Tuesday, December 2, 2014

Four years published - Self published sales information

Happy Anniversary . . . (s)

So, on November 24th, I celebrated (completely forgot) my 4th anniversary of self-publishing.  On November 30th, I celebrated my 18th wedding anniversary with my wife. Fortunately, I didn't forget that one.

Self Publishing

I decided to finally get around to writing a book in January of 2010, just as I had planned to do 20 years earlier.  2 things got me to finally do it.  I discovered Smashwords and decided I'd give self publishing a try, and I turned 40, at which point I realized I needed to accomplish something instead of making excuses why I hadn't.

I'm addicted to writing books to the degree that I now become anxious when I haven't written for a few days. It's the second most important thing in my life after my family.  I intend to do it for the rest of my life.

In these four years, I've written 24 original works (8 novels, 2 novellas, 4 short stories, and 10 children's books).  I've published 29 titles (4 compilations and an illustrated version of the Emo Bunny that Should)

2014 is the first year I haven't published a book. Difficulties in life have hampered my writing and all other aspects of being a successful self-publisher.  However, things have settled to a large degree and I'm writing more again.

Success

As far as success, I consider that I became a successful writer after I finished my first book, "Rojuun".  As for professional success, I've sold over 13,000 books in the last 4 years.  That makes me a low-level midlister in the self-publishing industry I believe.  It's hard to say. There's not a lot of sales info in the publishing world.  All the companies and most authors believe that sales are a matter of national security *sigh*.

I've decided to share my sales with anyone who's interested.  I've broken it down by book and by sales. There are others who have sold far more, and many who would love to have half this number.  I can tell you that it's taken a crazy amount of work to do this well, and if I had done more work I would have sold more.

If you are writing your own book, you can look at these numbers for information, but keep in mind that they are just the numbers of one author.  If you write, I hope you do it because you enjoy it and not to measure yourself against anyone else.

Sales by book

Rojuun (sales)
380
Anilyia
2853
Kethril
2441
Willden Trilogy omnibus
1092
Dralin
586
Ebudae
1312
Pelya
1146
Wyvern
770
Liselle
461
Rain Glade
224
Alien Coffee
292
Emo Bunny Illustrated
91
Collection
401
Collection 2
14
Wings of Fantasy
597
Blue Haired Alien Girlfriend
117
Test Pilot
217
Don't Ever Change
105
Storage Room in the Grey Void
13
Emo Bunny that Should
149
Zachary Zombie, Lost Boy
221
Drippy, Peg-Legged Rainbow
27
Unholy Cow
72
Attack, Sugar Plum Fairies
176
Phairyphant
27
Naughty Nanoworms
20
Zachary Zombie, Wicked Worm
8
Steampunk Roo
24
Pow the Panda
8
Grand Total - Sales
13844
Rojuun
52968
Dralin
15272
Blue Haired Alien Girlfriend
34386
Test Pilot
34186
Don't Ever Change
37393
Emo Bunny that Should
96090
Zachary Zombie, Lost Boy
40569
Drippy, Peg-Legged Rainbow
28544
Unholy Cow
29862
Attack, Sugar Plum Fairies
58936
Phairyphant
8
Naughty Nanoworms
9
Zachary Zombie, Wicked Worm
1754
Grand Total - Free Giveaways
429977

 Sales by store

Store
Total
Amazon
8742
Smashwords
527
Apple
2464
B&N
1707
Kobo
250
Sony
43
Createspace
61
Blio
8
Library Direct
16
Oyster
6
Grand Total - Sales
13824
Amazon
233720
Smashwords
50180
Apple
97707
B&N
45680
Kobo
3361
Sony
2831
Blio
82
Library Direct
4
Oyster
4
Diesel
43
Page Foundry
14
Grand Total - Free Giveaways
433626

Disparity in numbers 

There is a slight disparity between the total sales by store and by book. I would estimate that there is a 1% total error margin in the numbers. With 29 titles available through 15 distributors over the course of 48 months (I could show you the number of sales of each book by month in each store, but there’s not enough room here)  I haven't sorted out sales by country, though that information is available to a degree.  I'm also on Wattpad, but I haven't added the download info from there at this point.
What to expect in the future 
 Currently, I'm 30,000 words into Liquid, the second book of the Wyvern Trilogy.  I hope to be done early next year if I can strangle enough time to write.  After that, I have hundreds of books in my mind waiting for their turn.
The project that I'm truly excited about is that I've submitted "Dralin" to be published as an audio book.  If that goes well, I intend to make the entire Ryallon series into audio books and possibly even the Demented Children's stories.


*** 
Well, thank you for reading my books and allowing me to share my demented imagination.  I wish you all the best.
John H. Carroll

3 comments:

Kenny A. Chaffin said...

Excellent and congratulations John! My sales over the last 3 three years are virtually non-existent so to my you are a wonder.

Keep up the great work!

John H. Carroll said...

Thank you Kenny. :) Getting the sales is a crazy amount of work. I've done some things well and some things I've messed up. I've also had some good luck. Just not enough to support the family yet. ;)

Anonymous said...

Nice job. I look forward to Liquid and all subsequent Ryallon stories.