX, and this has been a shockingly good week, so I had to chime in.
> 
> I approved and paid for the final version around 11/29, and it went live on 12/12. I paid upfront, having chosen a narrator with a lot of bestselling romance credits (Tanya Eby - and I was so happy she was willing to work with me. She was a pro all around.) It cost me a small fortune (just under 3K) and I thought of it as a bit of a vanity project, honestly, with only long term potential. That is, I didn't expect to sell 50 the first day and almost a hundred more in the week following. I'm on the bestseller chart -- #10 in humor, #60ish in romance -- and today Amazon went live with the Whispersync and reduced it to $2.99 for ebook owners. Who knows what will happen now?
> 
> ...


Congratulations, Gretchen! And thanks for sharing--that's really heartening to know. I'll check back in when my first is up--fingers crossed!


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## ElHawk (Aug 13, 2012)

That's awesome, Gretchen!!  Congratulations!  I wonder if Tanya Eby's name on it was enough to drive a bunch of sales right off, since it sounds like she's a known voice in the genre.  Sounds like it won't be long before your investment pays off.  hooray!


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## Gertie Kindle (Nov 6, 2008)

ElHawk said:


> Right -- of course! Gotta prove I'm worth it.
> 
> I'm very impressed with ACX, on the whole. I felt like they took my presentation as seriously as they would have taken any publisher's.
> 
> And I'm _suuuuuper _ excited to hear this audiobook! This is my favorite one out of all four volumes in the series.


Is this about Thutmose I two wives? I picked it up because I love Egyptian history. Did Whispersync, too.


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## wildwitchof (Sep 2, 2010)

Rosalind James said:


> Congratulations, Gretchen! And thanks for sharing--that's really heartening to know. I'll check back in when my first is up--fingers crossed!


Thanks, Rosalind! You've got an awesome year behind you, from what I've seen on the boards--I'm sure you'll do great. And you have a series--listener/readers love that. Good luck!

ps, I almost used one of the same images for DIVING IN that you have on one of your covers, then changed it to vector art at the last minute, in part because you'd already used it


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## wildwitchof (Sep 2, 2010)

ElHawk said:


> That's awesome, Gretchen!! Congratulations! I wonder if Tanya Eby's name on it was enough to drive a bunch of sales right off, since it sounds like she's a known voice in the genre. Sounds like it won't be long before your investment pays off. hooray!


Thanks! That was what I was hoping. I had no experience with audio, either as listener or producer, so I wanted somebody who had lots of experience. I searched the Audible boards, googled audio review sites for romance, listened to samples of other romance narrators, and cross-referenced with the ACX narrators--then sent Tanya a request to audition. It was great. You never know if a good audition will lead to a great book overall--can they do it on time, can they do character voices, etc--so this seemed a good way to go. I got dozens of auditions, many of them really, really good, and it was hard to say no to them.

One thing I heard from audiobook listeners: they'll buy books by their favorite narrator, whatever the book. It's kind of like how I'll watch any movie with Daniel Craig in it  (seriously, though--why don't more men narrate romance? I'd LOVE to hear a man talking for 10 hours about love...)


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## Usedtoposthere (Nov 19, 2013)

JanThompson said:


> ACX seems to be promising after all, the 7-year-thingy notwithstanding. Thanks. I'll check it out...


Jan, just a note: I had an Audible subscription for YEARS, way, way pre-Amazon (starting about 10 years ago), when downloadable audiobooks were brand-new, and they were awesome. They keep getting more books, and they have a separate site in the U.K., for example, which doesn't have all the same books. I know because when I lived in AU & NZ, I could get those books, some of which weren't available in the U.S. So their reach is quite broad.

They've had a good head start on the whole audiobook deal, so I think, especially combined with iTunes which is no slouch either in the digital download department, they're a fair bet. We'd all like to see into the future with this deal, but as we all know . . . not possible! Just have to make the best decisions we can with the info we have today.

Oh, and Gretchen: Read your excerpt from one of your book pages, and loved it. No wonder your audiobook is doing well. Funny and hot.


