Cheap eBook Authors Realize Even Cheaper Is Even Better

from the do-the-math dept

We've been covering how more indie authors are discovering that just releasing their works as incredibly cheap ebooks can be amazingly profitable. But just how cheap? Kevin Kelly highlights how JA Konrath, who is the leading experimenter in this arena, has just discovered that $2.99 might have been too high. As an experiment, he dropped the price on one book that was $2.99 down to $0.99... and saw sales leap from 40 per day to 620 per day. As Kelly notes (his original math was wrong, but now there's updated math and more, including Amazon's cut:

Do the math:

2.99 x 40 = 11.96

.99 x 620 = 613.8

Amazon pays out 35% for ebooks priced below $1.99, and 70% for ebooks that are $1.99 and up. So the math is:

2.99 x 40 = 119.60; x .70 = $83.72


.99 x 620 = 613.80; x .35 = $214.83

I don't think publishers are ready for how low book prices will go. It seems insane, dangerous, life threatening, but inevitable.

It's not even that publishers aren't ready for how low book prices will go... it's that they still don't even realize that the prices are going to go down at all. Instead, many of them are still looking to make the prices go up, not realizing the umbrella they're creating for disruptors.          http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110308/02510113396/cheap-ebook-authors-realize-even-cheaper-is-even-better.shtml