As the author of 9 self-published books, including a few Amazon bestsellers, I think self-publishing is a fun and rewarding side hustle.
The lightbulb moment for me came early on. I’d published my first book (on how to hire and work with virtual assistants), and I expected to sell a few copies through my website, which I tracked with my Amazon affiliate link.
The surprising thing was almost none of the sales came through my site; instead they came organically through Amazon. Even though my first author royalty check was less than $50, I was excited. I’m a professional author! Someone (several people) bought my book!
Since then I’ve published more titles and learned more about the writing, editing, and marketing process. One of my book projects generated 20,000 free downloads in its first week and went on to earn passive royalties for over a year.
More recently, I launched a new book at $0.99 and it became a bestseller on its first day, and netted $2600 in its first month.
If you’d like to learn more about my book launch process, especially for non-fiction authors without a huge platform, check this link for a special offer on my Udemy course that walks you through the whole process start-to-finish.
For my latest book project, I had this wonderful idea that if I could get someone else to do the writing, I could get it to market faster. I was super busy and eager to expand my self-publishing efforts. The Idea You may have heard the stories of successful Kindle authors who actually use ghostwriters … Read more
Everyone knows Amazon’s self-publishing platform is the place to be for indie authors. That’s not news. I mean, where else can you instantly get shelf space in the world’s largest bookstore, and reach a network of millions of Kindle owners, all for free? To be sure, if you’re not on Amazon, you’re definitely missing out … Read more
I love the idea of having something for sale in an established marketplace, and I think there’s no better example of that than Amazon. If you don’t have a book for sale on Amazon you’re missing out on a huge audience of buyers. You might not make a fortune, but self publishing is a viable … Read more
During the month of March, I set a goal to write everyday — at least 500 words. The reason behind this is that increasingly: “Content is the currency of online business.” <– tweet this! And content takes time and work to produce. I’m not an amazingly fast writer. In fact I’m actually pretty slow. I … Read more