As a part of a rejuvenated approach to our travel articles (eBooks) we analysed the first three years of our eBook sales to see what the statistics revealed. The first eBook was published in November 2011 and two more were published in late 2013. So it seemed timely to reflect.
Sales: Suffice to say our sales have been in the hundreds and not thousands. There are two things at play here: First, we need to self-publish ebooks more regularly. For example, we didn’t publish any eBooks in 2012 or 2014 and two will be published in early 2015. Secondly we need to be more active in building our brand and letting people know about the eBooks. During 2015 we will contribute more to the self-publishing industry through our website posts and an active participation on Twitter and Instagram.
One eBook has accounted for 75% of these sales. There are reasons for this as well. At the start we looked at the places we wanted to visit and searched Amazon to see where the least eBooks were available, so we could write for those cities. The highest selling eBook has been for a city which has plenty of travel material – go figure. So now we are looking at future eBook selection differently.
Amazon: 54% of our eBooks have been sold through Amazon. These eBooks were sold in five countries with the US (59%) and the UK (39%) dominant, with three other countries accounting for the remaining 2%. We only recently started to target a broader range of countries on Amazon.
Smashwords: 46% of our eBook sales were distributed through Smashwords. The most successful retailers have been Apple (68%), Kobo (18%) and Barnes and Noble (9%). Interestingly, Oyster and Scribd “sales” are starting to appear. Our eBooks have sold to 20 different countries: US (39%); Australia (23%); Canada (12%); and the UK (4%). Is the UK Kindle country?
We like Smashwords: We can upload directly with ePub; they pay quarterly into our PayPal account; and they distribute to a broad range of retailers.
Quarterly Sales: Quarters 1 and 2 are the strongest; Quarter 3 okay but quarter 4 is dead. So travel eBooks need to be ready for the northern hemisphere summer planning.
Overall: The overall breakdown by retailer offers food for thought: Amazon (54%); Apple (31%); Kobo (8%); and Barnes & Noble (4%). Apple is more important than we thought: our attention is required here.
Comment: Recent coverage/comment within the self-publishing industry points to sales slowing or flattening-out. We believe that eBooks will increasingly exploit there natural advantage: embedded audio and video, although proprietary formats will be a drag . This is an area for us to study. It will be interesting to see how prominent Scribd and Oyster are in next year’s analysis.
It is doubtful any conclusions can be extrapolated from this analysis as the sample is so small. But it is interesting nonetheless.
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It is interesting that the E Book about the City that has the most published about it sold the best. It is like everyone wanting to eat in the restaurant that has the most diners in it. 🙂