Difficulty of selling books by unknown authors

LC wrote:

And again with the "unknown." The point YOU are missing is that for nonfiction, it isn't necessarily a matter of being known. It's a matter of being credentialed. People writing nonfiction in areas they have no credentials for will, of course, be rejected. They then perceive getting published as "hard." How hard was it for your husband to get his Elsvier contract?

I disagree with the above. You have to be known. You have to have some sort of notoriety. Known people are marketable. It is as simple as that.

I recently read an excellent book written by two men who had the credentials for what they were writing. But it was about an incident that was not well known, although quite serious. It was well-written, and given me by a friend, which is perhaps another problem with selling books, when people loan their books to their friends.

My greatest fan says she has loaned my book out to many friends.

Carol

They all do it, Carol, they all do it. Guess they think they're doing a favor.

Dear Carol,
Of late, my book is shared friend to friend, from family to school and I do not mind that. It does not bother me that one bought copy of Wooffer is passed around. In fact, it is better than someone paying 24.00 for one and keeping it in their shelf or never mentioning it again. I say, let every one who wants to, read it free.

I wish I could paper the school halls with my stories, the bathroom walls. I do not care about that little bit of money.

Love,
Betty

Shelagh wrote:

Now, you are just being pedantic. Non-fiction covers poetry, biography and much more where credentials don't matter a jot. Being known, however, means a great deal. Jane Goody was a dental receptionist before she appeared on reality television. Her biography sells because she became a media star. A biography of Jane Goody the dental receptionist would not have sold more than a couple of dozen copies to friends and relatives.

I didn't say being known was never needed. I said it's not necessarily needed. Of course someone with celebrity can sell their biography and an unknown can't. Who wants to read a biography of the dental hygienest next door (unless she's a secret porn star or something)? Re poetry -poets can hardly give that shit away. Nobody buys or reads it. It takes someone of Maya Angelou's stature to get it published.

As for the vast rest of non-fiction. Thinking offhand of books I've flipped through at B/N -a book on jewelry making written by a woman who owns and operates a custom jewelry shop. How-to art books by people who teach art. Interior design books by ...interior designers. Exercise books by personal trainers. None of these people are "known," but they are credentialed.

Carol Troestler wrote:

I disagree with the above. You have to be known. You have to have some sort of notoriety. Known people are marketable. It is as simple as that.

What can I say, Carol. I am not known but I got three contracts.

Betty Fasig wrote:

Of late, my book is shared friend to friend, from family to school and I do not mind that. ... I do not care about that little bit of money.

I don't care about people sharing my nonfic book. I figure most of the borrowers weren't going to buy it, anyhow.

The textbooks are another story. Evil bastards that my pubs and I are, we deliberately made them consumable. That is, we combined textbook pages with perforated workbook pages strictly to make the books un-resellable. Hahahaha...

I think that is great LC. You must have the credentials, write well, and are knowledgeable and probably have a marketable subject. My only comment is that you just don't seem to be as thrilled with your success as I've seen others here.

It would be nice if we knew the titles of what you have written.

And all people have to do is run your perforated pages through the copy function on their three-in-one printers and then share them with others.

One time someone even sent me some pages they had gotten from someone knowing it was a subject I was interested in. They were my writing, with the name removed. They were workbook pages from our program manual.

Carol

Carol Troestler wrote:

One time someone even sent me some pages they had gotten from someone knowing it was a subject I was interested in. They were my writing, with the name removed. They were workbook pages from our program manual.

LOL

Yeah, I know people will copy stuff. I figure it's payback ...I copied enough stuff from other people's textbooks to use in my classes over the years.

Dear LC,
I love your demented laugh.

I snort. I cannot help it, it is in my genes to snort. I do laugh out loud some times and it is always too loud.

Textbooks are a hard way to make a living. The New Editions are so much like the old that there must be a black market in the paragraphs that have changed. I wonder what kind of text books you write. You must have some knowledge of your material to write such books.

I marvel at the talent here. We are not just a lot of pretty faces!

Love,
Betty

The easiest way to sell many books and become well known is to make lots and lots and lots of different friends. Not just in one forum, but in lots of different ones.

That's harder said than done but if you offer to promote somebody else's work and they offer to promote yours in return... favor for a favor... then everyone's a winner. At least that's how I find it anyway. That said, the book has to be good as well...

Shelagh wrote:

LC wrote:

Shelagh wrote:

It doesn't matter to me if my books sell one hundred copies or one thousand copies. Who cares how many copies of my books have sold? Will the number of sales affect the quality?

