How Much I Made Publishing My Books 📚

hello everybody and welcome to another publishing video here on the channel where we're going to be getting into the financial breakdowns for my first two self-published books breach of peace and Rebels Creed I do want to start this off by apologizing for not getting this video to you a little bit sooner I was originally planning on getting this out in 2022 but due to a mixture of anxiety and just being incredibly busy this video kind of just kept getting delayed and delayed to the point where it just kind of faded into the constant tension I

feel as someone who suffers from severe anxiety and I just forgot about it until I came across a Reddit post on the subreddit here for the channel where someone was asking when if it was going to get done and someone even responded maybe speculating that possibly my books just did so poorly that I didn't want to showcase it's kind of actually the opposite of that when I started the journey to try and put out these books I thought in my just naive estimate meant I would sell roughly as many copies as I had patrons it

made sense to me that okay if 1500-ish people which was about how many patrons I had in the time like the channel enough to support me by going the extra mile there I'll probably sell maybe a few hundred more copies than that that was really stupid to think and then the organic growth for the book also exceeded my expectations at getting several reviews here on YouTube from people who had mixed responses which I have appreciated the critical feedback and the positive it's been great and I've taken a lot of that to learn to do better

for my next book neon ghosts publication date coming soon and then it even started to take off in places like bookstagram and Tick Tock I even got a couple websites reviewing the book books and as the dollar amounts kept rising and Rising I was really afraid if I made this video it was going to come across like I was just bragging about how good my books did I I don't ever want to be one of those YouTubers who is like flexing his cash on people I find that to be tacky and disgusting but I also

am a very big believer in financial transparency in pretty much every industry in existence it allows people at all levels to better understand their own value and in addition to that the insights you get from looking at how much money I made where from my books also helps highlight just how bad the Amazon Titan grip on the self-publishing industry really is and so for those reasons I decided to finally get this done but if my tone seems a bit different it's because I am still very very nervous doing this but if I'm going to do

something that could be taken as kind of douchey let's go ahead and look the part black T-shirt check the chain check unnecessarily large secondary ring and now I need unnecessary YouTube Flair to grab your attention and make you think that I'm quirky and special I haven't put contacts in since I got my Lasik so let's see how this goes wash my hands first do I seem quirky yet relatable but in all seriousness though I do also need to say before we get into the units and then the actual cash thank you everyone who has supported

my authorial career it is actually a dream come true for me I grew up reading Tolkien Pullman Jordan Le Guin and now having a book that has sold well enough to be ranked on Amazon even at all was enough to make me cry when it happened I am going to be hustling to constantly be improving I'm incredibly proud of my first two books but I already know how much better I can do and I can't wait to prove that to you in my next book you all are why I'm able to do this and I

genuinely feel so much love tangentially coming off of that if you are someone who wants to self-publish a book please obviously I don't know why I feel the need to clarify this but just in case someone out there doesn't get it do not compare your initial sales numbers to mine I am coming from a place of extraordinary privilege within the self-publishing space having this platform to promote myself on and no one should feel bad for not matching my numbers the exact opposite that is normal that is fine I have an advantage that is just straight

up unfair over other Indie authors that's why I like to help promote them here on the channel whenever I get the chance I can't read oh my God but before we jump into the units and money a quick word from today's sponsor because this video is brought to you by campfire in my personal opinion if you are looking to write a Fantastical or sci-fi World there is no better writing tool to look into than campfire chock full of incredible features Taylor Made to help you as an author be able to organize your thoughts and get

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description down below and choose your own price but getting into the units sold so I actually sold the paperback versions of my book through a company called ingramspark I do not like them I think they are very rough when it comes to not only your ability to put your book together on their site as an author but their lack of tools available behind the scenes which is a video for a whole other day is severely disappointing and even their latest upgrade for their new reports I find to be substantially worse than their old reports which

were already bad but video for another day I'm sorry when it comes to exactly how many books I sold physical copies of between 2021 and 2022 the total comes to I really can't read right now 29 742 books so yeah my initial estimate of total across all mediums of it being available of only selling a couple thousand uh was blown out of the water thank you again so much now when it comes to ebooks I want you to specifically listen to these numbers unfortunately I can't give you every specific vendor due to a technical issue

