After all the hard work you put into perfecting your self-published book from content to cover, you certainly want readers to purchase it. One of the most important decisions you’ll make will also determine how well your book sells: the price you choose for your print book or e-book. So how do you know if you’re pricing your book too high, too low, or just right? The experts at Self-Publishing Relief have industry-proven tips to help you decide how to price your self-published print or e-book.
How To Determine The Best Price For Your Self-Published Print Book Or E-Book
Check the price of comparable books. Finding the typical prices for books in your genre is a surefire way to find the right price! You should also identify and search possible keywords for similar books. Let’s say you’ve written a romance novel you’re about to self-publish, and current self-published romance novels in print sell for an average of $14.99, while self-published romance e-books sell for an average of $5.99. You can probably get away with being slightly above or below the average, but if you’re a first-time or little-known author, we recommend staying in line with the prices of your competition.
Look for similar authors. Be on the lookout for authors who write in the same genre as you and have a similar catalog of work. Once you know who your competition is, you can see what they are selling their books for and price your book competitively.
Consider the size of your fan base. A truth of the self-publishing industry is that not all books are created equal; readers are likely to pay more for some self-published books than others. Popular self-published authors can charge more for their books, since they have established reputations and fan bases. When gauging the average price for books comparable to yours, make sure you take into account whether the authors you’re looking at have similar levels of popularity to you.
Don’t under- or overprice! Choosing a very low or very high price for your self-published book is likely to backfire. Some self-published authors think they should price their books as low as possible at first (for example, charging only 99 cents for their first e-book), but a low price can actually hurt sales. Readers are likely to dismiss low-cost books as not being very good, poorly written, or of low quality. Conversely, readers aren’t likely to pay an uncommonly high price for a book—whether print or digital—from a brand-new author, because they’ll have no way to gauge whether the cost is worthwhile.
Pay attention to your book’s file size, page count, and minimum price threshold. Before you can set your print book’s price, you’ll need to know the minimum price threshold—how much of that price is going to go to the company that does the printing and distribution. The rest of the price of your book will be your royalty payment. Also, for most self-publishing platforms, you can charge more than their recommended price—but you cannot charge less.
You should also consider these questions: What is the word count and page count of your book? Do you use a lot of color? Do you include a lot of images? In addition to book length, platforms like Amazon’s KDP (Kindle Direct Publishing) set the prices for self-published print books based on page count, color, and images. Books that use a lot of color or include a lot of images tend to be priced higher.
The length of your book affects both the e-book and print book prices. Parameters for e-book pricing are based on the file size of your book. For both print and e-books in general, shorter books tend to be priced lower than longer books.
In a market where every sale is critical, getting your price right is well worth the effort. For more details on how to price your self-published print book or e-book, check out these articles on our blog:
What’s The Right Price For Your Self-Published Print Book?
If you’re thinking about self-publishing your book, we can help you determine the very best price for your book and guide you through every step of the self-publishing process. Contact Self-Publishing Relief today for a free consultation!
Question: What would you consider a reasonable price to pay for a self-published book?
Thank you. This blog gives helpful ‘food for thought’.