This is a big goal for a selfpublished, nonfiction book in a very narrow niche. Download it once and read it on your kindle device, pc, phones or tablets. About three quarters of the sales have been hardcover books with audio and ebook splitting the remainder. Writers like ken follett, nora roberts, james patterson and.
Tweets that mention how i sold 10,000 copies of my selfpublished book the book designer says. I tend to read that as maybe somewhere between 5 and 20 copies on average for a fairly consistent ranking between 50 000 and 200 000. Except they havent already made their money, because for pubg 10 million copies sold is still nothing compared to what its going to make in the future. How i sold 100,000 books on amazon david farland story.
First off, i want to thank david for giving me this platform to play on for the day. I found that there are only nine books that have sold over 100 million copies excluding religious, ideological, philosophical, or political books, and looking over them, i found that they have five criteria in common. Rowling, whose harry potter and the cursed child sold 4. Tim grahl writes in a refreshingly humble, downtoearth manner, and provides much actionable advice on the most ethical, longterm ways to. That 75k number is pretty skewed by the existence of anthony doerrs runaway literary hit, all the light we cannot see, which sold over 1. Thanks to everyone who helped us get here by buying and recommending the book. Readers often write to me wondering if word of mouth can be so powerful. So if that is a firm 20 million copies, thats a lot of money. According to npd bookscan, which tracks print book sales, triggered has sold more than 115,000 copies as of nov. How i sold 100, 000 books on amazon kindle edition by dandridge, doug. Note, however, that the deathly hallows, the final book in the series, has sold 65 million copies, so it seems that. Another interesting thing is that while harry potter and the philosophers stone is there with 107 million copies sold, the second book in the series only has 60 million copies sold, so it seems that about 40% of people are not continuing on with the series after book one.
Books that have sold over 50 million copies stacker. To do this we made a landing page and whipped up a quick cover using a. Figures are provided by npd bookscan and include approximately 85% of all trade retail print book sales in the u. Amanda hocking, the writer who made millions by selfpublishing. Because religious texts are often translated into many foreign languages and distributed widely by churches, however, precise figures are hard to come by. If an author writes a book that sells 20 million copies.
We just got our royalty statement from crown and are pretty excited about the fact that weve sold over 200,000 copies of rework now. The stepbystep guide to marketing your book, my goal, for obvious reasons, was to sell at least copies. Book launchers founder julie broad shares 8 ways to do so in this free download. Looking at one of his graphs gives about 10 copies sold per week for a rank of 100 000. Three and a half years ago, i joined forces with authors stephanie casher and james w. The costs of obtaining the rights and reformatting books to make them available are still too. How much money does an author make from a bestselling book. Indiepublished genre novels on amazon might account for 90% of that titles total sales. Best selling refers to the estimated number of copies sold of all fiction books written or cowritten by an.
He has written three novels, three collections of short stories, three plays and a book about his wedding. Ill assume you actually mean sell 100k copies, not give 100k copies away for free as mark messick mentioned a great strategy. If you are willing to take the time, there is a lot. But if all their books only sold 10,000 copies, they might struggle financially. For todays post, we have a guest, doug dandridge, who is here to tell us how he sold 100,000 books on amazon. Some books are called bestselling when they hit top ten rank in an amazon subsubcategory. My second has sold nearly 5,000 copies, and my new release, dont touch the. The stepbystep guide to marketing your book is one of the best marketing books i have read and ive read many. One statistic thats floated around for years says a selfpublished book only sells about 100 150 copies in its. Lewis to form independent publishing venture the pantheon collective.
I am often asked how i sold a 100,000 copies of my debut book you are the best wife within a year, that too without a single book launch, no media coverage and no professional pr. The sales info tab lets you see how your print books are selling across the u. How i sold 100, 000 books on amazon kindle edition by. For example, regarding giving away copies of your books, i have given away over,000 copies of my books over the years and continue to give them away. When i did this exercise last year, a general fiction bestseller sold. Everything you wanted to know about book sales but were. Make sure not to include any commas or spaces when you type in the bsr amazon best seller rank in order to calculate how many sales are needed. The book has been making waves on both sides of the atlantic, with sales of over 125,000 copies across all formats in the us, according to its publisher, which printed an initial 500,000 copies of. This page provides lists of bestselling individual books and book series to date and in any language. Heres a brief breakdown of what happened in first six months of the books life. When i published the coaching habit, little did i know how big it would be for me. An industry rule of thumb is that 93 percent of books published sell less than 1,000 copies. Lewis posted on october 5, 20 by authordiscovery leave a comment note. Obviously, you want to sell books maybe even make it a.
