Amazon Bargain
My novel BMOC is now $0.99 at Amazon. With my second book coming out sometime soon (I hope) I thought I would experiment with online pricing models. I sold about 30 a month at the old price, but Glen Reynolds linked an article praising the 99-cent Kindle price point. So what the heck, let's try it. My loss is your gain, as the ads say.
Reasons you might like the novel:
- It's a sort of combination of Harvard Business School case study and murder mystery, with some humor thrown in
- The business at the center of the novel is actually the good guy (err gal, I guess, since the protagonist is female). While sympathetic to capitalism, the book is primarily a light crime novel, not some sort of Randian morality tale.
- The villains include a media mogul, a tort lawyer, a local news anchor, and a US Senator -- just like life!
- Several of the business models were made up on the fly when I attended boring cocktail parties and entertained myself creating whimsical businesses for myself. Since that time, readers of the book have emailed me with news stories of recent startup companies following almost identical strategies.
- 4-stars at Amazon
EAS:
I should have waited :) I bought BMOC over Christmas at its previous price and thought it was a brisk, funny, well-plotted read. Definite bargain at 99c!
March 10, 2011, 2:24 pmTJIC:
Agreed - this is a definite buy at 99 cents.
Go buy it, folks!
March 10, 2011, 2:32 pmChris:
BMOC is a great book. And the business model at the center of the story is one that had crossed my mind as well.
March 10, 2011, 2:41 pmDan Smith:
Do you plan to e-publish on other platforms, such as Pub-It, which handles ebooks for the Sony E reader format? You might consider doing that, because it will get you even wider distribution than Kindle. It requires different formatting, but you already have a cover.
March 10, 2011, 3:09 pmjoe:
it's still showing as 2.99 on amazon, is there a secret code at checkout?
$1 books is a great pricepoint, I'd buy almost any potentially interesting book for a dollar, without the guilt that if it turns out to be crappy that I'm stuck forever with a crappy paper book, just delete it from the kindle.
March 10, 2011, 3:15 pmCaroline:
@Joe
March 10, 2011, 3:41 pmI just bought it. I had no trouble. Try searching BMOC Meyer. The .99 price popped up automatically.
Dan:
I have the environment killing, tree hating version of the book and loved it. I think I will buy this one as well just to show some support. Then I will read it while sitting next to a mall fountain in your honor.
I have a nook though so I will have to crack the DRM and commit a crime to read it the way I want. Don't worry though. I respect IP so it will stay with me regardless of what DRM is there.
March 10, 2011, 5:17 pmAndrew:
Grabbed it :-)
March 10, 2011, 6:18 pmMark Sundstrom:
Thanks -- just made the purchase and look forward to reading it.
March 10, 2011, 6:22 pmDJB:
I purchased and read the paperback a while ago and have been meaning to reread it, however since buying and using kindle I cant stand paper books anymore. This has provided me the incentive to buy and reread on kindle. Thanks, I am looking forward to the next book.
March 10, 2011, 7:14 pmKirk:
Since I really enjoy your blog, I thought I'd buy it. I stopped, however, when I was presented with a price of $2.99 instead of $0.99.
I assume this is because I am sitting in Norway. I confirmed that by updating my location in the settings and the price fell to $0.99.
This false geographical segmentation really gets on my nerves and there are plenty of things I've tried to buy on the Internet that I can't because I live in Norway. As a U.S. citizen this feels a bit unfair personally, but it is also unfair to the vast majority of the world.
I have always hoped that the Internet would break these geographical barriers. Although many things have improved through the years, the trend seems to have turned the other way with the discovery of geo-location.
The obvious result in many cases is that one just downloads without paying (which I will not do in this case, of course).
Maybe I'll read it if I remember to buy it sometime when I'm in the States. No way Amazon is getting $2 from me for what is essentially free for them.
March 11, 2011, 1:52 amLowcountryJoe:
Why did you forget to include the mobsters and hookers in the description above?
March 11, 2011, 4:36 amaeronathan:
Is there any way for you to get your novel listed in ebook form with Barne's & Noble for those of us on the Nook bandwagon? :)
March 11, 2011, 6:45 amalex:
Sold!
March 11, 2011, 7:02 amJoseph K:
I'm the same as the other commenters. At 99 cents, it's a steal. I read Glen Reynolds story and had the same reaction, since I'm also going to be publishing something on Amazon's kindle store as soon as I finalize it. I was originally thinking like $7.99 would be a good price point, since that's in line with most kindle books. Then I read on Techdirt about authors making very good livings on books sold for under $2.99 (http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110302/01504713321/more-authors-realizing-they-can-make-damn-good-living-self-releasing-super-cheap-ebooks.shtml), and I was thinking I'd put it up for $2.99. Then reading Glen Reynolds, I'm thinking, it should definitely be at 99 cents. I'm like you, I don't need to make money off of this, so why not experiment with the price.
March 11, 2011, 7:58 amDon:
Nice object lesson in supply and demand economics Warren, let us know how your experiment goes.
Just told my wife to grab it with her Kindle account (which I and my daughter use via our Android tablets)
March 11, 2011, 9:16 amDon:
Smart-ass question of the day: can I get a signed copy for $1.99? ;^)
March 11, 2011, 9:17 ammahtso:
“My loss is your gain, as the ads say.” What loss?
As I read the Reynolds piece, that author was selling so many more books that he was making more money at the lower price. (He got about 30 or 35% of sales, but gross sales at the $0.99 price are more than gross sales at the higher price.)
I can’t help but compare to the Coyotes: now they have sky high ticket prices and very low attendance. I wonder if they could make more money by lowering prices thereby increasing attendance.
March 11, 2011, 9:18 amDan Smith:
I downloaded Kindle for PC and bought it. First few pages have me hooked. Nice work, Warren.
March 12, 2011, 8:50 amSol:
"He had her car in site" should be "sight".
March 12, 2011, 4:44 pm