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## wildwitchof (Sep 2, 2010)

Rosalind James said:


> Gretchen: Read your excerpt from one of your book pages ...


Thank you!


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## ElHawk (Aug 13, 2012)

1001nightspress said:


> Then I got one of those stipend deal things on another book, a novel. So far I've had one audition submitted. Which was OK, but not great. So I'm hoping a 'great' will apply too ...


What's the title of the novel? I'll send Amanda your way, if you're looking for a female narrator with an American accent (or if you don't care about accent.) She's amazing, and has been doing quite a few audiobooks lately so it seems like she's eager for more work in the field.



Gertie Kindle 'a/k/a Margaret Lake' said:


> Is this about Thutmose I two wives? I picked it up because I love Egyptian history. Did Whispersync, too.


Yep, that's the one! I hope you like it. 



Gretchen Galway said:


> One thing I heard from audiobook listeners: they'll buy books by their favorite narrator, whatever the book. It's kind of like how I'll watch any movie with Daniel Craig in it  (seriously, though--why don't more men narrate romance? I'd LOVE to hear a man talking for 10 hours about love...)


Yep! I listen to many audiobooks (in fact, I don't think a day has gone by when I haven't listened to a book since 2004...) and I definitely have my list of favorite narrators. I often do searches on Audible for narrators and will listen to anything they read, just because I enjoy their voices and inflections so much. I don't care what the book is...if it's one of my favorite readers, I'm going to buy it.

So that was very smart of you to target Tanya!


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## Wansit (Sep 27, 2012)

Audiobookers, quick question for you - is it worth it making an audiobook of your perma-free? Are ebooks and audiobooks super separate markets? I wonder since whispersync seems a popular feature. It would be a shame to waste my money on the free book when it be better to start with the first paid book.


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## MeiLinMiranda (Feb 17, 2011)

I finally landed some studio space by trading news writing for it (long story). I'm going to brush off my skills with an actor friend and start in on my main series. If it goes well I might even take on others' books, but only if it goes well. No sense in embarrassing myself!


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## ElHawk (Aug 13, 2012)

Wansit said:


> Audiobookers, quick question for you - is it worth it making an audiobook of your perma-free? Are ebooks and audiobooks super separate markets? I wonder since whispersync seems a popular feature. It would be a shame to waste my money on the free book when it be better to start with the first paid book.


I think the markets are still separate enough that it would be well worth it.


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## minxmalone (Oct 28, 2012)

I have an audiobook of my perma-free novella. It earned out it's $400 production fee in less than three months. You have to expect that you'll get some negative reviews when you put out a short audiobook but it's definitely worth doing. 

I've had a great experience with ACX. I paid my narrator upfront and the sales are slowly building. I've heard that you have to be patient for readers to discover you and that if you have a series, sales will pick up once you have a few books out. My fourth title in this series is going through review right now so hopefully that's true!


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## Lisa Grace (Jul 3, 2011)

I have several auditions I need to listen to for _The 15th Star_. I don't listen to audio books so this is very hard for me to decide on a voice talent. I'll probably pay someone up front, as I don't want to be tied for seven years on this book in case things change dramatically. It's the first in a series, so I'm afraid of being stuck for the whole series if something dramatic with how the industry works, happens.


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## Taking my troll a$$ outta here (Apr 8, 2013)

ElHawk said:


> Hey, guys. I just finished listening to the "draft" version of The Sekhmet Bed in audiobook format. It turned out amazingly well, because my narrator, Amanda C. Miller, is spectacular and smart and hard-working and I really can't say enough good things about her. Now that the production is pretty much done (for the most part), I though I'd share a few things I learned in the process in case anybody else finds it useful.
> 
> It's a long post, so here's the Cliff's notes version:
> 
> ...


Thank you for all this info, it is a huge help. ACX applied stipends to my two books during auditions, and I had a tough time finding out what exactly that meant. This makes a lot of sense.


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## bmcox (Nov 21, 2012)

Thanks for sharing this information.


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