Monday, July 4, 2011

Pricing Your Way to New Fans

by Allan Leverone

I’d like to thank my friend and editor extraordinaire Jodie Renner for her gracious—and utterly irresponsible—invitation to me to guest-post at Crime Fiction Collective today while she’s en route to Manhattan for Thrillerfest. I’m men’s size medium, by the way, Jodie, in case you want to bring me back a Lee Child t-shirt. Although good luck getting it off him.

Anyway, I’ve been thinking a lot about promotion. I’m going to start with the assumption that genre authors want to sell books. I know I do. It would be nice to be so pure of motive that sales meant nothing, that the process of writing was reward enough in itself, but can we agree that’s a load of bunk? Can we agree that’s a sentiment best left to the “literary” authors, who write books where nothing much happens and it’s all very introspective and ethereal?

Because I sure hope I’m not alone in wanting people to buy and read my work. I love to write, but if I wanted to write for myself I could just keep a journal.

So as a thriller/horror author you’ve probably never heard of, promoting my work is almost as high a priority for me as ensuring the quality of that work. That’s where reasonably-priced e-books come in. When I say “reasonably priced,” I’m talking about e-books priced lower than what you would pay for a mass-market paperback, preferably a lot lower.

Obviously, authors contracted with large traditional publishers have no say in the pricing of their work, but if Indie authors, those working with small presses or releasing their work on their own through rights reversion, price their work low enough, a book that defies easy genre classification can potentially gain a wide audience, introducing people who may never have sampled an author’s work to that author.

I’ll use as an example Dave Zeltserman. Fans of noir/crime fiction are probably familiar with his work. But what about readers in other genres? What motivation would, say, a fan of paranormal fiction or urban fantasy have to try Dave Zeltserman’s work? Until recently, none.

But with the rise of reasonably-priced e-books, a fan of urban fantasy might look at Zeltserman’s BLOOD CRIMES (it’s a vampire novel, sort of), priced electronically at a very reasonable $3.99 at Amazon, as a worthwhile gamble. That fan might read the book and discover she loves it, and what will she do if that happens? First, she’ll tell her urban fantasy-reading friends about this great book she just read from this cool author, and then she’ll go out and try another Zeltserman book, maybe a book that’s not strictly, or even partly, urban fantasy.

My point here is not to pump Dave Zeltserman’s tires—although if I don’t sell more books I may end up pumping his gas—my point is to demonstrate how reasonable e-book pricing can potentially earn an author more fans and, consequently, more sales and more money, in the long run than that author might have expected to earn. Books that may have been rejected in the past by what we consider “traditional” publishing houses because they don’t fit neatly inside narrowly-defined genre labels, have a chance at gaining an audience and exposing that audience to the author’s other work as well.

And if the books are good enough, it becomes a win-win for everybody.


Allan Leverone is a three-time Derringer Award finalist as well as a 2011 Pushcart Prize nominee. His debut thriller, Final Vector, was released in February by Medallion Press. A follow-up, The Lonely Mile, is coming this summer from StoneHouse Ink, and his horror novella, Darkness Falls, will be released in September as part of Delirium Books acclaimed collectible horror novella series.

16 comments:

  1. Hey, Collectivists, thanks for having me, and Happy Independence Day!

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  2. The fact that Big Six publishers are coming down on their prices for backlist books indicates they realize the selling point for ebooks is under $5. The downward pressure on prices continues though as more and more indie authors price their books at $.99 to compete for top spots on Amazon's rankings. I think "reasonable" will soon become "cheap" and digital fiction—by all authors— will be affordable for anyone to try.

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  3. It's been interesting to see the phases of e-book discussions evolve from whether or not they were viable, to who is chosing that route and why, to pricing strategies.

    Thanks for the post, Al.

    Happy Fourth!

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  4. The other point to consider is that authors who are published by big presses have little control over prices. The only way those authors can use pricing to attract new fans is to self-publish novels in new genres.

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  5. Heath, thanks for stopping by and for taking the time to comment. By the way, Collectivists, if you're not familiar with Mr. Lowrance's debut psycho-noir instant classic, THE BASTARD HAND, it's well worth your time...I was spellbound from the first page to the last. It ain't pretty, but it's a great read.

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  6. LJ and Peg, thanks again for having me here! It's fascinating, Peg, how in the space of just a couple of years the big ebook debate has turned from viability to what effect their pricing will have over the entire publishing industry. We're in the middle of a revolution, which is sort of appropriate on this July 4th.

    LJ, the proof of your last point is in Barry Eisler's decision to release his next John Rain book himself. He's one of the top thriller writers currently working as well as a very savvy promoter, and if he believes self-publishing his next novel is to his benefit, passing up a huge advance, that's pretty telling...

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  7. After announcing he was going indie, Eisler signed with Amazon, which is now a major publisher in competition with the Big 6. But he also plans to self-publish some work. But J.K. Rowling self-published the Harry Potter books, an even bigger game changer.

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  8. Thanks for your great post, Al! --And for filling in for me today. I'm off in an hour or so for New York, then Craftfest at Thrillerfest on Wed. I'll try to nab you that Lee Child t-shirt! LOL

    By the way, lots of big names teaching at Craftfest this year, including Ken Follett, Steve Berry, DP Lyle, William Bernhardt, Allison Brennan, Andrew Gross, David Morrell, Hallie Ephron, Michael Palmer, and Gayle Linds. I'll take lots of notes, and all my clients will benefit!

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  9. LJ, Did JK Rowling recently self-publish her Harry Potter books? After making huge bucks with large publishers?! If so, that really is revolutionary!

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  10. Even with low prices and special offers, it's still an uphill battle finding those niche (romantic suspense/mystery) readers who are willing to take a chance on a relatively unknown author. I've had 7 books published with traditional publishers, but they're all small press/limited distribution.

    I've run a buy 1 get 1 free promotion, and even that hasn't created the spike in sales I'd hoped for. But I have definitely made more money selling my back list titles at prices ranging from 99 cents to $2.99 that I'm making on the books, both e and print combined where the publisher has control.

    (And I think Barry Eisler is actually going with Amazon's new mystery imprint rather than strictly 'self publishing' although I could be mistaken)

    Terry
    Terry's Place
    Romance with a Twist--of Mystery

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  11. Good point about JK Rowling, LJ, and if arguably the world's most successful modern author chooses to self-publish, that's a pretty clear indicator of the current state of publishing, even if she's only doing it electronically.

    I hadn't seen the news that Eisler signed with Amazon Encore, but I'm sure as Amazon gets their genre imprints up and running, he undoubtedly won't be the last big name to sign.

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  12. Terry, I know exactly what you're saying as far as promotion is concerned. I've only had one book released, and I've tried various different promotion/marketing strategies with no idea what might work. I guess the best bet is just to keep writing the best books possible and see what happens...

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  13. Jodie, I was there in 2007, and got to attend various authors Craftfest presentations, and they were all very cool. I saw David Morrell, Barry Eisler, and about a half-dozen other authors. I took something valuable out of every one of them...not to mention getting some books signed by some of my favorite thriller authors...

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  14. Al, any of the 'big guys' will tell you the best marketing tool is to write another good book. Which is hard to do if you have to spend a lot of time marketing!

    Terry
    Terry's Place
    Romance with a Twist--of Mystery

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  15. Jodie, Rowling is only offering e-versions of her books through her Pottermore.com website.

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