new model for self publishing by Emily Kimelman

[Vijaya]

"We dreamed of authors bypassing retailers and selling books directly to readers. In this new model, authors are the retailer so they know who is buying their books and can reach them again through email marketing, sending them to sales pages without anyone else’s ads displayed.

But that’s not even the best part. What got us really excited about selling direct was the possibility of affiliates. Authors paying each other a percentage of sales to reach new readers, creating additional income streams for everyone."

See the rest here: https://writerunboxed.com/2022/09/09/73961/

[Hopscotch]

I'm always looking for ways to go fully independent but at what level of sales is this idea practical for a not-yet-bestselling writer, espec considering the added workload required to meet local, national and international sales taxes, something we leave to Amazon now?

[TimothyEllis]

Being reliant on Facebook ads for traffic tells me it's doomed to failure.

Or for anyone who's not a big name to start with, doomed to waste a lot of money.

[She-la-te-da]

I doubt it would be anything that would work for the majority of self published authors, including me. We don't have the know-how, money or time to put in being a retailer, on top of everything else. I'm also not a fan of the "scratch my back, I'll scratch yours" method of selling books.

But someone with a name? With the knowledge to get readers to trust some site they've never heard of? Could work.

I see lots of pie in the sky this is gonna be great ideas, and so far, none of them have panned out.

[alhawke]

"We dreamed of authors bypassing retailers and selling books directly to readers. In this new model, authors are the retailer so they know who is buying their books and can reach them again through email marketing, sending them to sales pages without anyone else’s ads displayed.

Thanks for this article.
This seems to be gaining more and more popularity among writer circles. Why? Is it because of less sales at standard retailers or the improvement of resources via Bookfunnel? I'm just curious, cause the idea seems to be gaining a lot of momentum.

I don't see this as a gold mine, I see it as an alternative retailer store. Being wide, I'm all for creating my own store, but I still have yet to be motivated with time to put it together. I also keep thinking most readers will prefer the stores they're familiar with anyway. Amazon.

"Mini-stores" will only work for writers with multiple books in their catalog or a well-developed brand. You can't start out with your own store as a starting author. Authors will have to drive people to their "mini-store". I already drive people to my website. I use Google ads. I see the only way to move sales will be to either hope to latch on to current promotions or ads or work with outside advertisers (Facebook/Google) to directly push the store (I mean, Amazon advertises for you --not enough, but they actually do. Now it would be solely up to you for your store).

{edit the interview talks about book sharing for advertising. I get this as extra advertising and I like the idea but, again, is it enough for the average Indie writer? Will it provide enough sales worthy of the set up? I don't know.

[Wonder]

I'm always looking for ways to go fully independent but at what level of sales is this idea practical for a not-yet-bestselling writer, espec considering the added workload required to meet local, national and international sales taxes, something we leave to Amazon now?

I'm setting up an online bookstore and you're not wrong about the workload. The tax situation makes things complicated, depending where you're located and where you sell. Here's something I've learned: When I listened to the podcasts of authors talking about how easy it was to sell in an online store, I thought "great!" Now, having gone through the process myself, I suspect many of them aren't handling taxes correctly. One example: the EU currently requires foreign non-EU sellers to register with a tax representative inside the EU who will remit taxes for you. That's a service that can cost 1 Euro per sales transaction (if you go piecemeal) or 100 Euros per month (If you use a subscription). Some of these requirements are new, meaning authors who started a few years back didn't have to worry about them at the time.

Every time you sell a book in a new country, you need to figure out what regulations and taxes apply to your situation. Granted, it's not always difficult. Some countries have fairly high thresholds for sales before you're forced to register.

I'm still moving ahead, but cautiously. The strategy piece about direct sales is on point, but I'd be wary of just flinging open the floodgates and saying "Oh yeah, I sell globally from my site" without thinking about the work you're taking on. It might be best to geoblock your store so you can start selling only in countries where you've got a handle on what's required.

Wonder

[Lorri Moulton]

I have my own store (it's a slow process) because I write in a variety of genres, and I've started doing Kickstarters. 

The business side definitely takes time away from everything else including writing.  As do the Kickstarter campaigns, but I've wanted to do this for some time, so it's worth it to me.

ETA: I don't do affiliate anything. Many people use them, but I've decided just to share someone's link when it's a good fit.

[elleoco]

It's probably wrong of me since I tend to always be marching to a different drummer than most, but I judge by what I'd be willing to do as a customer. And I'm not willing to sign up to multiple online sources for books. Or to smaller sources that probably protect my credit card info even worse than large ones do.

[Post-Doctorate D]

It's probably wrong of me since I tend to always be marching to a different drummer than most, but I judge by what I'd be willing to do as a customer. And I'm not willing to sign up to multiple online sources for books. Or to smaller sources that probably protect my credit card info even worse than large ones do.