Why do you see sales as a meaningful goal?

To me, sales are definitely a meaningful goal. I treat writing as a profession for a couple of reasons. First, I've spent way too much time and money to ever consider it a hobby, and second, sales not only provide an income, but is indicative of readership. Unless you're journaling, if no one reads your material, why spend the time and effort?

This is difficult to admit, but I agree with Brenda about sales. The first sports editor I worked for kept reminding me, "Our job is to sell papers."
I can understand, though, that some people enjoy writing for a small audience. I have done that with high school sports books of interest only to local people despite the months of unpaid research required. I just enjoy it.
What it boils down to, I think, is there are many kinds of writing and many reasons for doing it. One size doesn't fit all.
Here in an e-mail is one kind of payment for a year of concentrated research:

I just spoke to you on the phone. Again my name is Dylon Leymon. I am the varsity quarterback of the Cuyahoga Falls Black Tigers. You're inspirational writings have reminded me and my teammates the amazing tradition of Cuyahoga Falls football. I am constantly telling my teammates that we are a part of something that is bigger than oursleves. I credit your book for proving my point. I have not forgotten the 17 championships and 100 plus years of hard work that have gone into this program. I would like to personally give you and your wife tickets to our opening game against Barberton to show my appreciation. I look forward to seing you in the future, and no matter where my football carreer takes me in the future nothing will compare to my experiences as a Black Tiger. Sincerely, Dylon Leymon #16

Dick Stodghill wrote:

This is difficult to admit, but I agree with Brenda.

About time you smartened up, Dick. Guess there's hope for you after all...well, sorta. And I have to admit that I agree with you:

One size doesn't fit all.

LC writes for money. Brenda writes for sales. On another thread, I mentioned that one of my husband's books sold 4,000 copies in two years. What I didn't say was that the price of the book is $65:

http://www.amazon.com/Structure-Function-Musculoskeletal-System-Watkins/dp/0880116862/ref=pd_rhf_p_t_4

A paperback book selling for $10 would have to sell six times as many books to make the same amount of royalties. So, selling 4,000 hardbacks is equivalent to 24,000 paperbacks.

Personally, I don't give a damn about sales or royalties. I wrote the books. They are out there for anyone to read.

Shelagh, read the e-mail from a high school boy on the post above Brenda's admitting how smart I am. There's all kinds of payment. Money's nice, of course.

Sounds better than a cheque to me, Dick.

Dear Dick,
What high praise for your work.

You know, when that child came here and looked in the chickens house and said, "Is that the rooster that Santa pulled out of his bag." I smiled as if I were Margaret the Chicken, her own self, and said "yes it is!"

Such simple and beautiful affirmation of one's words! They come from and out of the blue.

Love,
Betty

That's wonderful, Betty. What a reason to keep writing.

You know, some of us can write and write in our chosen genres - suspense, thriller, horror, romance, etc, and not everyone is going to like them. But everyone loves your stories. They're magical and they reveal a world many of us have forgotten or never knew. Most of all, they remind us that every life has value.

Oh, and Dick's was nice too.

If someone writes a book and no one buys it, where is the reward of having been published?

If someone writes a book and those who buy it wish they hadn't, where is the reward of having been published?

Abe, but if 100 someones buy your book, and they read to the end and like what they read, than that is a reward for having been published. Each of those 100 people are as important as each of thousands of people. Now we have their money, and from some we hear they liked it.

Shelagh, I've purchased books and after beginning to read, wish I hadn't purchased them, and some of these books have sold thousands, but the one I purchased ended up unread at used book sales.

I think I've just added not much of anything.

Carol

LOL! I think you got the point, Carol. As authors, we never really know if readers enjoy our books. Good reviews, compliments, messages of encouragement may or may not be sincere. We have no way of knowing who is and who is not enjoying reading our books. Initially, it seemed very important that others should enjoy reading my work as much as I enjoyed writing it. With the passing of time, it has become less important.

I cannot say enough about the joy that has come into my life by sitting down at my computer and spilling out words, sentences, chapters and whole books. Those experiences transcend ordinary life.

Now, I am being serious.

Carol

Brenda, It's nice to be Number One in your thoughts. I'm sure your lavish and well deserved praise for Betty came ahead of the single sentence devoted to me only because we both believe that ladies always come first.

Quote :

If someone writes a book and those who buy it wish they hadn't, where is the reward of having been published?

In the royalty check!