
Authority Case Studies: $30k in sales from first-time authors - kanamekun
http://nathanbarry.com/authority-case-studies/
======
rainl
I've bought some of the books mentioned in the article, and many more which
have been marketed with similar tactics, and have generally been disappointed
with my purchases.

They are often the authors first book, heavy on the white space, with large
fonts and so on, haphazardly organized, and night and day from something like
a Pragmatic Programmers title.

I'm as susceptible as anyone to the copywriting strategy of "this book will
solve your particular problem and, if you save even an hour, it pays for
itself" but too many launches of this type have soured me on self published
business and technical books unless there is absolutely no other place to get
the information.

As a rule of thumb, if someone is selling a book in multiple "packages" , to
me its an indicator that the quality will be poor and I will regret the time
wasted reading it.

~~~
joelhooks
I've had a significantly different experience, and have directly benefited
professionally from Nathan's books, a couple in the list, and several others
of this nature.

~~~
TBInman
Seconded

------
programminggeek
There are two awesome takeaways from this article. One, it is really smart
that Nathan is showcasing his customer's results, because it makes it easier
to sell the product if you can point to success other people had with it. We
all love to tell ourselves the story that if they can do it, I can do it.

Two, if you look at some of the specific tactics like landing page, launch
list, preordering, leveraging other people's audiences to sell your product,
etc. and put them together all in the same campaign, you are much more likely
to do well than if you do just one or two of those tactics.

I always like to read/listen for the little nuances that sometimes creep
through articles like this in-between the lines. Some of the best little
nuggets of wisdom are hidden in plain sight and never made a big deal of.

------
mcone
I have no experience with self publishing, but as an author with No Starch
Press
([http://nostarch.com/masteryourmac](http://nostarch.com/masteryourmac)), I
can tell you that publishers probably put more work into the books than the
authors themselves.

Publishers hire people to design the cover, copy edit the manuscript, provide
a tech review, lay out the book, and market it. The amount of work that goes
into a traditional book is astounding, so it doesn't surprise me that some
people here are complaining about the quality of self-published books. In my
opinion, the logistics are simply too much for one person to handle.

And let's be honest here. The real work of an author should be to write.
Should they really have to worry about marketing, layout, and copy editing? I
think not.

I'll go with a traditional publisher again. My book looks beautiful, reads
well, and is on the shelf at the local Barnes and Noble. Sure, I don't get all
of the revenue, but I do have a wider audience and steady passive income.

~~~
petercooper
_but as an author with No Starch Press
([http://nostarch.com/masteryourmac](http://nostarch.com/masteryourmac)), I
can tell you that publishers probably put more work into the books than the
authors themselves._

Believe me, this is because you're an author with perhaps the best tech
publisher out there (Pragmatic Bookshelf being another, and then O'Reilly and
Addison Wesley probably as the best 'big' ones).

 _Most_ tech publishers simply try as rapidly and cheaply as they can to get
as many books out into the market as possible whether that means cutting
corners, screwing over authors, or whatever.

No Starch (to whom I have no real connection other than being a fan of their
books) was founded by someone with a desire to publish high quality geek-
oriented books and who is still heavily involved in this process. This is also
certainly true for the Prags, and slightly less so for O'Reilly (I don't think
Tim is heavily involved in editorial now but he's still a huge and active
figure), but don't believe the glut of tech publishers out there are like
this! :-)

All that said, you are broadly right. It is better if a publisher can do what
they do best and authors do what they do best, rather than authors try and do
everything. It's like an entrepreneur doing their own legal and accounts. But
on the flip side I'd say self publishing still beats going with a _crappy_
publisher.

------
zrail
My book is one of the case studies (Mastering Modern Payments). If anyone has
any questions fire away!

~~~
onion2k
$15,000 from 150 hours work is very good, especially as (presumably) you
learnt a great deal from the process and established yourself as a domain
expert at the same time. That's brilliant. I don't have a question, just
congratulations.

~~~
patio11
Somewhat surprisingly to me before I did it: _if you control the marketing
/sales channel_, then it is rather substantially a better deal that you might
think it is after the launch window. The reason is that the book remains in
the market after being written (like a software product and unlike, say, a
consulting gig), and you can structure your affairs such that people are
routinely exposed to it and you get decent residual income from it.

e.g. From my video course that launched last September-ish:

[http://images1.bingocardcreator.com/blog-images/hn/power-
of-...](http://images1.bingocardcreator.com/blog-images/hn/power-of-
residuals.png)

My ballpark estimate for total sales was in the $20k to $40k region, which I
would have allocated 95%+ to the initial launch window. Surprise x2: a) I
underestimated how much it would sell and b) I greatly underestimated the
residual value of the project.

(Incidentally: The long-term marketing/sales channels are partially ranking #1
for [lifecycle emails], a subject of interest to many marketers which
_honestly_ I should not be #1 on the Internet for, and also having a brief in-
text commercial in one of the emails that people get a few weeks after they
sign up for my email list. Most of y'all can execute on these, particularly
the autoresponders for new signups for the email list.)