If they use someone like PayPal or Square or a number of others to process your credit card, they never even see your credit card number.  And for those that might process credit cards more directly, the credit card processing companies make you jump through a whole bunch of hoops to verify that you're handling credit card transactions securely.  Always annoyed the heck out of me because if you didn't have every i dotted and whatnot, they'd tack on extra fees until you did whatever they wanted while at the same time credit card numbers were getting leaked through hacks of big companies and it seems like they hardly ever paid for their mishandling of credit card data.

[Anarchist]

Forward-thinking web designers who cater to authors should add this to their services.

[Matthew]

The affiliate marketing angle is interesting. In terms of setting up  my own store, I've determined it's not worth it for now. When I last looked into it, every payment processor wanted you to be a registered business (e.g. an LLC) before they would let you sign up. I've done it before, and even doing everything yourself can be expensive, plus time consuming. The matter of whether you run the business properly is a different matter. Running the website itself is not crazy expensive, but it might not be worth it for people with low volume. But now if you want to offer physical books, you have to manage the printing, inventory, and shipping of it all.

I have no doubt there's a good bit of money to be made there for someone who can direct readers to their own websites, but it's a rather large time investment.

[Hopscotch]

The affiliate marketing angle is interesting.

Seems to me this is an author cross-promotion w/a money sweetener for affiliates.  I see its benefit to a best-selling writer in extending his/her marketing reach.  But, as most cross-promos don't sell a lot, I'm not sure for the rest of us.

[Post-Doctorate D]

I don't think this is just for big names at all.  It might be easier for them, but it's something that could be done by anyone.

Amazon (and other retailers) take about 30% of the sale price of your book.  For that they do next to nothing.  Sure, you can say they handle the taxes and payment processing and all that, but that can be done for less elsewhere.  So, again, they do next to nothing for 30% of your sales price.

To get visibility on your books, you need to buy ads.  AMS, Facebook, whatever . . .  All that will cost you.  And you spend money and you send those visitors to . . . Amazon (or another retailer).  And, if the person who clicked on the ad doesn't buy, that money was essentially wasted.  If you send them to your own site, and they don't buy, you at least might have a chance to get them on your mailing list and get them to buy in the future.  But you can't do that if you are sending traffic to Amazon.  So, you buy the ads, send the potential buyers to Amazon and then either get no sale or it costs you 30% for Amazon to do next to nothing.  Lots of money wasted there.

At the very least, have your own website.  If you buy ads, send traffic to your site.  Try to get them on your list and then send them to retailers to buy.  You can try selling direct later on, but at least start out my making your own website the focal point.

My latest release, exclusive to Amazon with KDP Select, has been out over a month now.  It has sold zero copies.  So, being on Amazon, being exclusive on Amazon, gives you zero benefit.  You have to buy ads.  You have to spend money on promoting.  Amazon doesn't need you promoting their site.  Promote your own site.  Get people on your list.  Get them to buy on Amazon (or wherever) and then get them to come back to your site.

It's harder these days because people are on crummy sites like Facebook and Twitter and other garbage sites that are designed to keep people stuck in their own silos and it seems people these days rarely venture out onto the actual Internet.  But, on the flip side, it's not terribly unlike AOL users back in the day that rarely ventured outside AOL because they thought AOL was the Internet.  Facebook/Twitter/whatever is the new AOL.

I don't have the answers.  Obviously.  I wish I did.  But I do know that continuing to feed the beast (Amazon) is not the answer. 

[Hopscotch]

Lots of interesting points, Post-Crisis, but the fundamental is Amazon is the Big Global Catalog.  You want to be in there, even if you have to pay-to-play via AMS and 30%.  What portion of your marketing you devote to Amazon is the larger question.  So far, I haven't seen evidence that direct sales from a website is profitable except for big-sellers w/bucks and staff to spend making it work.

[Lorri Moulton]

Most people selling direct still have their books available at retailers, but the focus is on sending people to their site or store first.  Many have a link directly to other retailers or Books2Read.

For myself, I'm focused on ebooks right now, so I use PayHip.  If my focus was on selling paperbacks, I'd probably be looking at Shopify or maybe WooCommerce.  And BookVault is supposed to be coming to America to give Lulu some competition. 

If you don't know about all this, I'd suggest checking out some groups on Facebook or other places...and there are books about this, too.  Morgana Best, Joanna Penn, and others are talking about it, so maybe check out those podcasts and sites, as well as others.  The information is available if anyone is interested.

ETA: Here's a link to Patty Jansen's thread on Kboards about 'why you should sell on your website'.
https://www.kboards.com/threads/why-you-should-sell-on-your-website-merged.336411/