The First 100 Days

It’s been 100 days since I published my debut novel, Ahelno. I’ve learned so much, and I’m grateful for this new journey that I’m on and the lovely people I’ve met along the way. 

I’ve been very transparent about my progress thus far (see my previous posts 1 and 2 on self-publishing), so I thought a status update was in order.

Sales

• 104 books (101 ebooks and 3 paperbacks)

• KENP: 297,147 (705 books equivalent)

• Customer locations: 95% US, 3% UK, 1% CA, 1% AUS

Royalties: $1,650.65

Expenses:

$642.10 Early expenses (cover art, website, software, promos, etc)

$840.42 Meta and Amazon ads

Profit: $168.13

One thing I want to make clear to new authors who are thinking of self-publishing: The fact that I’ve broken even on my book is highly unusual. Most authors I speak to take a long time--sometimes years-- to make any sort of profit off their books. Yes, you can technically publish for free on KDP and use a free editor like Reedsy, but you really do need a decent cover. You should definitely recruit ARC readers. A website is highly recommended, and there are tons of other tools you can invest in to improve your writing and your reach. You can spend an infinite amount of money on self-publishing, so you do have to be careful.

Every published author will tell you that you have to invest in the basics: The cover, the blurb, and, of course, the book itself. But I do believe that the modest sales/Kindle success I've had is due to my genre (alien romance) and the strength of my Amazon keywords. Alien romance doesn't have as many readers as, say, romantasy or contemporary fiction, but the readers are voracious, and they are always looking for their next read. They are often specifically looking for alien/paranormal/monster romances, which aren't as crowded as those other subgenres. I didn't think about writing in a less-competitive genre when I first published. I just wrote the story I wanted to tell. But I am now keenly aware of how lucky I was to publish my first book in a niche that offers a lot of opportunity for a new author. I also got lucky with keywords, thanks to Publisher Rocket. No, I'm not getting paid for that endorsement. Both of my books--even the one that isn't published yet--appear at the top of search results for four different keyword searches. That means someone who searches Amazon for an "alien romance with noncon" will get a list of matching books, and Ahelno will be at the top of that list. That's the kind of organic discoverability that authors dream of. I have heard it's hard to get distinctive keyword phrases out of more generic fiction books, however, because the genre is so crowded, so YMMV.

Overall, I am very pleased with the first 100 days. I spent way too many hours glued to the KDP dashboard, as I'm sure most new authors do. Fortunately, that frenzy has died down a bit, so if you're in that boat right now, don't worry! Your life will return to normal soon.

Stay tuned; the launch of A.I. Human happens this week. Later this month, I'll review the many different ARC sites I used for my ARC campaign, and I'll post a comparison of this launch with the launch of my debut novel in May.