July 2011 Sales Update

I felt at the end of last month that my sales this month would not be as high. I had a few reasons for my belief. First(ly), I had someone purchase all my works in one big swoop (5 sales). I also was featured on Daily Cheap Reads Jr. These provided a little more than my average exposure (none but enthusiastic book bloggers). Another reason for my belief was that my release was very late in the month (the 27th). This only allowed 5 days for the new release to sparkle in July... not even a full week! So some residual sales were probably lost (but are being picked up early August).

Despite these things, I only fell short of last month's sales by 2... TWO! I believe this month and through the end of the year should go up, up and up! So, onto the chart!

My July sales totaled 25 units. That is about 92.59% of June. I was expecting more around 20, so I was pleasantly surprised :)

Since I put my first book up for sale in February, I have sold 92 units. 27.17% of those were in June. My sales last month were 40.29% of my total, so the percentage has dropped. While this seems down dramatically, please also note that my TOTAL units sold INCREASED 37.31%. So, having the same number sell each month (or less) of course the percentage will drop, if for no other reason than there are more "points". Think of it like school grades in school. The more points there are, the less each individual point is worth...

"Thug" has been slow on the uptake. The first four days saw six sales, where I was expecting closer to 7-10. But I'm not worried, because there is a lot in the world to read and I'm sure fans of the series will come around to grab it up eventually (or even soon!).

17 of my sales (68%) came on or after "Thug"'s release (July 27th). This is down from 77.77% in June, but that's kind of a good thing. It meant my sales were more evenly spread across July, not all coming in a big lump like at the end of June. This was definitely better for my overall mental state throughout the month :P But it was also exciting to see sales more often.

July had my highest number of DAYS with sales, at 12/31 - 38.71%!

In June I averaged .9/day in sales. In July: .81. Ah, it went down, but that's okay. It is literally the difference between two sales.

Smashwords was 4% of my sales this month (down from 18.51%). B&N was 24% of my sales, up from 22.22%. Amazon was a whopping 72% of my sales!

Best-selling rank so far:
#1 - Cheat, 31
#2 - Liar, 16
#3 - Shackled, 14
#4 - Coward, 13
#5 - Thief, 12
#6 - Thug, 6

Onto conversions! Remember, I want at least 50% conversion, and I think 75% is great!

So, as follows:

Cheat - Liar; 31 - 16 (51.61%) June saw 47.82%, so that conversion rate has risen! That means people who picked up "Cheat" before have read it and decided to move on in the series :) I hit my 50% conversion, so yay!

Liar - Coward; 16 - 13 (81.25%) Well, this is down from 100%, but both numbers increased, meaning people are getting more into the story! I am still well above the awesome 75% mark, so I am very pleased.

Coward - Thief; 13 - 12 (92.31%) This number has risen almost 11%! I think that is great. It is startlingly close to 100% and well above both the 50 and 75% benchmarks. I have nothing bad to say about these numbers, either :)

Thief - Thug; 12 - 6 (50%) I have hit the 50% goal marker, so I am happy. As I mentioned, "Thug" was slow on the uptake, but I believe early August will see more sales of it.

I'm going to introduce a new section here, at least for this month. We can talk about "units" and percentages, but I thought it might be a little bit of an eye-opener to see how much I am actually making. (Here's a hint: not much :D) So, I've prepared two charts for you. The first is a breakdown of ALL the royalties I've earned since the beginning of my "journey" if you will (since February 2011). It is broken down by vendor. Please check it out:

This second chart is a breakdown, by month, of the royalties I've earned (not vendor exclusive). Because of the "rules" of royalties by the vendors, anything less than $10 in a month means you don't get royalties until that account balance reaches $10. In (very late) June I received my first royalty check from Amazon... for February, March and April! I won't receive another one until (at the earliest, late) August :( But, I finally hit $10 at both B&N AND Smashwords this month, so I should receive THREE in August! :D So enough blathering and here is the chart:

Final Notes:
I feel like I'm pretty on track with where I should be, from July. I'm hoping to be swept up in the big Christmas rush season. As the weather cools down and more people turn back to reading, I offer a nice, affordable body of work to peruse. I also think that writing YA will help fill the void left behind by Twilight or Harry Potter, especially since HP is coming to the ebook world. Hopefully those readers will be looking for their next big reading fix and they will come upon me :)

My July goals were 30/40/50 (achievable/happy/excitement). I'm not totally surprised I didn't meet my achievable, but I was pleasantly surprised by beating my pessimism. Boons last month aside, I did well on my own this month :)

If I were going to give someone advice, from this point, I would say: TITLES MATTER! I'm not talking what the book is called, I'm talking having works out there for people to snap up after they read something else of yours. If someone isn't buying X, they might be buying Y, Z, A, N, or P! (I have 6 titles, so I used that for reference, hah.) While I have no proof that people finish "Cheat" and immediately buy "Liar"... the sales pattern strongly reflects it...

So why are you still here? Get writing! Okay, I'll give you just one last little bit, and then you better GET WRITING! (If you're aiming to meet/exceed me) :)

I feel a little confident about August, so here are my August goals:

Achievable: 35
Happy: 40
Excitement: 50

Thanks for sticking around and I'd love to know what you think!