Indie Authors - Don't Let the Amazon Returns Scare You

Keep in mind that there are an overwhelming amount of readers who wholeheartedly support authors. They far outweigh the few misguided souls.

When I first started publishing on Amazon, I totally freaked out when someone returned one of my books. It was shocking, it was embarrassing, and it... hurt. I felt sad that someone hated my work so much the person felt the need to return it - even when it was free. 

Now that I have been doing this for five months, I've come to realize a few things and don't allow returns to mess with my head or my writing. The fact is people have different reasons for returning an eBook.

There are legitimate reasons:

• They didn't mean to buy it.
• The formatting of the book was bad and made it unreadable.
• There were so many errors in the writing that it detracted from the story.

I also know (having read some of Amazon discussion boards) there are a few misguided Kindle users out there. Some readers do not understand if they read the book, they are expected to pay for it.

Unreasonable returns:

• A few readers think it's a library. (I've had people buy an entire series and then returned each and every one.) They enjoyed my work, but they had no qualms about returning it.
• Some think they can return a book if they don't like the ending or one of the characters.
• Others don't take the time to read the description or check out the sample and end up buying a book they don't really care for.

Reasonable or not, I believe authors should watch the returns to see if a book has real problems. Normally, I experience between 1-5% returns on all of my books. However, there have been months where some of my books saw 10-20% returns and it upset me wondering what was wrong (especially when no one left a negative review). Funny thing is the following month those same books had only a few returns. So, there may not be any rhyme or reason to the returns but it is worth going back over your story to make sure there aren't any serious issues.

What time has taught me:

Amazon allows for eBook returns, so there will be people who abuse it. As a writer, there is nothing you can do. Amazon currently has the greatest number of readers so even taking into account the loss of sales, you will still see more success there than on any other site.

May Numbers for Red Phoenix on Amazon

Oh wow, what a month May has been for this indie author! I noticed at the end of April that my book, Brie Learns to Obey, was rising in the ranks even though it had just been released. I had no idea then how well she would do in the month of May. So well, in fact, that I ended up continuing that series and putting my other projects to the wayside.

Brie's success on Amazon means that people are starting to look at my other work.  All of my books have done better this month than previous months. The month of May has been a joy ride. Whoop!

For the Month of May 2012:

6,079 books purchased (Keep in mind that I get .35 for every book sold)
71,212 freebies downloaded

Best Sellers for the Month of May: (Numbers not as laughable as the past few months.)

Paid - Brie Learns to Obey 2458, Brie Learns Her Power as a Submissive 1448 and Blissfully in Love 498
Freebies - Deeper Baby! 18158, Brie's First Day of Submissive Training 16983 and Blissfully Snowbound 11098

* For the month of May I added two books on Amazon and no additional books went FREE.


Quick Recap of Past Months:

Starting to rise

April:

878 books purchased         

29,879 freebies downloaded 

March:

693 books purchased
27,571 freebies downloaded 

February:

298 books purchased         

12,386 freebies downloaded 

What I am Learning:

You need to keep the momentum going once a series gets popular. Brie Lives Her Fantasy was just published May 30 and is doing impressively well in that short amount of time. I plan to publish the next Brie book by the end of the month. Doable if I work hard.

Part of my success is due to the popularity of Fifty Shades of Grey. I know this for a fact because I have fans on Facebook who have said as much. I am a lucky author because of timing.

There are small time "publishers" who will try to cash in on your indie success. Unless they can do more for you than you are doing now, my advice is to avoid them. They will just slow down the process and take 50% of what you make. (That is not to say there aren't reputable small publication companies out there, I just haven't been approached by any.)

I will update you next month to see how June pans out. You may or may not experience the same success, but there is no reason not to try if your heart is set on writing. 

Right now, I am one blown away indie author.  A big hug to all my readers!

April Numbers for Red Phoenix on Amazon

#6 Top Free Erotica

This has been a fun month as an indie author. I've seen one of my freebies, Deeper Baby!, make it to number 6 on the free erotica list (several others are in the Top 100). I also received a number of good reviews on Amazon this month, which is helping all of my books. 

For the Month of April 2012:

878 books purchased         

29,879 freebies downloaded

Best Sellers In the Month of April: (still asking you not to laugh at my numbers)

Paid -Boy Toys 104 with a tie for Amy's Choice 97 and Blissfully in Love 97
Freebies - Deeper Baby! 11,551, Thrilling Her 7301, Blissfully Snowbound 3131

During the month of April I added 3 new novelettes and 4 more of my books went FREE on Amazon (of the 22 titles I have on Amazon, 10 are free).

Quickly Moving Up

Quick Recap of Past Months:

March:
693 books purchased
27,571 freebies downloaded 

February:

298 books purchased         

12,386 freebies downloaded

What I am Learning:

• Keep the books coming. I have seen the numbers of my older books steadily go down. However, I believe the new ones are getting more notice because people recognize the name. (Brie Learns to Obey was recently published on Amazon and is quickly jumping up the ranks of paid novels.)
• You never know what will appeal to people. Books I thought would be a big hit fell flat, while others surprised me by their popularity.
• Listen to the readers and hone your work based on how they purchase and what they say in their reviews. HOWEVER, be true to yourself. The beauty as an indie eBook author is that you can write and publish what you want, even if it doesn't make big bucks. Someone out there will appreciate the uniqueness of your story and sometimes that is all the success you need.

* Note: Amazon allows for returns of eBooks. They are the only online bookstore I know of that does this. I noticed a big difference this month. Boy Toys which has done well previous months had 13 returns versus 4 in March. (Same book and I even had more sells last month). I will never know why they were returned - no one left reviews, but it was a significant jump. In total, 58 paid books were returned in April as opposed to 12 in March.  

I will update you next month to see how May pans out. I will say this, if your heart is to have your work published this is the perfect time for Indie Authors. It's a ton of fun!

March Numbers on Amazon for Red Phoenix

Most Downloaded

March Totals on Amazon

Since I publish directly to Amazon, I am given constant updates about numbers concerning my books. This can be a good & bad thing (see post Indie Author Addicted to Checking Unit Sales/Downloads). But when you want to get an idea about how many people have been reading your work for the month, it can be a lot of fun. :)

For the Month of March 2012:

693 books purchased
27,571 freebies downloaded

As an indie author, I can't tell you how exciting that is. :) People are reading work by Red Phoenix - Whoo Hoo!

Best Sellers In the Month of March: (don't laugh at my numbers!)

• Boy Toys was the biggest seller of my paid books at a total of 135, followed by Amy's Choice at 81
• Thrilling Her is the largest download (made top 15 of erotica for a brief amount of time) at 7756

Biggest Seller

Quick recap from the last month:

298 books purchased         

12,386 freebies downloaded

* I added 2 new novelettes in the month of March, for a total of 15 purchased and 2200 in downloads. Also, 2 more books from the Sensual Erotica series became freebies during the month at a total of 13,500 in downloads. When you factor those things in, sales increased over 50%, but downloads decreased slightly.

I'm curious to see what April brings. Will sales continue to increase or will it start to dwindle as new books flood the market?

I'll keep you posted, just in case you're thinking of jumping into the self-publishing arena. :)