~~~
pchristensen
Looks like you're #1 _and_ #2 for [lifecycle emails]

------
davidw
It seems that there are a lot of books being sold directly these days. For
some reason, I'm a bit ambivalent about that, although I can't quite explain
why. Perhaps it's convenience? No wishlist, no one click from Amazon to my
Kindle? Perhaps it's the lack of exposure to reviews on Amazon or other sites?

It's certainly good for the authors, as they get to keep pretty much
everything from the sale, whereas with Amazon, at best, they're going to get
about 70%.

For whatever reason that I find difficult to spell out, though, it also means
I'm more reticent to buy these sorts of books.

~~~
graeme
I'm one of the authors. I do print books, so I'm not direct only. But I can
tell you why a lot of authors avoid kindle: If you price above $9.99, you do
not get 70%, you get 35%.

Kindle formatting is also very hard to get right. Very often the top negative
review of an excellent print book is "GGGGRRRRR, the kindle format is UUGGGGLY
and doesn't work!!!!!!!?!?!?!"

Not the kind of publicity you want. If you're pricing on value, better just to
avoid it.

~~~
mathattack
Thank you for the comment. I was just wondering... "70% seems high, does
anyone have first hand experience?"

~~~
davidw
Amazon's KDP pricing is like this: between $3 and $10, you get 70%. Otherwise,
you get %35.

I'll also add: Nathan seems like a good guy. I met him at MicroConf Europe,
and he came across as knowing his stuff. I'd probably buy a book from him.

But what if everyone sells their own books on their own site? Things could get
chaotic really quickly.

I guess time will tell...

------
clarky07
I haven't read Authority yet, but it is on my to do list. I did do most of
what they suggested in this article though for my book[1] except one thing.
That is price it high and do multiple packages. I think my biggest mistake was
having Amazon as an option because that limits me to selling for $9.99. It
hasn't been a total failure, but it hasn't made the ~5k these examples did,
and I'm pretty sure pricing is the biggest reason why. I suspect most of the
people who bought it at $9.99 would have also paid a higher price, especially
with additional resources in a package.

[1][http://buildanappbusiness.com/](http://buildanappbusiness.com/)

------
acoleman616
I'm in the process of writing a book right now
([http://yourfirstwebapp.com](http://yourfirstwebapp.com)) with the help of
Nathan's Authority, and I can say that his book is jam-packed with useful
info. It's been particularly beneficial in helping me develop a cohesive
plan/strategy to plan, write, and market my book.

------
nerdnorth
Biggest takeway for me: _look at the effect unit price has on revenue_

Just doing a quick analysis of the first two:
[http://d.pr/i/hhne](http://d.pr/i/hhne)

Having higher price-points dramatically increases total earnings.

~~~
wikwocket
I think this is an excellent point. A related trend I see is in kickstarters.
If you look at many of the big successes, they have pledge levels closer to
$50-100 than to $15-20. For example in the board games category, many card
games will raise $10-20k, but games with miniatures usually have higher pledge
levels, and raise more like $80k-100k.

I am not sure if the actual lesson is, "charge more," or "sell to people who
are willing to pay more," but I think both of these are valid pieces of
advice.

------
TBInman
All interesting and useful stuff. I would be interested to talk to some of
those that enlisted outside help in getting the final finished product
together about their experiences (particularly those of using elance etc for
these kind of services).

What's great about Authority is that it essentially validates itself the more
and more popular it gets.

------
pushingsocial
Reminded again about the value of creating relationships with top influencers
in a niche.

Writing a book and publishing it doesn't guarantee success, but having a
network of influencers review and recommend is the closest thing you can get
to a sure bet.

------
nathanbarry
I'm late to the comments (been traveling all day), but I just wanted to add a
huge congratulations to each author in the case studies. They worked hard and
the success is well deserved!

------
dmak
I'm glad everyone's doing well with Authority!