happening on my side right now but I can give you the two biggest for me personally which would be of course Kindle and Google when it comes to my total ebook sold through KDP or Kindle Direct publishing which I have never been exclusive with as long as I've been on Kindle I've been on Google Books I sold 10 599 copies now when comparing that to the largest competitor in terms of how many I sold on Google I only sold 685 copies I think this might put in context why for other Indie authors who do not

have a platform to promote themselves on like me it becomes understandable why they end up signing up for Kindle exclusive and things along those lines because the larger percentages you get there for being exclusive absolutely smash the potential profit you could make by making your book even just available on any other competitors this this is why it's a problem and then for audible which I was exclusive on for both periods we're looking at 2021 and 2022 I no longer am my books are actually up for free here on my YouTube channel go ahead and check

them out if you'd like to I sold 1169 copies which I think is skewed a little bit higher than some people who self-published typically get in terms of percentages between the mediums and that is likely due to the fact that I spent extra money up front to get two of my favorite narrators of all time Michael Kramer and Kate reading which I'll use as an excuse to talk about the fact that yes hiring audiobook narrators art cover design editors total for the first two books came to a total of roughly ten thousand dollars for me

I wasn't able to find every single invoice but I think that was the budget I had importantly of note my next book neon ghosts will exclusively be on Audible and Kindle which absolutely sucks and is part of the reason why I pulled my first two books from being exclusively there it is due to the fact that my next book is not being self-published it is being Trad published and before this issue was brought to light I had already signed a contract I have tried to change it I have asked people but I would essentially be

screwing over small companies who again must have that larger split and higher percentage from Amazon for their business model to make sense and I feel bad trying to twist their arm getting to change it for up to me yes I would but I cannot ask people trying to run small businesses to do something that would financially impact them on that level I really hope you understand and just know that there will be a physical copy also available that will not benefit anybody except for those smaller businesses and myself but that brings us to the money

for the total in print sales that twenty nine thousand seven hundred and forty two books resulted in a total payday of 122 964 dollars far more money than I ever imagined I would make for my publishing career let alone just from my first two books in the first two years once you add in the Kindle Direct public publishing which came to a total of thirty one thousand five hundred and ninety nine the Google publishing which came to 2230 and the audiobook which came to a total of twenty one thousand seven hundred and ninety dollars I

received a payment of 178 583.77 now my ebook was available on a few other vendors aside from Kindle and Google which again I'm unable to get the analytics there right now due to a technical difficulty because they're through one Vin anyway I just added in an additional two grand because it was not much I have ever received from any of those platforms and I think I'm actually being a little bit generous for myself there might be a few hundred under that but that brings the total to 180 583.77 most of that money went for a

very generous down payment on my house I've always wanted to live in a town home and that is where a bulk of it went I genuinely couldn't keep the rings on that much longer I thought I might be a ring guy for a while but I just don't think it's for me so at the end of the day I am over over the moon with how my books have done as a whole and the Gratitude I feel towards my audience and the feedback I have gotten both critical and praising has been invaluable to me pulling

my first two books from being exclusively from audible means I shouldn't expect to see that audible number rise much more but I would just personally prefer you go to my YouTube channel where they're up for free with simply I think very minimal ad breaks and enjoy Michael Kramer and Kate reading's performances that I oh I'm so happy to have for my books the worst part was its skin at first Clyde thought the thing was wearing a baggy robe as her eyes focused it became clear those folds were flesh a line of spit dribbled from those

exposed teeth and as the demon realized it had been spotted it emitted a guttural hiss Unfortunately they just weren't the right fit for my next book so it's going to be a different narrator but I am equally thrilled with them but let me know what you think of me doing this the results the insights you're able to pull from especially in the industry level in the comments down below of course if you're interested in picking up my books I always have links down there as well and thank you campfire for the sponsoring Day's Video really

I cannot recommend that software enough if you're someone like me who has just a scatter brain approach to writing a book or if you like incessantly taking notes they kind of are adjusted to help both groups like And subscribe if you have not already hit the patreon I'm not really sure what else I'm supposed to say in this video so I'm going to go ahead and just say like And subscribe if you have not already hit the patreon if you like support what I do here another peace [Music]