This is a list of bestselling fiction authors to date, in any language. How i sold 100,000 copies of my debut novel the lowdown. When i first made the decision to selfpublish back in late august 2010, i never dreamed i would ever sell that many books. The series has grown steadily since fall 2008 and the hunger games has appeared on the new york. Thus i usually say that the average book sells 10,000 copies with a major publisher. There are bestselling authors, and then there are megabestselling authors writers who have sold 100 million copies or more.
So getting a complete picture of what a book truly sold is all about the net and the format. How i sold 10,000 copies of my selfpublished book the. If you take the above authors and their 51 titles, they averaged 12,455 lifetime copies sold for each book published. How this selfpublished author sold 800,000 copies of her. Today, she is the author of dozens of selfpublished books, which. O n 6 august 1996, harpercollins published a book it expected to sell around 5,000 copies in hardback. The first novel in the series, harry potter and the sorcerers stone, has sold in excess of 120 million copies, making it one of the bestselling books of all time. The daily lowdown on books, publishing, and the occasional author behaving badly. A best seller doesnt mean it sold millions of copies. I dont want to talk about the big, bad book numbers that all of you see in the media and know are good. Stephanie made her suggestions while editing the book. Use features like bookmarks, note taking and highlighting while reading how i sold 100, 000 books on amazon. While finding precise sales numbers for any given author is nearly impossible, the list is based on approximate numbers provided or repeated by reliable sources. Ari behn biography ari mikael behn born 30 september 1972 is a norwegian author.
More than 50 million books in print and digital in the u. Everything you wanted to know about book sales but were afraid. That one email blast took me about 8 minutes to write the email and send it ended up selling 214 copies of that particular book on day 1. I chose this route for my novel, and heres how i made it work. Featured on dozens of media outlets including inc and forbes.
Best selling refers to the estimated number of copies sold. I havent had a chance to look at the most recent report but have read parts of past reports. Book ranking general selling questions amazon seller. For example, if you notice all your competitors in a market arent selling more than 100 ebook copies per month on amazon kindle, you can be pretty sure your book wont be selling more than 100 ebook copies per month on kindle unless your book is a lot better than the competition, is more appealing to the market, and you have a better. Guinness world records estimates that over five billion copies of the bible have been sold, making it the bestselling book of all time. The bookscan sales of those books literally ranged from 1,000 to 1.
As of june 2017, the series has been translated into 80. James fifty shades of grey series has now sold more than 100 million copies worldwide, vintage books. Because so little general fiction made it into the top 100 in 2018, these books sold proportionally more, mccrudden holds. How to use our amazon book sales calculator let me show you a quick example of how to find the amazon bestseller ranking for any book on amazon so you can use the sales calculator.
A federal election commission filing made the revelation recently and critics alleged that this boosted trump jrs book to top new york times bestsellers list. As of this week, i have officially sold 100,000 ebooks. Having sold more than 500 million copies worldwide, harry potter by j. What with sales in fishysounding thirdworld countries like germany and england. Excluding religious, political, or ideological texts, this list covers 39 books that have reached this achievement, the overwhelming majority of which are fictional novels featuring stories that capture our imagination or change how we view the world. But the reality check is that the typical book released by a traditional publisher sells less than 10,000 copies net. The theme 10 people trapped on an island and each person being. Here, he writes about how he turned a debut novel into a 100,000 copy bestseller. Stacker explores books that have sold over 50 million copies. There is an extensive report from author earnings that takes a long, hard look at book sales data. Most authors do not make any money off of actual book sales because. Since releasing 100 days of growth, the ebook i put together with my.
A tour in the us to mark publication of the novel, a game of thrones, saw modest. New york, ny july 19, 2012scholastic, the global childrens publishing, education and media company, today announced the first update since march 28, 2012, of u. Publishers only make money by selling copies of books, which is why they. A book that sells 100,000 copies a year for one year and then fades into obscurity makes a little money, but a book that sells 80,000 copies a year for 50 years makes a lot of money. If i buy enough copies of your book maybe 1,000 or 5,000 copies would you let me make a custom cover and put my information on the back. Generally, a royalty agreement will be for 10% of the net proceeds of the book. What kind of book can someone publish that will sell 100,000 copies. Can authors sell 1,000 book copies for under 100 dollars. Thats not the lived experience of the 99% in writing and publishing. How this selfpublished author sold 800,000 copies of her books. Others are called that after months in a row on a nyt list.
1385 21 474 1611 573 488 1084 565 1297 98 1342 1074 712 1027 74 260 933 1384 403 1077 351 993 327 302 195 335 272 1002 122