We’re coming down to the cusp of the year. Between the solstice and the new year, I try to look backward to see what happened and to look forward to see what the new year might offer.
I’ve written about some of my personal milestones in the last year—Smarter Artists, the Nebula Awards, becoming the CFO for the Science-Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America—but the market has had a few shake-ups.
1. Social media shifts. The recent news about Facebook’s apparent engagement in waging their own propaganda war has made people leery about participating in their space. It remains to be seen if some other platform can take its place. In a similar fashion, Google recently announced that it’s shuttering Google+ in August, causing a tsunami of G+ refugees onto the beaches of WeMe and PlusPora and Mastodon. This will be an interesting place to watch, especially if the Facebook monolith starts to fragment further than it already has. Looking into next year, I’m planning to stay agile in this space—consolidating my blogs, staying on Twitter and Facebook, looking for other platforms to replace my G+ presence.
2. Amazon. The last year has seen one thing after another tarnishing the already rusted surface. From the bots and stuffers scamming Kindle Unlimited to the bestseller blow-ups, Amazon has dealt with bad decisions all year. The most recent issues have to do with their efforts to shutter CreateSpace (their print-on-demand arm) and fold that business into KDP. To say that this effort hasn’t gone smoothly is an understatement. Then there’s the issue about ebooks not appearing in foreign stores because somewhere along the line—perhaps in conjunction with the CreateSpace integration—it appears that people got assigned to stores that don’t actually serve their region of the world. My expectation is that Amazon will continue to muck about trying to play whack-a-mole on problems, at least a few of which it creates for itself. They’re still going to be the six-million-pound gorilla, but the door is open a crack if Kobo can get its act together.
3. Audiobooks. Sometime in the last half of 2018, Pew Research discovered that audiobook adoption has reached the magical tipping point. In technical terms, that means that more than about 16% of people who read count audiobooks as one of their accepted forms. The direct result of that implies that audiobooks—already showing a remarkable sales rate in terms of percentage of market growth from year to year—are poised to explode in terms of raw numbers of people who will be sticking books in their ears in the coming year. Expect to see the percentage changes grow for a while but then slow as the adoption curve reaches closer and closer to the peak. The raw numbers will still be climbing as lots of late mid-market adopters jump on the bandwagon. I’d see this as one of the big stories going forward. New players are coming into the space to try to challenge Audible’s domination. Findaway Voices aims to give indies an alternative to the ACX funnel into the Audible ecosystem and should be a service to watch in the coming year.
What about you? What changes did you notice and what are you watching for 2019?
I’m looking for new online sites that are totally focused on books and readers. Goodreads is working okay for me, and I’m also exploring Library Thing. I’m on Facebook and Twitter but I don’t spend a lot of time there. From my point of view, the best way to communicate with readers is through a website and blog, using the social media sites to promote the blog. What might 2019 bring? Hopefully a great new social media site for book readers–one that’s not controlled by one of the media giants.
I agree, Pat. It seems like the key is consistency and fighting the urge to be everywhere there might be a reader.
Indies don’t need to sell 100,000 books a year – although it would be nice. There are more than enough readers on just one platform to support an indie.
Well gosh darn! & here I am about to put my novel up on Amazon!
Amazon is the Big Kahuna. Just remember that Amazon can help sell your book but it’s up to you to send your audience to find it.
I’ve had a couple of people ask “So no Amazon?”
Answer: Amazon is still the only viable market for self published works. Some authors have found traction on Kobo and iBooks. Neither Google nor Nook look to be in play in any significant way. KU represents around 50% of my revenue – a level I can’t match by going wide.
From my personal experience, I’m exclusive with Amazon because that’s the path that makes the most sense to me.
Hello, Nathan.
Great piece! My own experience of uploading my book to KDP this month echoes your dire prediction of Amazon’s “wack-a-mole” approach to problem solving. It’s a shame that CreateSpace is gone. Your point about Audiobooks is very interesting. I attended a audiobook seminar with RMFW last October, “Demystifying Audiobook Production,” and I loved Sandra Murphy’s presentation. It left me with a long “to do” list if I want to open this channel. I’m a new writer don’t feel ready to handle that investment yet, but I’m very excited to add it later on. I notice you have quite a few audiobooks on Amazon. Did you narrate them? What services Podium Publishing provide? How would you rate them?
Thanks for sharing!
Mark
While I started out doing my own narrations, sadly I was unable to use those early works without re-reading them. I was short-sighted in that I used theme music that I did not have commercial rights for. When I was giving the audio away in podcast form, that was fine. Sellilng the audio is a completely other matter and I neglected to keep the raw narration files. Lesson learned, I guess.
Podium is an audiobook publisher. I send them the manuscript and a complementary copy of the cover and they do everything else. Just like any text-based publisher, I have zero say in who gets tapped to read, what kind of covers they use, or what their promotion and sales practices are. I get a royalty payment from them quarterly. I’ve made them a lot of money. I just sent them the 9th title, completing my contract requirement with them.
In fairness, I never expected their contribution to my revenue stream would be much more than rounding error. They’ve exceeded that expectation. It’s still a tiny fraction of my ebook revenues but they actually out-perform paper – 8% for audio, 5% for paper. They’ve come a long way since I signed with them in 2015 in terms of author liaison and communications. Their audio quality is top notch and they get nominated for audiobook awards regularly. They even win a few.
If they approach you, definitely give them consideration. As a turn-key operation, they’re a good company to work with. Just remember they’re a publisher and they’re licensing your work to produce and distribute the audio the way they see fit. I signed with them in 2015 to get my main franchise into the audiobook market. It was a test of the market and an attempt to find new readers for my books.
The test was successful but not in the way I anticipated. There is almost no cross over between the audio and text versions of my work. While there’s a little, what I find is that people who listen are willing to wait for the audio production to catch up with the ebook. The numbers of audio fans are still small, but it’s poised to explode in the next couple of years.
Because I’m expecting a massive expansion in raw numbers as the adoption rate tapers off, I’ve hired a production company to produce some of my back list titles that Podium didn’t want. Having started in audio, I know what I want and with an established fan base that’s expanding into audio at a rapid pace. I’m choosing to embrace the self-pub ethos by investing in new product development that I can publish under my own imprint and keep more of the revenues.
It’s incrementally expensive but on a par with text production. I budget $3500 per title for my text-based products and make that back within a few days. The audio is another $3000 per title on top of that and I’m judging that it might take me as much as four months to break even. Science fiction and fantasy are pretty evergreen, so I’m not worried about the break-even point right now. As more and more people join the audio movement, those will all be people who haven’t heard of my books and the revenue stream – while relatively small – should be relatively steady going forward.
I’ve got a three book series in production now, and I’ll see how that works before I commit to the next series.
Wow! Thanks for your quick and very detailed response on your ventures in audio book publishing. I remember Sandra Murphy saying that science fiction was the fastest growing segment in the audio book market. Add that to the evergreen aspect of this genre and we should have a winner. Thank you again for taking the time to share your trials and successes!