I've read a lot of blog posts and articles recently about why and how readers buy ebooks. Many pundits claim that Amazon is so full of self-published drivel that readers have no clue what to buy. I want to add to this debate by analyzing a couple of my recent Indie ebook purchases.
First, at the risk of losing you, go read this excellent post. Please come back. 🙂 One of the most interesting points in there is how does a reader know a book is self-published?
They rarely do. As writers, we think like authors and self-publishing business people, which means we analyze Amazon listings objectively. Readers do not, they react emotionally to a name, a title, a cover image or a sentence in the blurb. Often the only pointers are: The book is only available in ebook, the low price, and that it might list Smashwords or similar entity as the publisher.
So let's look at two of my recent purchases. The books and authors shall remain nameless, but neither are well known.
1. An author happened to follow me on Twitter. I liked their profile so followed them back. Their profile mentioned their major book. I saw them tweet about it a couple of times. (Just a couple.) Fast forward a month to where I saw someone review it on Goodreads. I checked it out on Amazon. Mixed reviews, not a bestseller by any means. Fast forward another month, when I saw someone else tweeting about it. I returned to Amazon, read the blurb more attentively and bought it for $2.99.
What does this tell us? First off, that sales cycles take a long time. Most sales people learn this day one – that it takes 5 touchpoints to sell something. Second, all sightings on social media and the web carry weight. You never know what is going to tip a reader over the edge. This is a long-haul game. Play every card and every angle, and you will gain an audience, one reader at a time.
2. I read a great book on Amazon by an author that I have in paperback. I've learned to pay attention to Amazon's recommendation widget since it has given me good results. It recommended a book whose title grabbed me. I checked it out and bought it for $2.99. It was only much later, after I had enjoyed the book, that I realized that it was self published. So what. His next book is on my to-read list.
I bet most readers are influenced by Amazon, and as the blog post above says, tools like this make it easy to find books. I didn't know or care that it was self-published. In hindsight I should have guessed from the price, but I firmly believe readers don't look at it that way. Something attracts them (the cover, the blurb, the title) and THEN they look at the price. Whee, you can't go wrong at that price, they think.
This is probably typical of how I, a writer, buy ebooks, so why should I think that readers are any more sensitive to self-publishing than I am. Readers only care about a good story. They couldn't name a publisher on any paperback or hardback that they own. I think authors are projecting their own fears onto readers.
What do you think? What makes you buy an Indie book?