As many of my readers already know, I’m a big fan of audiobooks. It’s been the fastest-growing segment of the book market for a while now, and I’ve fully committed to producing audio versions of all my books. Bearing those facts in mind, it’s not hard to imagine that I was pretty excited to see this a few days ago:
In short, I crossed the 15K mark in terms of audiobooks sold. (Woo-hoo!!!) This comes a little over a year after reaching the threshold of 10K audiobooks sold.
Part of the reason I’m so excited about this milestone is because it’s fairly difficult to market audiobooks. Unlike ebooks, authors generally don’t control the price of audio titles, so being able to schedule things like discount sales is out of the question. Moreover, there just aren’t a lot of viable options out there. By way of example, I recently tried an audiobook promo with a well-regarded book promotion platform that had just begun audio marketing. The results were far less than stellar, and I was incredibly disappointed with the promo for a number of reasons. To their credit, however, the vendor gave me a full refund and has continued to tweak this area of promotion in an effort to improve. Long story short, I’d be willing to try them again, but this anecdote simply underscores how difficult it can be to sell audiobooks.
That said, I’m blessed in that listeners seem to find my work enjoyable and support my efforts in the realm of audio, as evidenced by the fact that my latest audiobook, Incarnation (Kid Sensation #7), did extremely well almost immediately upon release:
Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,169 in Audible Books & Originals (See Top 100 in Audible Books & Originals)
#2 in Superhero Fantasy
#21 in Superhero Science Fiction
#50 in Science Fiction Adventures (Books)
And while I’m on the subject, I should mention that I have the best readers and listeners in the world. Although most prefer either one format or the other when it comes to books (i.e., ebooks or audio), many of them will buy both just to support me. There are no words for how that makes me feel – and all they ask in return is that I keep doing something I love: write more books. (However, just to show I’m not simply resting on my laurels, I have continued to look for ways to market audio, such as recently uploading a bunch of samples to Soundcloud.)
All in all, I’m very pleased to have reached this threshold with my audio titles and hope that I can continue to improve on this level of success. For anyone who hasn’t tried audiobooks, you can get a 30-day free trial (as well as a free copy of one of my audio titles) by clicking on the desired audiobook here. (And if you like my work, please consider following me on Amazon, BookBub, Goodreads and Twitter.)
Already got my copy! Loving it 🙂 when will book 8 likely be released?
Glad you’re enjoying my work. As to Book 8, I’d hoped to have it done by now but anticipate finishing it in November. When it actually gets released depends on other factors (like how quickly my editor can get to it). Likewise, the audiobook depends on how fast my narrator can get to it. In short, it’s a little difficult to predict, but if I get very, very lucky maybe the book can get released in December and the audiobook in January.
Any update on Book 8? I’ve ran dry on reading material that catches my interest.
Nothing new, really. I still anticipate finishing it in November. Hmmm… I do have an excerpt I was thinking about posting, but it’s actually from Book 9. (Yeah, I’ve already started that one.) Maybe I’ll post that to give an idea of what’s coming.
Hows the next boock coming along?
It’s coming, but at a slower pace than anticipated. Still, if all goes as planned, I’ll get two books finished in the next month.